Chapter 2 - Botched First-Contact.
As soon as the octo-drill was pulled out from the door's newly-created hole, everyone present at the drill site immediately surrounded it. Peeking their heads inside curiously, they tried to make out any clearly visible valuables that they could be the first to get their hands on. A few of them left shortly after seeing no interesting items inside the hall, with only Mira, Anthia and Maurice remaining.
"Oh my cod, look at this! The interior is way more spacious than the outside! Sis', what do you think is bigger? Octavio HQ, or this?" Maurice asked her sister in a childish manner while waving her octoshot's barrel-mounted flashlight across the place. Her teammates didn't share that same excitement however, annoyed by the bright light of the hyper-active octoling's torch.
"I dunno… To be honest, I don't even know how big our HQ really is. Octavio stuffed the place with so many of his loudspeakers around its walls that it is impossible to guess the exact size of it, without throwing out all the stuff inside." Mira answered slowly and carefully, taking time to think more about the question. She continued, "I guess it's the HQ? If you think about the size of each loudspeaker and the number of layers in the stacks, HQ being bigger is more likely." Despite the strict and no-bullshit personality of a seasoned soldier, Mira was a caring and protective sister figure to Maurice, constantly looking after her younger sibling even though she might seem to be doing the opposite.
The roller-wielding girl flipped her night-vision goggles down, unslung her dynamo roller, and casually climbed through the hole before Oceanica could give a command. Mira acted as if the whole operation was just a walk in the park to her. Maurice followed her sister right after, despite all the discouraging stares from her colleagues.
"Hey! I haven't given any orders yet!. Too eager for the goods aren't you?" Oceanica asked in an attempted (but failed) authoritative tone, unsure whether to praise the duo for their bravery or just splat them back to the spawn point for insubordination. In the end, the elite decided against either option and just rolled with it, since she would gain no benefit from punishing them aside from worsening her personal image. Besides, their willingness could improve the squad's morale, so why even bother wasting time and ink?
"Alright, people, line up! Break time's over!" Oceanica called out, and everyone else around the bonfire hastily grabbed their equipment then jogged toward the octo-drill, leaving their half-eaten dinners on their seats.
After briefly confirming that her squadmates were all accounted for, Oceanica slightly nodded with a contented sigh, "Good. Let's do this. Octotroopers, to the front! Firing formation! Everyone else, mov-"
"-Hey, HEEEY! What about me? Are you just gonna leave me here like this!?" Jades, the team's combat engineer and co-pilot called out from next to the octo-drill, cutting off the Elite mid-sentence. Her yelling immediately caught the attention of everyone on-site, and they immediately threw worried looks at her, trying to remind the mechanic who she was talking to and how many ranks said person is above her.
Oceanica however, didn't seem to mind her subordinate's attitude, and simply answered back with her usual tone, "Ah, right. Forgot that you existed right there. I'll leave three octotroopers outside to guard the octoseeker with you, in case we need a quick extraction. It's not a full moon tonight, so the valley's predators shouldn't be too much of a threat." She motioned for three octotroopers to leave their line and move next to Jades, who looked visibly dissatisfied with the arrangement, but gave no objection. With all preparations done, Oceanica looked at her team and gave the order to advance.
The octotroopers were the first ones to pass through, illuminating the entrance hall with their vehicle-mounted floodlights, and quickly lined up into a firing line in front of the blast door.
"No movement detected. All clear." An octotrooper said in his monotone, almost robotic voice. The whole line immediately dispersed, making way for the octolings to move in. Oceanica and Anthia were the last to enter, and immediately called out to her troops.
"Jason, Linda! Cover turf! Anthia! Provide fire sup-" … Only to swallow the order back down her throat, as soon as she saw the reflective pink ground below her feet. It was perfectly-inked. Not a single corner was left untouched. "disregard that order."
The elite then glanced at Mira and Maurice's smug faces, then simply sighed. "Damn, they're fast," she mumbled while pinching the bridge of her nose, then moved on with the operation.
With the perimeter around the entrance set up and guarded by octotroopers, Oceanica unslung the big Alice pack from her back and waved for the team to start scavenging. Everyone's faces immediately lit up as soon as the command was given, and they began to scramble around for anything that looked even remotely valuable.
