Chapter 3 - Poked A Bear

Ugh…

F-fuck! What did I just do?! Why did I do that?!

I've just killed someone. Murder, fair and square.

… Wait, does she even count as a person?

I slumped down against the wall, shaky hands clutching my knees to my chest. I dropped my plasma gun next to my leg, its smoking barrel glowing bright orange from the heat. My vision was blurry and disconnected, like watching an old noir movie, reduced to only a fraction of its original size by my confused tunnel vision. My lungs, still recovering from cryo-sleep, were burning due to all the running, jumping and bullet dodging I just did. I'm wheezing whenever I exhale, but I paid no mind to it.

Fuck… fuck fuck fuck… FUCK!!...

With shallow and rapid breaths, I frantically took off my body armor, and patted myself to check for hits.

No external wounds, not even a graze.

I forced out a small laugh through my gritted teeth, not out of amusement but out of an attempt to push back the fear that's overtaking me. I know that this hasn't ended yet, and those fuckers are still hot on my tail. Becoming too horror-struck to move is the last thing I want to happen right now.

After making sure that my backpack was still intact, I took a deep breath to calm myself down, then peeked out from my cover. The humanoids seemed to be having a heated discussion at the far end of the hall, probably about the best way to murder my ass. Thankfully, they don't seem to care about me at all right now, so as long as I keep my eyes on them, I should be safe. Peaceful contact is out of the window at this point; like hell we'd be able to get along after what I just did to their friends.

Especially that first girl. Never thought I'd have the ball to actually drop someone like that. Killing people in VR and real life are two entirely different experiences. God… I know plasma weaponry typically has some serious stopping power, but I never would've expected it to be this… brutal. At least it was quick. Thank god I haven't eaten much, or that food would've gone to waste by now.

Even though I do feel some remorse for shooting the girl, it's still her fault, not mine. Seriously, who in their right mind pulls out iron when faced with a gun barrel at point-blank like that!? It's basically just asking to be capped. Hell, things might've even worked out smoothly for both sides if that girl wasn't such a dumbass. Fuckwit got what she deserves.

I glanced at my pistol's ammo counter, [3 SHOTS. LOW AMMO] it read, the text blinking a bright yellow. Despite the counter's warning, I didn't reload as suggested but instead felt around my jacket pocket for a full capsule, making sure that it's in the most comfortable position to pull out when needed. I'm not playing Call of Duty right now, so best not spam the "R" button. Placing the pistol on my lap, I rubbed my wrist in an attempt to reduce the soreness from the recoil. Lucky for me that my wrist isn't broken or anything, which is quite a surprise since this thing kicks like a horse. "Hasake Armaments Inc." probably didn't take the issue of recoil into account when designing this gun. Most plasma weapons are designed to be used by power-armored troops after all - one of the only exceptions being the Pulsar PDW inside by backpack. Did I really have to take a plasma gun? I could've just taken a simple 10mm with me into hibernation; dad gave me plenty of options to choose from back then. But noooooo! I just had to go straight for the hand fucking cannon, simply because it sounded cool.

Speaking of guns though… While those things were shooting at me a little bit ago, I noticed that the gunner pointed her cannon slightly upward, but the liquid jets still landed near me. Her teammates also did the same, pointing their guns all the way to the ceiling when shooting. When I fled from the battle, the group stopped firing altogether and simply stood watch, even though there was literally no reason for them to do so. I suppose those weapons they use all have pathetically short range, probably similar to a watering hose or super soaker, probably only good in close quarters. They also seem quite bulky and heavy, as evident when the gunner girl struggled to drag her weapon back to cover, or in the manner in which the other humanoids drew their guns. It looked like they were lifting bricks. With my pistol, I have a massive range advantage over those humanoids, as long as I keep my distance. The only problem was their weapons' quick fire rate and large splash radius, which means I'll most certainly be dead meat once I let one get close to me. I don't know what's in the liquid they use as ammunition, nor its effect on humans, and I'd rather not find out the hard way.

