Chapter 5: 20-23-15
I was utterly confused as to what I was seeing. I was sure, that I turned my console off before going off to work as I sit on my bed and grab my Gamepad, starting the game as I press the ZL and ZR buttons.
The screen zooms inside of Cap'n Cuttlefish's house, as I'm treated to my character waking up and letting out a yawn as he opens his eyes after having a good night's rest. I thought the game has returned to normal at this point, until I saw that Callie was missing. Her luggage and bags are still next to her bed, as I move my inkling to where Marie is, relieved that she at least was alive.
"Hey, Marie! Wake up!" I say to the microphone, and soon enough, the Squid Sister soon wakes up and looks at me with a tired look. "What do you want, Sam? Don't you see, that I'm trying to take a nap?" She groggily says, burying her face in her bed as I continue talking to her.
"Callie's missing, Marie! My chara-" I suddenly feel as though something begins choking me in real life, not letting me tell the truth to Marie through the microphone as she just rolls her eyes, and gets up from her bed.
"Alright, alright. Settle down, Sam. Callie must have woken up earlier than us, so don't worry, ok?" She begins walking out of the bedroom, as I hear my own voice come from my inkling, still having the same smile as he usually does. "Right, right! Sorry for waking you up so rudely, Marie." My inkling begins moving by himself as Marie goes to call for her cousin's name, only to be met with silence as she turns her head to the left and right.
"Callie!? Do you hear me!?" She calls for Callie again, and nothing responds back. Marie soon looks at my inkling, confusion on her expression as she places her hands on her sides.
"Where ever could Callie have gone to? She's making worried sick!" Marie calls for her cousin as loud as she can once more, before letting out a sigh and looking at my character.
"Maybe she's playing a game of hide and seek with you, Marie. Let's both look for her to make things more interesting, shall we?" He smiles as he perfectly imitates my voice, to which Marie nods at him with relief, oblivious to the fact the fact that she's talking to the one who splatted her cousin as she begins looking around the house.
Recommended Music: Undertale - Small Shock (GENOCIDE)
Then, a new objective appears: "Find Callie". Thank god, she was still alive, but little did I know that I would be proven wrong soon. My first clue as to where to find the Squid Sister was in the bathroom where my character splatted her, and I soon enter the same room, only to find... nothing. Everything seemed clear, no hints or signs of ink anywhere at all. Just crystal clear white tiles on the walls, and the stone ground below my character. "Didn't my character kill Callie here?" I thought to myself, before turning around and seeing Marie in front of me.
"I can't find her anywhere in the laundry or play area, Sam..." She mutters with a depressed tone, looking down as she sighs. I try speaking again, but just before I do so, the choking got worse as my character spoke to Marie again.
"Maybe she might be in the first floor?" He said, to which Marie's spirits are lifted up a bit as both she and my inkling went downstairs. The Squid Sister calls for her cousin again, only to be met with the same, silent response.
"You go look in the living room, and I'll go look in the kitchen and dining areas!" She runs to the left door and goes inside as my inkling just stands there at the bottom of the stairs, motionless until I move him to the living room. I open the door, and see Octavio and Cap'n Cuttlefish inside, watching some television together as the octarian leader ignores me.
"Hey, what are you two up to?" My inkling cuts me off me before I can tell Cuttlefish that my character splatted Callie, to which the inkling veteran looks at my character.
"Nothing much! Have you also seen the news about the missing inkling boys and girls, Sam?" He asks, pointing at the television as I notice the inklings that my character splatted yesterday are "MISSING", and any traces of them are gone. I just remained in silence, feeling nothing but regret for having been the one who splatted them. Just before I begin to talk to the microphone again, my character cuts me off again by talking over me first, as well as making me not being able to talk due to something strangling me as soon as he talks.
"What happened to them, Cuttlefish?" My inkling says with an emotionless voice, still retaining the same smile and not seeming to show any remorse or fear at all.
"Apparently, during some turf wars yesterday, one of them whippersnappers splatted them inklings, and they didn't respawn afterward like they usually did!" He looks at my inkling with worry, to which my character continues smiling as if nothing's wrong. Cuttlefish soon begins to look a bit worried after staring at my character, but soon shrugs it off, as he looks back at the television.