20 min' later…
"Some debris, trash, dirt… even more trash…Oh my cod…" Linda mumbled frustrated while digging into a nearby trash pile. Judging from her facial expression and rapid digging speed, one could tell that she was getting increasingly frustrated by the lack of valuables in the area. The team was starting to think there wasn't even anything down here. Still, no one dared to voice out their complaint and just kept going on with their work…
… Until Kaye – the male rifleman notorious for the sarcastic, provocative, and impatient personality that made him the team's leading troublemaker – suddenly snapped:
"Coddamnit! There's nothing worth keeping here. Why can't we just move to another area and be done with it? This hall is utterly barren… like, what do you expect us to find here? More stray Inklings?" He yelled out in frustration after 20 minutes of digging non-stop, without finding anything to fill the bag with. In response, Oceanica stopped her work abruptly and turned toward the guy, jabbing her shovel into the ground with a loud "clunk" that instantly silenced his rambling. She walked right in front of Kaye, and chewed him out in a loud and snarky voice, moving increasingly closer to his face as she did:
"And you have any problem with it? The scavenging protocol has stated VERY clearly that all areas must be searched thoroughly no matter how unpromising. You're one of the team's old members, you should be the one who knows the protocol the best. But here you are, still acting like some toddler who just learned to shift. Listen here, you dogfish: as an Elite and this team's captain, I order you to continue your search in this area. You hear me? Every corner! I want this place torn apart damnit!" Oceanica finished her scolding with her face now merely 6 centimeters from Kaye's, blowing cold breath vapor in his face. He was, of course, intimidated by the pissed elite before him. He was terrified, and shaking like hell, silently asking what the fuck had he gotten himself into. Unable to stand the elite's burning gaze, Kaye averted his eyes around only to meet more disapproving looks from his surrounding teammates, which only helped add to the tension and extinguish his will to speak.
"I said, do you hear me?" Oceanica growled again, patience for the petrified soldier running thin, causing the young rifleman to let out a pathetic yelp. All bark but no bite, typical Kaye.
"Tch… you have no idea how badly I want to strangle you right now. Now get back to work! I'll deal with you later at base." Oceanica facepalmed in frustration while dismissing Kaye, who immediately turned and scurried off without needing to be shouted at twice.
"Damn it. I need a vacation after this…" She sighed again, then resumed digging with the rest of the team. Oceanica worried that she might not even live past 60 if she had to deal with any more sanity-draining situations like this, so she had better preserve her lifespan from now.
"Wait… Don't know if it was just me, but does anyone hear clattering sounds from above us?" Anthia asked, pausing her work and turning around to look at where the sound presumably came from, instinctively reaching for her splatling as she did so. Even in the tall and dark ceiling that wasn't illuminated by octo-floodlights, she could still vaguely make out some sort of hanging platform with a hand-rail that leads deep into the facility. But after a while of staring and the lack of response from her teammates, she simply shrugged it off and resumed working.
Then, came another boring 10 minutes of fruitless labor, and not a word of small talk was made.
When the giant drill was pulled out and turned off, two intruders came through the hole, curiously looking around like astronauts stepping foot on Mars. Since their shadowy figures looked relatively human, I almost decided to reveal myself to them, but managed to refrain from doing so. There's something wrong with these people, particularly in the way they move. It's so fluid and smooth, like they don't have bones.
Staying put turned out to be the correct course of action though, because as soon as the shortest of the duo turned on its – no, HER flashlight, it illuminated them and gave me a good look of their features. Both of them are about my height, with large hands, wide hips, thin body and abnormally large heads. Both are dressed in black shorts, and some kind of black latex t-shirt with gray armor plates attached to it. The most grotesque part about the two however, is their hair – if it could even be called that. It wasn't like normal human hair, nor any kind of animal hair that existed on Earth. It was a mass of red writhing tentacles. Vaguely arranged into flip-bouffant style, with large suckers along each one, as if two giant angry facehuggers decided to attach themselves on top of the two's heads.
Their faces were nearly obscured by large round night-vision (?) goggles and scarf they wore. Their mouths were wide, far larger than that of a normal person, filled with two beak-like plates located on their upper and lower jaws. In short, they're anything but human.