Now about the tank-tacles' goo bullet… They're big and have a longer range, since those scooter-riding freaks still fired at me even after I've reached the end of the hall. At the same time, they travel slow as all hell, and don't explode on impact like I'd initially thought. When one of them zipped past my face, the space around the bullet seemed to distort in a strange way, as if the bullet were covered in some sort of force field. My best guess: These tank-tacles' mounted guns are the bigger and cruder versions of my plasma pistol, using the same principle of encasing the projectile in an electromagnetic field that'll pop upon contact, then launch its payload at the target. But instead of using superheated plasma, their cannons use pink ketchup as ammo. Slow as their projectiles are, these tank-tacles still pose a threat, since they can lay down suppressing fire for the humanoid ones to get close to me. I'll make them my top priority targets to put down.

Feeling my stomach rumble again, I pulled out my other bag of chips, tore it open and began to shove fistfuls of the crispy BBQ-flavored pieces into my mouth, all the while keeping a watchful eye on the enemy. The invaders were now standing in front of the hallway entrance, still conversing with each other as if I didn't even exist. None of them even bothered to take cover behind nearby walls, completely exposing themselves to my line of fire. They must've thought that my gun has the same limited range as theirs, and can't possibly reach them from where I am. Boy, are they in for a nasty surprise.

I threw the empty wrapping away after finishing the last of the chips, and wiped my greasy hand on my trousers like the unrefined savage I am. Hopefully its dark-brown color would make the food's yellowish smears less noticeable. Plus, it's not like I'm in any need of a presentable personal image anyway. That certainly won't make them think twice about blowing my brains out.

Cracking my knuckles with a satisfying 'pop', I knelt up with my pistol, taking another glance down the long hallway. The humanoids are still blocking the far end of it, having ceased their heated discussion and instead placing all their focus on to me, apparently about to make their next move. I looked around me, then at a small and uncorrupted section of my helmet's HUD minimap, particularly the part that I'm currently in. As far as I can see, there are no other ways to enter this place, other than the main corridor in front of me.

…Are they seriously planning to cram themselves into this rat tunnel to get to me?

True to my expectation, two "male" humanoids stepped to the front of the group, no doubt going to be the first to advance. The others would probably follow right behind in a line.

Huh. That… certainly simplified things a lot. - I raised an eyebrow, fidgeting with my pistol in anticipation. In a long and narrow hallway with practically no cover like this, I wouldn't even need to aim to land my shots. Just need to point it in their general direction, pull the trigger blindly, and watch those fuckers drop like flies. It's like those 80' alien-shooting arcade games all over again. So… which one of you uglies want to go first?

The humanoid on the left stared at me, before he stepped forward, knelt down and aimed his colorful sniper rifle at me. He(?) slowly squeezed the trigger, causing the gun to let out a shrill whirring noise that slowly increased in pitch and intensity, as if it was charging a shot.

That is… oddly familiar. I swear I've heard it somewhere before…

…I just can't remember the exact occasion. Mildly frustrated, I slapped my forehead lightly and gave my brain a quick jog. Memory after Memory took turns flashing up in my mind, as I hastily rummaged through the colossal library-of-life inside my head, none of them matching what I'm currently hearing. The humanoid still hasn't fired his rifle yet, and I stopped my search at one particular memory. It's the one about my dad's old combat footage collection that he used to show me when talking about his glorious war stories.

One of them features him and his drunken teammates cutting down trees with an anti-vehicle railgun, back in the early Boston Campaign. How they even came up with such a stupidly dangerous pastime, I never knew. But…

… It was the same sound I'm hearing right now.

Don't tell me… Is that a fucking 'AV' that he's holding?

Oh shit.

If that thing has what I think it does, then I'm in deep shit right now. That's not your average rail-gun, nothing even comes close. The AV railgun, the weapon that drills canals through tanks and mech suits, reduced entire machine gun outcrops into slag, and turned people into nothing more than red mist and a memory - all with complete ease. Its name and destructiveness was revered all around the world, and very often if you had one on your side, you would win the battle. Despite having a painfully slow wind-up time, once that process is finished, it's basically impossible for anything to survive the tungsten-coated, half kilo slug that it fires at hypersonic speed. Even if the shot misses, the extreme heat, shockwave and fucking RADIATION that comes after it would still finish the job.