"Sam, since you're Agent 3, could you go do some Turf Wars, and see if you can find this inkling that..." He pauses for a moment, then sighs, as he looks at my inkling. "...killed them?" He said, a word that inklings barely use. Usually, inklings use the term "splatted" instead of killed, so this caught me off guard and was somewhat shocking as my inkling responds to Cuttlefish.
"Of course, Cuttlefish. I'll see what I can do." That smile was still plastered on my inkling, and it began creeping me out at this point as I just quickly press the "Lobby" tab on my Gamepad, and pressed the "Regular Battle" choice once the lobby menu came up as I began doing some Turf Wars. Unlike the previous day, in which I had to do 5 rounds, I only had to do 3 rounds: Turf Wars, Rainmaker and Tower Control.
Again, I won't go into too many details of what was going on during the rounds, and try to make these descriptions of the rounds as brief as possible so I won't waste your time with pointless filler.
Round 1: Squid Harbor, Turf Wars.
The map I was treated to, was an industrial-type harbor with multiple ships of various sizes and various containers along with cranes that lift them up on the ships while the sun was shining in the sky. Considering that the Rainstorm was in effect, this struck me as a weird design choice for a map, but I ignored it. But that wasn't what grabbed my interest for this map.
Recommended Music: Pac-Man World - Bucaneer Beach
What grabbed my interest, was the song overall. The song sounded upbeat, and strayed away from the Splatoon type of music by using flutes and drums as the main instruments for the song as my team began turfing the area around us. Not to say that it was a bad thing, and I actually liked the change of music instead of constantly hearing inkling voices and singing in the background. Nothing wrong happened on this map at all whatsoever, the enemy team respawns like normal, no glitches or any of the players on the enemy team not fighting back whenever they see my inkling. Heck, some of the them even managed to splat my inkling sometimes as well while I was playing the map, which made me relieved that at least this map was normal and playable.
I began painting the wall of containers, and used my inkling's squid form as he tried to get onto one the containers. Now, being a roller user, it was impossible, but my teammates managed to help turf the container with their weapons so I could swim up to the large, rectangular box. I signaled the "Boo-Yah!" command, and was about to keep on moving until the container began to move by itself.
I was confused, until I noticed that one of the construction cranes had picked one of the containers up, and began moving it to one of the ships. This gave me the advantage, to which I was grateful for this mechanic in the map as I began sneaking to the enemy territory and surprise attacking them by splatting them with my roller and entering my kraken form after having turfed enough of the blue ink on the ground. I completely obliterated the enemy team, as they didn't seem to suspect me entering their territory. I continued playing through the map with no problems or glitches whatsoever as the timer reached 0:00, and I was taken to the match results screen with me waiting eagerly for Judd to pull out our team's flag.
Recommended to stop the music.
I was utterly confused at what happened, rubbing my eyes, as I see the enemy team having won with them having 50.1% of their "turf" painted and our turf having been "painted" 49.9%.
I saw, that my team clearly turfed more ink than the enemy team's as I saw about 75% of the map having been painted by our team and the enemy team barely having turfed the map at all. This must have been some kind of glitch, and the game was going so well until this point.
Sighing in disappointment afterward, I went to the next map and round. Surprisingly enough, while I was inside of lobby waiting for the Rainmaker map to start, the same team of players soon arrived. I raised an eyebrow, wondering how I got the same team and enemy teams as before as I just shrugged it off and began the second round and map.
Round 2: Stingray Chasm, Rainmaker.
The map I was treated to, was composed of many platforms and rock spires hovering above a large, dark chasm filled with spikes, along with the map's landscape being mostly made out of metal and having gridded platforms on it, giving a clear advantage to those using Splat Chargers as I prepared myself for the map to start. I saw the timer begin to count down, and as soon as the round began, I instantly noticed that the music was much, much different than the one in the Squid Harbor map.
Recommended Music: Left 4 Dead 2 Soundtrack OST: Pray for Death
The music was a loop of a guitar being played, as well as some additional sounds added to the music to fit the mood of the map I was in. Sometimes, the guitar would be echoing, making crossing over the grids even more tense as my team began going after the Rainmaker.