The shorter one has some sort of pink hi-cal pistol/ SMG that seems quite similar to a super-soaker water gun, maybe some sort of new plasma weaponry? The other intruder however, carries with her what looks like an oversized glass-cleaner. With a pink brush head and the most uncomfortable looking handle design I've ever seen in my life. Even though they weren't those fish creatures mentioned in the audio log, it didn't really help my panic as they were very clearly not human. They're a new type of enemy that I have absolutely no information about, so I just sat still with my pistol clutched tight and I continued observing them. I've also discovered that their body heat is extremely low, almost non-existent to be exact. The duo barely show up on my pistol's thermal scope, as two blurry yellow streaks of heat signature despite being only a dozen meters below me. It couldn't have lost sensitivity through time either, since the thing can still detect my arm just fine
I expected the duo to move further into the facility, cautiously checking corners along the way like what normal soldiers- or anyone with a functioning brain - would do. But to my surprise, the duo simply threw a green glow stick next to the left wall…
… and began to shoot/ hit the ground?
The fuck? What kind of looney-tune bullshit is this?
Wait. No.
They weren't attacking the ground aimlessly as I thought, but actually painting it with some sort of ketchup-like liquid from their weapons, and were doing it in an oddly organized fashion. The glass-cleaner girl rolled her roller back and forth along the entrance hall, each liquid line perfectly lined up next to the last, not a single unpainted spot. The other gunman shot small blobs of liquid with her (confirmed) SMG at the four corners where her companion's glass-cleaner couldn't reach. The bizarre display left me completely at a loss of what to do next, so I decided to just stay put, and let things play out. I finished my bag of chips during this time, feeling like staying late in a cinema with horrible service, watching two janitors doing their daily mopping. What's a good show without a bit of snacks?
After several excruciating minutes of painting the floor and chatting, the two alien girls finally stopped and took off their goggles, revealing their eyes - which unfortunately weren't clearly visible in the dim light of their flashlights - and pulled off their face scarves. This confirmed that the liquid they used to drench the floor with was not some sort of biological weapon, or at least not an airborne one since they can still breathe with their protections removed. Then, they simply retrieved their glow stick and leaned against the nearby wall, seemingly waiting for other people to come down. Welp, more reason not to show myself, now that there will be more than just two people. I looked down at my plasma pistol that suddenly seemed far punier than before, and decided to piss off while I still could. And that's when more of those freaks came in, making me sit back down again.
In addition to 4 more humanoid aliens with unidentified weapons (one of them even held a frickin' rotary squad gun), there were also seven of these… natural defects. They were basically giant tentacle-tips with eyes, mouths, and two legs, riding some sort of scooters with mounted guns. The "tank-tacles" – as I have dubbed them - immediately lined up in front of the blast door upon entering, with the humanoids using them as living shields. After the humanoids had entirely entered the hall, the tank-tacles broke their line and moved to secure random spots along the hallway, leaving the humanoids to organize themselves.
As far as I can tell, the humanoids are basically identical to each other, except for mild height differences. They wore the same combat uniforms, same goggles, and had the same hairstyles. Two of them, presumably male, had shorter tentacles and stature. One of them, however, stood out from the rest with purple-black tentacles and a seaweed head decoration instead of the deep-pink like others. Guess that one is special, some sort of commander/ squad leader maybe? I'll keep that in mind in case of an engagement, so that I can take her out first. Hopefully, it'll disorganize the underlings, or at least discourage them from continuing the fight.
The VIP gathered her subordinates around and handed each one a metal shovel, all the while conversing with them in a fast-spoken and high-pitched language that was unintelligible to me due to the far distance. It certainly wasn't English, or any other language I had ever heard for that matter. Then, with a swift hand gesture from the VIP, the other humanoids began to dig into piles of rubbles around the hallway. If these creatures are really some kind of scavenger or bandit type, then establishing positive contact with them would be all the more unlikely.
Since the humanoids were all occupied with their work, I decided it was time for me to retreat. I gathered my equipment and stood up slowly to make as little noise as possible, eyes still fixated on the group below. So… since I am overwhelmingly outnumbered here, direct engagement is basically suicide, and I could only think of three options after a few minutes of brainstorming.
1 – Try to lure them further inside/ find a way to distract them so I can sneak out undetected.
2 – Find another entrance and escape through it. Highly unlikely given the security level of the facility, and the fact that there are still those "fishmen Indians" lurking around here somewhere.
3 – Retreat back inside, create some basic traps with my engineering skill, set up defenses, get a vantage point and ambush them.