… And I've just let this one finish charging up a round. To say I'm fucked would be the understatement of the century.

What the FUCK did I even do, for them to pull that on me!?

I ducked back to cover just before the sound reached its highest pitch, then slumped against the wall and covered my ears with both hands. Despite being on the verge of pissing myself, I didn't clench my teeth, but rather opened my mouth wide, so that the shockwave wouldn't rupture my eardrums. One of the many seemingly-useless things they'd taught us back in the boot camp, now proven otherwise.

The people who made this facility used to say that its walls are made of concrete, and reinforced by meters thick layers of steel. Hopefully it's enough to resist, or at least bend the trajectory of one railgun slug. Hopefully.

The weapon beeped.

Oh fuck HERE IT COMES-

…

-'PFFFFT'

….

Wha-

A low and dull 'puff' sound rang out. I wasn't deafened or dead, and everything around me was still intact.

Did he just… misfire or something? Probably not, since railguns have such a low chance of manfunctioning, one of the benefits of having almost no moving parts. And even if they did, they would explode in their user's face instead of making that fart-like noise. Letting go of my ears, I glanced to my right, and was surprised to find a wide trail of purple liquid on the floor that led from the gunner's position to me.

Welp, false alarm… - Son of a bitch nearly made me piss myself. Turns out it's just another of their toys, but with a pool noodle for a barrel and a flashy paint job. Cupping my hands around my mouth and laughing like a maniac, I shouted towards the group.

"Hey! Heeeey! Fuck you! Yeah, you! Your gun's fucking blow ass! Your friends too! Can't aim for shit!" The sniper humanoid stood up and cocked his head to the side in confusion, my insults apparently having a hard time getting through him. But before he could respond to any of them, the umbrella-holding humanoid male pushed him aside by the shoulder, then knelt down in his place instead.

You gotta be shitting me… - I smacked my forehead with a loud 'thwack'. A certain white-haired physicist of old once said: "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over, and expecting different results". Never before had this quote held more true to me than right now. They're SERIOUSLY considering wasting ammo on another attempt, instead of coming up with something else.

If they really decide to do that, I would be so goddamn disappointed.

Oh wait-

-Contrary to my expectation, the disappointment never came. Instead, he folded his umbrella into a neat bundle not bigger than my forearm, put it away somewhere behind him and…

…What in the actual fuck.

Did he just… morph into an octopus!?

No, the word "morph" doesn't describe what just happened. The humanoid literally DEFLATED its body, then proceeded to FOLD over like a blanket. After that, like a pile of sentient play-doh, the neatly folded pile swiftly MOLDED itself into a cartoonish-looking octopus the size of a grown pitbull, with comically large eyes.

I covered my mouth in shock, as the other members of the team knelt down and followed suit. The first octopus-thing jumped on the ink(?) trail and sped toward me like a pink, fleshy and very aggressive Roomba.

O shit! - I aimed my pistol at the approaching creatures but was forced to dodge to the side, narrowly avoiding three ink bullets flying at my face. Fuck, forgot those scooter-riding bastards existed.

Swiftly regaining my balance, I fired two times at a random tank-tacle without aiming, my ears ringing loudly from the deafening gunfire. Both shots missed meters away from it, but at least I managed to momentarily stop their barrage, and force them off their scooters. One shot in the cell.

I scaled the pistol scope's reticle at the next still-firing tank-tacle, but saw through the corner of my eyes that two octopuses have already reverted back to their human form next to me. The one with a tomboy cut pointed his umbrella at my chest and fired.