Painting the ground below me an orange color, I moved my inkling as fast as I could to where the Rainmaker was and help my teammates, should they get there first. And sure enough after a bit of moving around, I see them fighting the enemy team, both teams firing ink and splat bombs at each other as I quickly run up behind the enemy team and take them by surprise by splashing them with my roller and crushing them. I didn't see any of the squid ghosts appearing whatsoever, and the enemy team just remained splatted for the rest of the round as I see one of my teammates grab the Rainmaker as soon as it's available to grabbed, and begin running back to our base as I support my teammates. It wasn't that long of a match, as my team got another easy victory for ourselves with the enemy team remaining splatted until the round ended.
I really thought the other team would put up a fight, and this ended up being barely challenging at all, which somewhat disappointed me. But what disappointed me even further, were the results after my team captured the Rainmaker.
Apparently, the enemy team won again, despite us having taken the Rainmaker to our base, confusing me again like last time. This glitch was starting to annoy me, as I just immediately moved on to the next match and map after seeing the results.
Recommended to stop the music.
I was taken to the lobby again, and waited for the other 7 players to arrive. While waiting, however, I noticed that the music while waiting for the other players wasn't even playing. But instead, there were some quiet, rumbling noises in the background as I just waited for the others to arrive. And sure enough, the players arrived. I was dumbstruck at who the players were, seeing that it were the exact same people that I played with during the previous two matches.
"What the hell...? Who are these people?" I ask myself out loud, seeming to be a bit creeped out by the fact that I've played with the same people when I just started on the first round three times in a row now at this point.
But that's not even the creepiest part. The creepiest part, was the image of the map we were going to play in. Darkness. Nothing, but pitch black darkness as I looked at the name of the map: "Anglerfish Depths".
If there was one fish that I had nightmares about as a child, and still somewhat sends shivers down my spine just by looking at it, it would the anglerfish. And you could only imagine, what my reaction was when I watched "Finding Nemo" and when the part with the anglerfish came on.
Moving on from personal stuff about myself, I waited for the Tower Control battle to start, and soon enough, the map showed up.
Round 3: Anglerfish Depths, Tower Control.
There was nothing in the map, but complete and utter darkness except for a light bulb hanging above where my team's spawn was. Judging from the design, it seemed to be a cave with unnatural formations on the ground and ceiling. I was about to get ready to begin turfing and revealing the path to me, only to see that I was the only inkling on my team and the enemy team was completely empty. There was no music whatsoever, except for a cave ambiance with sounds of water dropping into the lakes of the cavern my inkling was in.
Recommended Ambiance: Underground Cave Water Dripping
I began moving my inkling through the darkness, and thankfully, the Gamepad showed me what the map looked like, making it somewhat easy for me to navigate. However, I still had to be careful not to fall into any chasms, lakes or hazards in order to not get splatted by the map itself.
Since this was a tower control-themed map, I decided to head to the center of the map where the tower was, but I didn't find it anywhere over the pool of water I was treated to. I decided to go to the enemy team's spawn next, but there was nothing there either. No inklings, nothing. I also noticed, that there wasn't even a timer for this map. Just a glitched out mess of letters and numbers, as I decided to continue strolling around the map with my inkling.
Eventually, I decided to give up after searching for the tower for a while, and was about to go back to the lobby until I heard something that made me somewhat jump a little. I heard the sound of the water below my inkling bubbling, as I turn the camera to look down, only to see a hint of light below me.
I didn't think about the light too much at first, thinking that it was just a design of the map to help navigate the players as it managed to slightly brighten up the area around my character. I decided to head back to the center of the map, and sure enough, I saw something that made me relieved: The tower. I was about to move toward it, until I heard the water below my inkling bubble more violently as I began to see a shape forming in the water. I soon realized, that it wasn't just light. Before I could process what the light and shape was, I was immediately terrified as I let out a shriek upon seeing something horrifying that made me immediately get onto the tower and make it start moving toward my spawn.