So far, all of them sound equally dangerous, with any chance of success being decided by pure luck…Welp, to be honest, I have no idea what to do right now. These are all good options on paper, but they fall apart when you really start to think about them.
… Gosh, this is getting nowhere. Why don't I just get the hell out of here first and sketch out a plan later?
Having already stood up and done several warm-up exercises to dissipate my limbs' numbness, I tip-toed back into the 2nd-floor corridor behind me with my flashlight off, touching my hands along the wall and using my memory to navigate. Thankfully, the decorative patterns and Polaris logo painted on the wall were slightly phosphorescent, so I had little trouble finding my way back.
Okay, so… go straight twelve steps, then right six steps then left two steps, and the overseer office door should be somewhere on the right… If I remember correctly?
Let's go… One, two, three, four, five, six-
The floor below me suddenly creaked, causing me to nearly lose my balance, and all of my hair stood on end. It was so dumb of me to not remember that these metal plates have existed for several dozen centuries without repair, and must currently be in a dangerously degraded state. But… half an hour ago when I first came to the 2nd-floor balcony, I'd also walked on top of that same metal platform. So why didn't it collapse then? Did it really wait for me to be on TOP of my enemy to fuck me over!?
I slowly raised my foot again and tried to step on another safe spot, but then the metal floor creaked louder, shifting a little bit downward…
And how did I know that it shifted downward?
Well, that's simple . I was standing on top of it-
- With both legs. The fuck have I done?
"I'm dead. I'm so fucking dead!" I hissed out a soft curse while reaching for my flashlight, pulling it out while almost dumping everything else inside my pocket out with it due to how densely packed they are. Hope that those creatures haven't heard the noises I made. Now, where the hell's the turn-on button!?
"#!$*%#~_) - !?"
"#$% () - !"
"$-() - ?"
Several unintelligible, shrill and gurgling voices (?) erupted from somewhere below me, sending a chill down my spine. It honestly sounded like the scream you make when someone shoves your head neck-deep into a toilet, then flushes it… (Trust me, I know what I'm saying. Back in 5th grade, I snitched on the school's bully and his cronies for smoking in the bathroom. He was NOT happy about it.) The voice was then followed by more responding gurgles and erratic flashlight beams shining in my direction, but thankfully none reached me.
Fuck fuck fuck fuck FUCK! I screwed up REAL good this time!
I wasted no time in my button-searching effort and managed to find it on the bottom of the flashlight. In a panic, I quickly turned my flashlight on, un-holstered my pistol, and turned around with both items pointed forth. However, I whipped around a little bit too fast, causing my flashlight to fly out of my hand and smash against the nearby wall. Remember when I pointed out how tough this flashlight is? Well, turns out it actually is, still working even after being smashed against the wall. But my relieved breath was instantly sucked back in when I failed to catch the falling flashlight mid-air and let it fall to the metal floor.
The part that I'm currently standing on.
I looked down at my rolling flashlight then toward the slowly detaching edge of the metal platform, feeling the surface beneath me give way.
…
(Deep sigh) "Ugh, motherfu-UUAAAAAE !"
The ground shook as the platform fell with a loud 'SLAM', blowing large clouds of dust in all directions. The force of the impact was so great, it made Jason lose balance and land squarely on his butt. Barely recovered from the shock, he looked up just in time to see another platform right above him detach from the catwalk.
"WATCH OUT!" Linda dragged Jason backward by his chest plate collar, narrowly saving him from being squashed into paste as the giant slab of pure steel hit the ground right next to the first one. This time, Maurice and Kayes were also knocked off their feet, the latter hitting his head on the nearby wall with a dull 'thump', before stumbling face-first to the ground. That must've hurt.
"Ugh… What the hell happened!? I-is everyone okay!?" Oceanica shouted between fits of coughing. She wasted no time in recounting her team members and checking their condition, quickly confirming zero casualties in both the octolings and octotroopers.
"I-I'm fine. (Cough) I'm fine… Ahhhhh, coddamnit!" Mira grunted, pulling a horrified-looking Maurice back to her feet.
"Huh?... Contact! Contact!" Jason called out and pointed his octoshot pro at the dissipating curtain of dust, his flashlight revealing a strange obj- no, CREATURE sprawling on the ground in an awkward position. Everyone at the site was immediately on high alert, aiming their weapons at the creature in unison.