"-GHUUGCKKH!!" - the air was violently knocked out of me, as the melon-sized blob of ink collided with my kevlar vest with a wet 'thud', pushing me against the wall. He grinned smugly, before racking his ink shotgun for another point-blank shot. But before he could pull the trigger again, I bolted forward and grabbed his weapon's barrel, pointing it to the ground. His expression quickly changed to one of surprise as I swiftly closed the distance; he clearly wasn't expecting me to stay up from the blast, let alone regain my balance so quickly. Then, I pistol-whipped the bastard square in the face with a resounding 'thwack'. That's gotta hurt for sure.

Gotcha bitch!

Letting out a pained groan, he stumbled backward and fell with a hand covering his dotted left eye, dropping his umbrella shotgun in the process. With him being mostly out of the fight, I turned my attention toward the other humanoid, who had just finished her transformation and was still unfolding her SMG. I threw a wild haymaker at the girl's face with my left hand, which she easily dodged. The girl grinned like mad and gritted her teeth in anger, showing her razor-sharp beak that almost made me hesitate for a moment, and aimed her gun at me. Before she could pull the trigger, I kicked her in the stomach and knocked her off balance. Grabbing her by the neck, I threw her into the wall as hard as I could. These humanoids, despite their muscular stature, are way weaker than I expected. Almost as bad as the bunch of unathletic nerds back in my school, if I'm being honest.

The girl dodged my next pistol-whip with surprising agility, and swiftly pulled out a small yellow paintbrush from her shorts pocket. slashing at me with it like a combat knife, I managed to narrowly dodge the first hit, but not the second one. It skimmed harmlessly across my body and left a horizontal streak of ink on my kevlar vest.

"FUCK!" I cursed loudly while backing out of her range, covering my body with my left arm, and fired my last remaining plasma charge at her head.

'POOM!'

A large and jagged chunk was carved out of the humanoid's "hair" as the bolt collided, showering me with bits of charred flesh and severed tentacles. She screamed out in pain and clutched her wound, weakly staggering away from me in fear. Before she could make it to the wall, I grabbed her collar and pulled her into a chokehold. Here comes another hostage situation. Noticing that her teammates had just arrived and were about to fire at me, I faced the girl toward them and took cover behind her back. Those guys probably know that their teammate is still alive, just close to completely bald. These people wouldn't open fire at their own teammate, right?

The black-haired elite shouted and sprayed her SMG in full auto, hitting the girl square in the face. The others followed suit shortly after, opening fire without any regard for my hostage's life. The barrage completely turned the (even I had to admit) poor girl into a grotesquely surreal work of pink art, only a few of those shots actually managed to hit me at all It honestly doesn't feel too dissimilar from being splashed with water, and it might be just as harmless. Can't say for certain yet, with not having any reference for long term effects. I held the girl tight, despite her desperate struggle to break free, and slowly knelt down to grab the humanoid male's dropped umbrella shotgun. Then, with a kick to the ass, I sent the surrealist artwork falling face-first to the ground, and used the short distraction to force-open the umbrella. The group resumed firing right after that, pounding my improvised shield with everything they had – explosives included. The umbrella's skeleton creaked under the crushing torrent of liquid, and a few of its plastic ribs snapped, but I held onto it for dear life regardless. Right when I thought I lost my grip, they ceased their fire, and the sound of liquid being sucked into a container was heard. Are they… refilling their ink tank? Or are they trying to trick me into lowering my shield, and then blast my ass off?

Well, you know what!? FUCK LOGIC! I'm taking the gamble!

I tossed the ragged umbrella aside, pointed my pistol at the bunch of tank-tacles and octofied-humanoids. And for a brief moment, I looked like one of those old western gunslinging badasses, straight from some power-fantasy movie on Netflix. One against many, armed with nothing but a pistol, and still managing to put up a fight… Damn, this is the moment that makes life worth living!

I smirked wickedly and pulled the trigger. Naptime, motherfucker!

…'click'… Huh?

I glanced at the ammo counter.

[CELL EMPTY]

Ah shit…

I glanced back at the group of aliens, who were staring wide-eyed at my gun, still awaiting their fate in utter terror.

Now what? … uh, right! A distraction! I need a distraction!

Rummaging around in my jacket for a moment, I grab a spare flashlight battery. Please let this work..