Recommended Music: Super Godzilla - Mecha-King Ghidorah's Theme
An enormous, hideous brown anglerfish sporting a set of razor-sharp teeth appeared in front of my character, its blank eyes staring right at my inkling with what seemed to be hunger as it didn't waste another second staring at my inkling, and charged straight at him in an attempt to devour my character as its lantern glowed furiously to the point of lighting up the map completely. This was one way to start off the tower control map, as the anglerfish let out a roar and jumped straight at my inkling as I attempted to fight back by splashing at it with my roller and ink, barely doing anything against the creature as it lunged for the kill and almost managed to chomp my character down with its teeth. I began smacking it with my roller as hard as I could with my character, the creature seeming completely unphased by my roller as I began moving the tower to my spawn.
I seemed safe while standing on the tower, only to soon see the creature leap up at the tower and attempt to splat my inkling. I quickly jumped down before its teeth landed onto the tower, and it soon fell into the water as it began swimming underneath my inkling. There was only one thing I could do at this point onward during the fight: Run and fight.
For this boss battle, I went with both options. When it was underwater and hunted down my inkling, I would run away from it until it re-emerged from the water and leapt at my inkling, and then begin fighting it by smacking it with my roller and going into my kraken form whenever it was available as soon as the anglerfish got his teeth stuck on the cave walls. Thankfully, with the amount of time it took for the anglerfish to get unstuck, I managed to deal a significant amount of damage at it as it fell back into the water and soon let out a roar once it came out of the water, opening its mouth as it prepared to lunge at me with craze and hunger in it eyes.
I soon remembered how the Octomaw fight went in Octo Valley, and I quickly came up with an idea. I made my inkling throw a Splat Bomb into the anglerfish's mouth as it lunged at my character, the creature stopping in its track as it lets out choking sounds once it got the Splat Bomb stuck in its throat. It soon lets out a painful roar once the Splat Bomb blew up inside of it, causing the creature to choke up purple ink as it went back into the water again.
I knew that the battle wasn't over yet, and sure enough, the large anglerfish comes back up from the water as waves began to form around the boss. I made my character jump over the waves, knowing that water in Splatoon would harm your character, and I also had to avoid a new attack from the anglerfish. It used its tail to splash the water it was in, causing more waves to form and making it harder for me to defeat the creature. I readied another Splat Bomb, and my character immediately threw it into the mouth of the creature as it let out a roar and attempted to lunge at my inkling. It choked again, and let out a second roar afterward as it went back into the water.
The same process was repeated again one more time for the final phase of the battle, with the anglerfish using combined attacks now as it let out roar after roar while attacking, seeming to have completely lost its mind. I decided to finish this battle once and for all as I went into my character's squid form to recharge my ink and throw one final splat bomb into the anglerfish's mouth. However, it outwitted me this time, and gritted its teeth as the Splat Bomb was reflected toward to my inkling and blew up. I began to run from the creature as it began to constantly gnash its teeth in an attempt to chew my inkling into pieces. It was a close battle between my character and the anglerfish, but I was smarter than the AI. Using one last Splat Bomb at the right time before it managed to devour my inkling, the anglerfish swallowed the bomb as it let out one last roar before its head completely blew off as purple ink covered the screen like it usually does whenever you defeated a boss in Octo Valley.
Recommended to stop the music.
I saw nothing but purple ink where the anglerfish used to be, and let out a sigh of relief as I soon noticed the map having been completely brightened to the point that I could finally see the whole map after defeating the boss and safely see the hazards that I had to avoid during the fight.
Going back to where the tower was, I stood on it, and after about a minute of waiting, the tower arrived to where my spawn was, and I won this round. My inkling had the same grin on his face, looking happy as I went back to Cap'n Cuttlefish's house after completing the objective. However, upon leaving the lobby, it didn't take me back to the house. Instead, I was standing in what seemed to be the Calamari City at night. Cap'n Cuttlefish's icon was grayed out, and I was forced to move my inkling to where his house was as he activated the bubbler around him to move through the rain. Along the way to Cap'n Cuttlefish's house, I noticed several posters of missing inkling boys and girls, and then I saw something that creeped me out upon further examination.
I saw pictures of the players that I played with. All 7 of them now labelled "MISSING" as I made my character's tour through the city as quick as possible, and back to Cap'n Cuttlefish's house in a hurry.