"Hold your fire!" Oceanica shouted, raising a fist up to stop the alerted octotroopers from shooting.
"What the shuck is that… thing?" Anthia furrowed her brow
"An inkling, maybe?" Maurice suggested softly, tensing up by the moment.
"Unlikely, its limbs look too long for an inkling, and there are no squid tentacles on its head. Look at those fingers and feet! I've never seen anything like that before in my life, swear to cod." Mira whispered in front of her sister, eyes still glued to the unconscious creature. "Maybe a crustacean? But there's no exoskeleton on the outside of its body either…"
"Whatever that thing is doesn't matter right now, we'll find out after we have successfully captured it. Now, does anyone have a rope or something?" Oceanica asked the team, receiving head shakes and hand waves of denial. "Coddamnit… well, go restrain it by hand then! Kaye, Jason, Linda, and Mira, go grab the thing and make it kneel up."
"Yes, boss." They replied, then walked cautiously toward the creature with their weapons raised high.
"You think it's sentient?" Jason whispered softly to the whole group.
"Obviously. Just look at its clothes! Only sentient beings can wear clothes." Kaye answered matter-of-factly, like he was stating common knowledge.
"Duh! Salmonids can wear clothes too, you know. And they still have the brain of their ancestors. Maybe slightly smarter than them, but nothing too notable." Mira countered.
"You're overexaggerating. The salmonids ARE smart, just dreadfully savage and warlike. They even have superweapons and stuff!"
"Well, maybe?... Maybe. Oh, and those superweapons are mostly ours, just saying."
"I have the feeling that this one will be more than just that. Welp, one way to find out." Jason simply shrugged, ending their short conversation. But before the four could go halfway toward their target, it shifted slightly and grunted.
"Shuck! It's waking up! Hurry up and grab the coddamn thing! Everyone else, combat-ready!" Oceanica shouted, making the four octolings walk faster with weapons lowered.
However, instead of straight-up grabbing the creature as ordered, the four abruptly stopped in front of it, trying to push each other into being the first one to touch the thing.
"You do it."
"No u"
"C'mon! It's just some weird animal! Don't be a dogfish and grab it!"
"Well, if you say so, why don't you prove your point first and touch it?"
"No, Mira. You have the most experience here, so it should be you! We'll back you up from behind."
"Oh, shell nah. What if it's poisonous? How can you back me up with that? Are you going to pay for my medical charges or something?"
"One more word and I'll cut your monthly paycheck CLEAN OFF, you hear!? All four of you will touch it at once, and that's an order!" Oceanica barked, pissed off by her subordinates' time-wasting quarrel.
"(sigh)…Alright, you guys ready? One – two – three – GO!" And the octolings' hands shot toward the creature in unison, but instantly stopped dead in their tracks.
"Wait- Ah CARP! IT WOKE UP FOR REAL!" All four octolings screamed, then bolted back to their team position, except for Mira who had difficulty dragging her roller behind like a prisoner's chain ball.
"Y- you USELESS DOGFISHES! That's IT! 30% cut of this month's pay lost for you bunch!" Oceanica shrieked at the four, ignoring their pitiful plead for mercy. It may seem like an overly-lenient sentence for a crime like insubordination, but given the fact that the pay for the rank-and-file soldier in the Octarian army is abysmally low even in war times, and the fact that they live in a nation where people struggle every day to afford their most basic life necessities, this kind of punishment is considered even harsher than physical ones.
"Octotroopers, forward!" The elite ordered her walking meat shields to line up in front of the octoling squad, while they aim their guns at the now-awoken creature through the formation's gaps. Everyone held their breath in anticipation, and the air in the hallway tensed up to an unbearable degree.
After what felt like an eternity, the thing finally pushed its hands against the ground and sat up, revealing its small eyes, without any eye-mask or eye-patch pattern seen in inklings and octolings. Upon being shone by the octotroopers' floodlights, it briefly shielded its eyes in a tired manner, then squinted at the light to get a better look at its source.
The creature froze, pure terror slowly filled its pale gaunt face.
Duh-wha… oh shit.
Oh shit. Oh fuck.
Screaming internally, I stared unblinking at the ragtag band of looters before me like a deer in the headlights. How long have I been out? Nah fuck it, this ain't no time to wonder about that. More importantly, where is my gun!? I remembered holding it when I fell to the ground, so it should still be somewhere near me.
