Just as promised, Tartar and Valentine found a way to extract Smollusk from Dramatic Days in Orderland. Tartar's arm hadn't returned, so Sheldon built him a prosthetic. It was a shiny gold colored metal arm that went to his elbow.

He didn't see Apocalypse for a while after the escape from the Spire, and hoped he wasn't in danger. Ron, however, was seen often, and the New New Squidbeak Splatoon were excited to see him again.

The Splatfest caught up to them rather quickly, and Tartar waited in the square to see what the theme would be.

Tako was practically hopping out of his seat with excitement. "Yaki! Guess what time it is!"

"It's Off the Hook time?"

"Uh, no. It's time for a Splatfest!"

Tartar nearly gasped when the screen behind them showed a fax machine. It was rusted in some spots, the darkness of the image making it hard to see the purple of its body, and the colored tape that it was being held together by.

"That's human technology, isn't it?"

Smollusk peeked around Tartar's arm. "The humans sure did do a lot, huh?"

Smollusk, even though he promised not to do anything bad anymore, was still in "time out" for what he had done before. His prison was a Tupperware container with holes poked into the top so he could breathe.

"Yeah." Tartar looked back to the screen.

"What's the theme, what's the theme?! Spill the news already!" Tako seemed to like Splatfests a lot more than Yaki did.

"The theme this time is 'what would you spend Valentines with your crush?' That's interesting."

"Well, I would do something romantic! That's sure to get them to notice my feelings for them! For example, a poem." He cleared his throat.

Tartar heard someone say, "Oh my gosh is he going to read it on live TV?"

"My three hearts all tell me that," he slid on his knees, "I love you."

"That wasn't a poem, Tako," Yaki sighed.

"I tried my hardest. This is why you write the lyrics for all of our songs..."

"I'm sure they'll love it."

Tako got off the ground. "Well, do you think it's good?"

"Um, sure. It could use more pizzazz though. I can help you with it if you want."

"N-no...It's fine..."

"Anyways, I'd do something casual. Why put all that money into something when you can hang out right at home? I'd love to watch a movie with you sometime!"

"But I'm busy this week. Maybe you can ask your crush though. I'm sure they'd like to."

"Oh, uh...okay."

"Pick your teams at the box!"

"Don't forget your Splatfest tee."

Tartar entered Ammo Knights. "Hey there, Sheldon. Thanks again for the prosthetic. You really didn't have to."

"It's no problem! After all, you're my number one customer!"

"Heh. Are you taking weapons, by chance? I want to run a few suggestions by you."

"Oh? You want to run some ideas by me? Well, go ahead then! I want to see the goods!"

Tartar put Smollusk's Tupperware on the counter, then pulled out his E-Liter. "This is an E-Liter 5k. I customized it myself. I used your E-Liter and adjusted it. It has a Killer Wail special and Squid Beacon sub."

"Hmm...A five-charge sniper seems a bit overpowered, no?"

"Well, it's not too ink heavy because that would kill me slowly. Of course, I can alter it again for production but-"

"Do you have other weapons for me?"

"Oh! Yes! Here, I have this one." The next one looked similar to the blender he used in NILS. "Don't worry, it's only an altered Splatling. I took the design from the superweapon NILS8 and-"

"Do you have anything not related to your villain era?"

"Uh..." He dropped it back in the box. "So, want to take them?"

Sheldon shot him a look.

"I'll leave then. But the offer's still open! I have a dozen new designs on the way!" He exited the building.

"Have you heard that Inkopolis Plaza's lobby is closing today?" An Inkling gossiped to an Octoling.

"Yeah, turns out some weird Inkling is pretty bummed about it," the Octoling replied.

"Inkopolis Plaza?" Tartar asked.

"Yeah, the first place Turf Wars ever opened. Just take the train. You really know nothing, do you?"

"Must be a noob," the Inkling said snootily.

"They must be punished!" Smollusk cried as Tartar scoffed at them and walked off.

"Don't worry about it. They're just a bit rude because they think they know everything. Heh, but they don't know that I know everything. The Inkling's insecure about her hair, and the Octoling hates the way the Inkling cooks."

"Wow...You're cool!"

Tartar unlocked his apartment and dropped the box of weapons on the table with a sigh. Something fell in his room, so he went to investigate.

Apocalypse was in there, putting the laptop back onto the table it was on before it fell. Tartar flinched when he saw the black feathery wings and pointed tail.

"Eight! Hey!" He awkwardly leaned on Tartar's desk. "I wasn't being weird, was I? This...this isn't weird, is it? That I'm in here?"

"The more you drag this out, the stranger it gets..."

The table snapped and Apocalypse fell.

"Aah! Are you alright?"

Apocalypse held up the laptop. "I saved it, it's fine."

Tartar grabbed it and put it on his bed. He helped Apocalypse to his feet. "What are you doing in my apartment?"

"I wanted to give you this." He held out his thick black arm.

"Before I take anything from you...You actually look like this? It wasn't just what Smollusk did to you to turn you to a Jelleton soldier?"

"It's a personal story, but yeah. Maybe I'll tell it to you, when I know I can trust you. But I wanted to give you this because...well, you did help me after all. But don't expect this as normal treatment."

Tartar held out his hands, and Apocalypse dropped the item into them. It was a crumpled-up paper. He fixed it and it simply said "thanks" with nothing else.

"You're an odd one, aren't-" He looked up, but Apocalypse was gone. He blinked. "Okay...Weird."

"That guy is weally weird," Smollusk agreed