Upon arriving to Cuttlefish's house, I noticed that the interior was completely dark, save for a bit of light coming from the living room. And surprisingly enough, the door was still open. I was about to open the door, but my inkling did it by himself and locked the door behind him after closing it behind him. I could hear static coming from the television in the living room as my character began walking up the stairs.
I thought my character was going to go back to the bedroom and take a rest after having fought that large anglerfish boss, but instead, he proceeded to turn to the left hallway, and began walking to one of the doors there. I soon noticed he was standing in front of the security office door, and proceeded to open it as I see Cap'n Cuttlefish sitting on his chair, looking at the cameras.
"Hello, Cuttlefish." My inkling says with an emotionless voice as Cuttlefish turns to look at him with a surprised look on him, smiling as he looks at my character.
"Sam, you're alive!? You've had both me and me granddaughter worried about you!" He says, overjoyed upon seeing me, until my inkling closes the door behind him and grins at the veteran.
"Yeah... you should have been worried about me in the first place..." My character takes out his roller, Cuttlefish's expression turnning from happy to confused as he gets up from his chair.
Recommended Music: Undertale - Bonetrousle (GENOCIDE)
I soon knew what was coming as soon as the music started. I quickly tried screaming into my microphone, telling Cuttlefish to call for help. But only a weak choking sound came out as I just watched the events before me unfold, hoping that Cuttlefish would forgive me for what I've done.
"N-now now, Sam! That is one real nice roller you've got there, but I'm... k-kind of in the middle of something here!" Fear can be clearly heard in his voice, as he smiles nervously at my inkling, kindly motioning him to get out of the security office. But my inkling just stares at him with the same grin, taking slow steps toward Cuttlefish as his kind facade drops completely.
"Hey, I asked you to get out! I am workin' on something here, and I need some privacy!" He raises his voice, but my character was unaffected as he grips his hand tightly around his roller. I soon notice, that my inkling's eyes have turned from black to a tint of red as he inches closer to the captain.
"Oh, don't you realize, who this... "murderer" you've been talking about to me is?" My inkling spoke in a different voice, which freaked me out as soon as I heard it. Callie's voice. Cap'n Cuttlefish widened his eyes, and proceeds to throw his chair at my inkling in an attempt to save himself, only for my inkling to turn one of his hands into a fist, and the chair begins glitching out, and it soon disappears, baffling both me and Cuttlefish.
"W-what!?" Cuttlefish says, confused as to what he saw as my character grin grows wider, showing his teeth.
"I still need you, Octavio, Epsilon's, and Marie..." My character says with Callie's voice, tilting his head as he stands above Cuttlefish, smiling at the scared inkling veteran.
"P-please! Just get out of here! I'll promise to give you anything you want, if you leave me alone!" Cuttlefish begs, cornered against a wall as my character just stands there, smiling at the scared inkling with the same grin.
"Good..." He readies his roller, and I soon hear the door behind my character open as I hear the familiar voice of Marie scream in her human voice as she witnesses my character about to splat her grandfather.
"CUTTLEFISH!" She screams loudly as she sees the scene in front of her, and just as my character's roller crushes and splats Marie's grandfather, the game freezes like it did when Callie was splatted by my character as an error code appearing on the screen.
Recommended to stop the music.
I had no idea what to say after what happened, and just remained in silence as I stared at the television with shock. I soon felt the choking and gagging that prevented me from talking stopped, as I proceeded to say something quietly as I looked down, feeling bad about what happened just now.
"...Why?" That was the only word I said, before I pressed "OK" on my Gamepad's error code, and was taken back to the Wii U Menu, seeing that there was only 1 application available now in the middle while everything else along with the music in the menu were gone: "Splatoon"
Author's Note: Yes. Cuttlefish was my second victim. =)
And no one is safe from me in this fan fiction, including the writer himself and the readers and reviewers. Oh, but that's right... this is just a "fan fiction" for you all, right?
Just because you all get to see someone get killed while reading this, just for the creepiness factor, doesn't mean you all get off scot free. No, no...
I will make sure, that you all will get punished for your actions, just by reading this story alone. You all are to blame for your imminent consequences soon. =)