I moved my arm behind my back as slowly as possible to hopefully touch my pistol, without letting them know what I was doing. They immediately stopped their chatter upon seeing me move and the sounds of gun cocking filled the air, forcing me to stop my search. But luckily for me, I managed to feel the weapon grip's distinctively bumpy pattern right behind me and was almost tempted to grab it, if not for all the barrels aimed at my face. With no other option, I decided to just sit still and wait for an opportunity to present itself.
After a long moment of gurgling, two tank-tacles in the middle of the line moved away from each other, making way for a female humanoid with what seems like a pair of akimbo-pistol to go through. She slowly approached me with her guns holstered and both of her hands spread forward, signaling her peaceful intention with gestures. The others behind her, however, still have their weapons pointed directly at my face.
Let's play along for now- I thought, also raising my left hand up while squeezing out a smile as genuine as possible, intending to grab my gun and hold her at point-blank as a meat shield when she got close enough to fully cover my body. Yes, I know it's a dick move to respond to people's friendliness with violence, but during my time as an assistant engineer, a.k.a errand boy for the R.U.S military during the war, I've learned to never trust one's intention immediately, no matter how harmless they may initially seem.
Oh yes, she's getting closer… and closer… and closer, now only four meters away from me. The humanoid then knelt down and extended her arm to me, while making these "Psst" "Psst" sounds like trying to lure out a scared kitten from its hole. In response, I flipped my reached-out hand upward, allowing her to grab it while silently doing a blind condition check for my gun with the other hand. Magazine's still there, the safety lock has been flipped, there's no detectable cracks or dents anywhere on its surface… In short, it's ready to fire.
Finally, the girl grabbed my hand, fondling it gently through her black combat glove like handling a fragile egg. The sensation was… weird, to say the least. It doesn't feel like being grabbed by a human hand/ any known animal's paws, but soft and squirmy like having a small octopus wrap around your hand. What- doesn't she have bones or something!? After a few moments of awkward hand holding, the girl finally let go of me and turned toward her teammates behind with a smile, her guard completely dropped.
Then, the girl turned to her team and said something, making them laugh and lower weapons. Welp, guess it's my cue to act then. As quickly as possible, I shot up into a kneel and pointed my pistol at her face, quickly positioning my body behind the surprised girl to hide from other enemies' line of fire.
"Don't – move! Hands behind your head." I growled aggressively, cocking my plasma pistol backward to emphasize my point. I made no attempt to grab the girl or draw the gun too close to her face to avoid being surprise-disarmed, a lesson learned from numerous action movies I've watched throughout my life. Trying to dodge isn't an option for her, since there's no way in hell she can move faster than I can pull the trigger. She was, understandably, startled, glancing up and down at me and my pistol. Her teammates reacted instantly, raising their weapons at me again and exchanging loud gurgles with each other. To my surprise, the girl doesn't seem fazed upon being threatened, but quite the opposite. Instead of following my demand and raising her hand like any sane woman would do when in front of the gun barrel, she refused to comply with a wide and mocking smirk, daring me to pull the trigger. What's with this girl!? Does she not fear death? Or has she just not seen anything like my gun before, and boldly assumes that it isn't dangerous? Maybe she just didn't understand what I was trying to say due to language barrier, but her defiant reaction put me in a pinch regardless. I can't retreat backward without her to shield me, and can't shoot her either, since her teammates behind would have no hesitation dropping me dead when there's no hostage left to save. Besides, even with all of those SWAT-roleplay and hostage-taking bullshit I've just done, it just didn't sit well with me to actually take someone's life even in self-defense, and even if that "someone" is a miniature eldritch horror straight from Cthulhu's temple. Yes, I've experienced lots of violence in VR games and holographic-airsoft, but those were just video games, and the idea of shooting someone in a simulation only for that person to come back and kill you later makes it much easier to pull the trigger, unlike in real life. And now, in front of something that looked far too human, and knowing well that they're gonna die for real if I shoot, I suddenly felt way more hesitant to pull the trigger than before.
After a tense moment, I decided to warn the girl again: "I said, hands behind your head!". As expected, the girl still didn't comply. She peeked behind my back for some reason, then finally turned toward her team and yelled something that I could only interpret as insults directed at me.