"GRENADE!" I shouted as loud as possible, tossing the battery in front of the group. Turns out, that actually worked. The group immediately dove for cover as soon as the battery landed, placing their arms over their heads while squealing pathetically. Taking my chance, I booked it out of there. A few ink bullets managed to hit my back when I ran, but the exoskeleton-like frame and thick armor plates of my bulletproof vest absorbed the majority of the impact. Though, judging from how much I was pushed forward when they hit me, it would have hurt like hell if I wasn't wearing this vest. My gratitude to the P-Sec guy.

Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck… keep running! Don't stop! KEEP RUNNING!

Still grinning from the adrenaline rush, I charged blindly through the hall's mini-park, sprinting past benches and water fountains like a madman. However, due to the darkness of the hall, I failed to notice the giant rotten tree in the middle of the park and ended up barreling right through it, taking a mouthful of its nasty insides.

The giant rotten tree fell down with a loud 'slam', immediately breaking into large mounds of dirt as soon as it touched the ground. I barely had time to dodge aside before continuing my mad dash out of the mini-park's gate, only coming to a stop after taking cover behind one of the second floor's support pillars. Panting loudly, I wasted no time in checking the places where I'd been hit with their ink. I wasn't able to see clearly in the dark, but I managed to make-do with the faint light from my plasma pistol's glowing-hot barrel. I need to move quickly before it cools off. Much to my relief, the thick liquid wasn't able to seep through my thick winter jacket, and my neck was protected by the security vest's tall collar, so no damage was done. God, I need a drink. That sprint took a lot out of me. reaching into my pack, I pulled out my water bottle.. I twisted the bottle cap and… sure enough, it's empty. What did I even expect? Welp, just gotta roll with it for now.

I took out my switchblade and stuffed it inside my pant pocket for easy access, not forgetting to take a quick glance at the opposite hall. Tossing another piece of chewing gum into my mouth, I ejected the spent battery from my gun's mag well and loaded a new one in.

From now on, no mercy. Shoot on sight. Shoot to kill.

"Oh carp! BOMB!" Oceanica shouted, taking a step back from the strange object that was thrown in front of her. She then swiftly turned into a black octopus by reflex and super-jumped away from the blast radius, slamming into the wall with a loud thud.

"GET DOWN!" Anthia screamed and hit the floor, hands protecting her nape. Her teammates followed suit, and the octotroopers - who can't duck like their developed brethren – simply took cover behind their combat scooters. Everyone held their breath…

One second…

Two seconds…

Three seconds…

…

Eight seconds…

"Wait, what? Why didn't it explode?" Mira perked her head up and looked around. And sure enough, the strange "bomb" was still laying in front of her, completely unchanged.

"Dang it! It wasn't a bomb at all! That monster tricked us!" Jason shouted in anger, throwing the battery away and slamming his hand on the ground repeatedly like a raging kid. "And it ran away like a shucking coward!"

"Curb your carp, Jason!" Oceanica – who was the first one to stand back up – ordered. "Go check up on Maurice and Kaye first! We need a medic bag over here!"

By the elite's command, Jason and Mira ran up to the two wounded octolings with a pink medical kit – which can only deal with ink damages, and some small physical injuries such as shallow cuts, while the others surrounded them with their weapons aimed at the end of the hall. Jason knelt down to inspect Kaye's eyes and found out that he was still conscious. Despite the guy not being in critical condition, and only suffering a bruise and some scratches where the weapon's grip made contact, Jason still shook his head in pity for him. Mira knelt next to her younger sister, eyes welled with tears. They were born and raised under the same roof, they went to the same school, got drafted into the same regiment, and stayed in the same dorm. They've been depending on each other to survive, shared countless joys, and overcame great hardships together. The twins were so inseparable, that their relationship had developed into something greater than simple sisterhood.

They were each other's lifelines.

And now, some lowly creature. A single – stupid – savage - dirty creature was trying to take Mira's other half from her! That bastard… oh how she'll enjoy killing it.