"HANDS BEHIND YOUR HEAD, NOW!" I raised my voice while putting my free hand behind my nape, signaling for her to follow. Judging from her reaction, she'd definitely understood what I was trying to say, but just purposefully refused to cooperate.
Dammit, woman! Why must you make this harder for both of us!? I swear to God, as uncomfortable as it might be, I'll shoot you for real if you try to fuck me over with this bullshit!
"What the shell is it holding?" Anthia asked, revving up her splatling to store a torrent of ink, ready to be unleashed at any moment.
"I dunno, probably a sawed-off version of an N-Zap 85'. Still, the shooter's handle is too short for an N-Zap. And why would anyone cut away their shooter's barrel like that!? So impractical." Jason replied.
"So… can we all agree that it's sentient now?" Kaye added, fidgeting with his weapon anxiously.
"Well, salmonids use shooters too, and they're still dumb as shuck… so no. It ain't smart unless it speaks." Anthia answered.
"Guys! The thing doesn't even have an ink tank on! Its weapon is useless!" Linda called out, "Awwww! Are you seriously threatening me with that toy of yours?"
Oceanica, who had long ceased to be amazed by the creature, became impatient on how long the standoff had gone. She promptly gave out an order to the scout:
"Whatever, just splat the creature and get back to work. We'll let the eggheads have its body later."
"You got it, boss!" Linda answered in a cheerful tone, reaching for one of her dualies. If she would regret this action later in her life, will remain unknown. As soon as her gun left its holster, a large and bright-blue flash sparked out of the creature's weapon, accompanied by an ear-splitting 'POOM' that instantly sent the team into disarray.
"WHAT THE…!?" Maurice screamed as she staggered backward, hands covering her eyes, now blinded by the intense light. Droplets of searing hot liquid landed on the girl's face, burning her skin and disorienting her even more.
Is this… is this that thing's ink?
No. That can't be ink. This wetness, this water-like density…
…This smell! So distinctively pungent and sickeningly sour, that it made her want to retch her guts out. Even though she'd hardly ever encountered such a stench in her life, a primal and instinctual part of her still knew what the fluid was, without having to see it.
…B-blood!?
While the team was still trying to regain their bearings, Linda the scout only stood still in place, her wide, shock-filled eyes locked in a thousand yard stare. She was still trying to process the situation she was in, seemingly unaware of the lethality of what had just happened to her. Slowly, she looked down, and her eyes went wide upon meeting the charred gaping hole in her chest.
"Oh." was all Linda could muster, before weakly collapsing right in front of her colleagues' faces, letting out a wheezing and bubbling "Ghhrrk…" sound as she choked on her own blood. Below the girl's head, obscured by her sprawling tentacles, a puddle of dark pink pooled out and rapidly began to expand to all sides. A short and dread-filled silence ensued, each squad member taking in the sickening stench of burnt flesh.
"…"
"... Shoot it! Shoot it! OPEN FIRE!" Oceanica, who was the first out of her team to recover from the shock, screamed on top of her lungs at the creature. But before she could even raise her octoshot up, three more 'POOMs' erupted again, sending two octotroopers off their vehicles with huge chunks of flesh erased from their body. It broke everyone out of their stupor, and they immediately ran for cover while throwing everything they could muster at that thing. Inkjets, charger shots, splat bombs and octotrooper ink projectiles were sprayed blindly toward its general direction, painting the hallway's section in a deep shade of pink. The creature immediately grabbed its dropped backpack, and ducked behind the fallen platform's metal-plated handrails before any of the shots could land a hit.
"FALL BACK! FALL BACK NOW!" Oceanica shouted, then retreated with her squad back to the entrance hall. Meanwhile, Anthia laid down gallons and gallons of ink toward the creature's position and pinned it in its cover, buying time for her teammates to retreat. As soon as she stopped firing to give her weapon a chance to cool off, it swiftly popped up and snap-fired a shot at Anthia which narrowly missed her neck, punching clean through the face of an octotrooper behind her with a meaty 'squelch'. Anthia bolted back to her teammates who were taking cover behind the hallway entrance's wall opposite to the blast door, dragging her machinegun behind like an oversized travel-pack while screaming bloody murder like the sky was falling on her. Maurice peeked around the corner and fired several potshots at the creature, who immediately rewarded her with a plasma bolt that removed a decent chunk of the wall she was hiding behind.
Another 'POOM' erupted, and a shower of purple blood poured onto Mira's head, spewing forth from the now headless Octotrooper behind her. She kept firing her octoshot despite having her nostrils assaulted by its unbearable smell, ignoring the disgust and fear that was welling up inside her.
"It's trying to run! Maurice, throw a splat bomb at it!" Kaye called between short bursts of inkjets from the opposite wall, only for his octoshot-pro to take a direct hit in its small ink-tank and flew off his hands. He knelt down to pick it up but stopped mid-way when he discovered that half of the gun had already been turned into a pile of multicolored molten plastic. "Coddamnit!" Kaye cursed, unsheathing his mini-inkbrush and switching firing positions with his friend Jason - a sniper octoling.
"BOMBS AWAY!" Maurice yelled and pulled out a finger-sized plastic capsule from her short pocket. She attached the opening of the capsule onto her ink tank and filled it completely, causing it to inflate into a pink tetrahedral balloon that constantly flashes white. Maurice threw the bomb toward the creature's cover and it exploded, painting a large area around it with ink. A loud and guttural scream soon erupted after the explosion. Oceanica motioned everyone to a ceasefire, then peeked out from her cover with octoshot raised.
"Confirm splat?" Oceanica asked in her octopus form, hastily refilling her ink tank from a nearby puddle.
"…Negative. It fled just in time. But it got hit pretty hard, I think." Mira responded with a disgusted face, looking down at her blood stained clothes then at the far opposite end of the hallway where the creature just ran to. It poked its head peeking out of the corner in a frightened manner, and locked eyes with her in response. Kaye and Anthia hesitantly walked toward their fallen comrade with their mouths covered, retrieved her name tag with two fingers then dropped it onto Mira's hand. The soldier carefully put the blood-stained metal piece safely into her short pocket as if it's something fragile, giving it a small assuring pat. Upon Oceanica's command, two octotroopers moved to place Linda's corpse into a yellow body bag, then carried it to the octoseeker.
"The thing has retreated further down the hallway, away from our weapon's fire range. I highly suggest calling for backup. We don't know how many more tricks it has up its sleeves, so it's best to take precautions." Mira said, wiping herself clean with a stack of paper tissues from her personal kelp satchel.
"Huh? What the hell are you talking about, Mira?" Oceanica questioned with a raised eyebrow, "Why should we give up now? The creature's hurt, stupid and scared, possibly out of ink - or whatever it uses as ammo - since it ran away mid-fight. Even if it still has some ammo left, we have overwhelming numbers and firepower. Five octotroopers and five combat-hardened specialists against one crazed freak with a gun, how could it possibly win? Plus, if we call for backup, We'll have to split our prize to those squidheads as well, and you don't want that to happen, do you? So, I'd say… we go after the creatures and flank it from all sides, splat it 200% dead, yeet its body to the eggheads at base … then maybe have a crabby-cake or two later."
"But boss, it's too risky! Look at what happened to our colleagues! Its weapon can burn through walls and-"
"Shut your beak, soldier! This is a direct order, and you are not to disobey it! Everyone, we're hunting BIG games tonight! Also, can someone get Kaye here another weapon? We can't have him curse the creature to death, right?" Seeing the reckless attitude of the Elite, Mira couldn't help but shake her head in exasperation.
"Are you getting a bad vibe from this? Because this is exactly how horror movies tend to begin." Jason whispered to Anthia, uncertain about his superior's bold move.
"Yes, I am. What can I say… if we advance then we might die, but if we retreat then we will all die, so y'know… gotta choose the lesser evil" The gunner shrugged while handing Kaye an octo-brella, much to his displeasure of being forced to use something he isn't familiar with.
"Ayo what the shuck!? Why brella, dude?" Kaye protested, hesitantly giving back the brella shotgun to Anthia.
"You know what? That's all you're getting, so take it or leave it!" She snapped back, looking incredibly annoyed by Kaye's picky attitude. In front of his colleagues' fury, the male octoling ceased protesting, and picked his brella back up.
"Alright, alright, chill! Fine, I'm keeping it okay? Coddamn, why so grouchy?"
"Everyone's ready? Good! Let's get going." Oceanica announced loudly. And with that, the team advanced deep into the dark hallway, unaware of the danger awaiting them ahead.
Edited by HAKASE, my bestest mate