Mira hurriedly placed the medkit next to Maurice and cradled the girl's head in her arm. Then she wiped the pink ink off the girl's body, and whispered in a shaking voice: "Maurice? Maurice! Can you hear me? Wake up, Maurice!". No response.

"MAURICE!" The girl's whisper turned into a loud wail, as Mira barely held back her tears. Still no response.

Right when Mira was about to lose it, Oceanica calmly walked up to the crying girl, stared at the duo for a short moment… and slapped Maurice right in her cheek. Hard.

"WHA-!?" Mira snapped out of her trance and stared at her superior with shock, which quickly became scorching anger. But just when she was about to pound the elite into paste, her sister opened her eyes, and groaned quietly.

"Don't play soft, soldier. Crying wouldn't have brought your sister back, so do something about it instead of whining." Oceanica stated with a blank expression, then walked away to check up on Kaye. Damn hag, talking all high and mighty like she's Mira's grandmother, without having the slightest clue about their relationship. Mira hates that bitches guts, but she decided to just swallow it down for the sake of the mission. Just this once.

"Oww. Cod… that hurt… sis? Uhh...Where is it? Have you guys splatted it yet?" Maurice asked in a daze, darting her eyes around the corridor before stopping in her sister's loving eyes. Her head was buzzing like a swarm of hornets inside, and her neck felt… lighter than before. Probably thanks to the massive lack of her head tentacles, which was nearly 1 kilogram each.

"Sadly, no. It used Kaye's brella to shield our attacks and then it ran away. But let's not talk about it for now. Tell me, are you hurt? Did the thing do anything to you other than… uh… that? Swear to the Great Octavio, I will do every terrible thing imaginable to that little dogfish once I get my hands on it." Mira said, poking at the round hole in her sister's ruined bouffant with a finger. Maurice smiled reassuringly and stood up.

"It's fine, sis. My Octo-armor took all the blunt. And the shot hit my hair instead of my head, so… heh, I'm fine. It didn't even hurt, really. Probably just look real ugly right now. You remember that Annaki beret that you took from an inkling prisoner a year ago? Well, I think I've found a use for it." Maurice said with a smile, trying to cheer her sister up.

"Wait… did you just call that thing "He"?" Mira picked up her dynamo roller, before realizing something was wrong with her sister. Unfortunately Maurice had already gone to secure the perimeter and didn't hear her ask, so she decided to just drop the question. Come to think of it though… The creature's movements and actions just then were obviously calculated, and definitely weren't based on pure primal instinct. Welp, guess Kaye won the bet then. But for now, they have a bigger problem to deal with.

"Ey, boss! Kaye's still fine! Well... mostly." Jason reported to his superior after cleaning his teammate's wound and dressing it with a simple bandage (which is totally a waste of medical equipment, since Kaye's eyes aren't even bleeding… but protocols are protocols). Oceanica and the rest of the team turned to look at Kaye, who was still looking around with his intact eye. As Kayes injured eye turned toward them, a collective gasp rang out from the group.

Feeling the stare of his teammates, Kaye decided to just wait for an answer, before he realized something horrifying. He slowly reached his shaky hand to his bandaged eye and touched it, his face turning into an expression of horror.

"Jason… how bad is it?" Kaye asked apprehensively, lightly fidgeting with the layers of bandage and realizing that he could still use both eyes normally. He received only silence and a sympathetic look from the boy as an answer. "…Does anyone have a mirror? I'd like to see for myself."

No one had one, or they simply weren't willing to lend him one. Realizing no one would give him a mirror, Kaye took out his pocket makeup kit he always carries with him. Its mirror is pretty small, but it should do fine.

All hell broke loose after that.

In the Octarian society, instead of the male being the dominant gender, the female – who is stronger, larger and more aggressive – is. Female octolings tend to do all the heavy work such as fighting, and therefore are regarded higher than the males with their weaker physique. When the oestrus cycle comes, it's the female octolings who will choose their male partner based on facial appearance, tentacle style and height. Without any of those criterias, it would be significantly harder for a male octoling to find a partner and continue his bloodline. This is why the face is considered the most important part of a male octoling, and merely touching it without permission is considered a grave insult to not just him, but his family as a whole.

And that lanky son of a blobfish didn't just merely touch Kaye's face, but shucking desecrated it with its filthy paws! The wound that it caused would surely leave a scar, ruining the cute innocent-looking eye that he has always been proud of, and taking away his greatest opportunity in life! Kaye stared blankly at his reflection in the mirror, seething rage slowly boiling up inside him. His teammates, even Oceanica herself, were hesitant to approach the about-to-go-mad octoling. All of them were afraid of getting into the radius of his impending wrath, despite knowing that Kaye's instinct doesn't allow him to hurt the opposite gender. Jason however, decided to sit next to his best friend anyway and try to reason with him.

"Uh, dude…" Jason tried to catch the guy's attention, receiving only silence as an answer. He gently grabbed Kaye's arm, but Kaye refused to move and continued to stare at his mirror.

"…Dude, listen. It ain't that bad, I assure you. I used to have a wound like that before and-"

Before he could finish his word, Kaye violently ripped his arms from his grip, causing the sniper to nearly fall down. "TO SHELL WITH YOUR COAX! YOU SEE WHAT IT DID TO ME, AND STILL SAID THAT 'IT'S NOT BAD' !?" He screamed at his friend's face, smashing the make-up box to the ground and shattering the mirror into a million pieces.

"MY BEAUTY… MY PRIDE… it's shucking GONE!" He screamed, tears streaming from his manic eyes.

"Wha- dude, calm down, CALM DOWN!" Jason sat back up and made another attempt to cool his friend down before being grabbed by Anthia.

"Stop, don't add fuel to the fire. You're making this worse." She whispered, pulling the octoling boy away from Kaye in the process. Reluctantly, he complied, and was about to stand up and leave with Anthia, before a fully-psychotic Kaye lashed out and yanked his charger rifle away from him. He also snatched Maurice's octoshot, and connected the two new weapons into his ink tank.

"Swear of the Great Oct, if I'm going down today, then I'm taking that dogfish down with me… it'll PAY for this!" He hissed aggressively, holstering the octoshot next to his ink tank, and ran off further down the hall. Two octotroopers got off their scooters and tried to stop Kaye, but he effortlessly shoved them all aside like bags of wool.

"Wait, Kaye! Don't go, it's dangerous!" Maurice called out, but her warning was ignored. She didn't call to him out of friendship, or respect, but out of her duty as a soldier to not allow her platoon to split apart.

Maurice was about to run after Kaye but was held back by Oceanica before she could take two steps. "You will NOT go after him! He's already gone too far into uncharted territory." The black-haired elite said firmly, looking deep into her young subordinate's eyes.

"B-but, Ma'am! One of our army's motto is 'to never leave an octoling behind!' Why can't I g-" Maurice objected, gazing at the dark and eerily vacant end of the hallway that Kay has just disappeared into.

"-Yes, that's one of our mottos. " Oceanica abruptly cut the girl off. "And do you know what the other is? It's "Always be brave and courageous". Yes, Maurice, "brave and courageous" is far different from "suicidal", and you were about to cross that line! Kaye already made his choice, now he has to deal with it! We can't risk everyone else's lives for the stupidity of one individual!"

The Elite turned to her team: "Now that we know what we're dealing with here and what it can do, we can't afford to be careless anymore. As you've seen before, our weapons aren't effective against whatever this thing is, and that's why we need some heavier armaments. People, let's move to the Octoseeker, and grab some handheld stingrays! Now that we know that it's immune to our ink, let's see how well the creature fares against sheer blunt force trauma!" Oceanica ordered her team, and they all began heading toward the bunker's reception hall in silence. Anthia glanced at the hallway one last time and heard distant gunfire revibrating in it. Looks like the battle for vengeance has already started. She sighed defeatedly and exited the blast door with her team, praying for the poor bastard to at least hold out until they return.

Edited by Hakase and Senut