Chapter 16: Harmonizing on Hump Day

By the time dawn lit the plaza, the two inklings left Sheldon's shop.

"Well you seem to be the most adept at using shooters." Aeolia stated going over their results. "Just stick with one weapon type for now and see what resonates with you the most."

Luke sighed. They had spent the entirety of their time at Ammo Knights trying to figure out what weapons Luke had some talent for. Unfortunately, he didn't have a knack for sharpshooting with a charger nor was he really for rollers as he was slow to react with them. Shooters seemed the best option. It was still a bit disappointing, but he reasoned in his mind that he probably shouldn't care about being able to use them as long as he could use any weapon.

"Don't get discouraged." Aeolia told him, "It's natural to be unsure of where you fit in. You'll find what your good at in due time."

He sighed, "I'll try to keep it in mind…"

He left the weapons shop, Aeolia staying behind to practice.

In the plaza, Luke saw the traffic of enthusiastic turf players flood in at a steady pace. Had he left the shop maybe an hour or two earlier, he might've contemplated heading back home.

But then, his team had all filed into the plaza so that plan had withered spectacularly in his mind.

Brodie had done a double take as he looked from Nova towards the plaza, "Luke?" He looked the other boy over. What are you doing here this early?'

Luke felt the cold sweat of realization begin to drip down his face as he ran through scenarios to tell his team. "Oh, I-I honestly didn't expect to see you guys this early, I-um-well-I-uh came here to go see what the shops had available, you know get outta these duds and look for something more…me? B-but the shops were all closed so I had to wait a bit; I didn't wanna go back home after waking up this early, y'know?"

There was a tense moment with trio before someone spoke up.

"Oh, great!" Nova piped up, "Then that means we're about ready to practice right?"

Luke could swear that she was probably trying to dispel the weirdness in the air, why her reasons where were left ambiguous to him but he mentally noted to thank her later for her discretion. "Yeah. I could got for some morning rounds if that's ok." They both looked to Brodie who held up his hands in mock defense.

"Hey don't look at me like that! You're the boss man, boss man." He chuckled, "I'm ok with whatever…"

"Alright then," As Luke thought for a few moments to himself, he immediately noticed the amount of choice he had this moment. With Deborah and Tytus still not here and not pressuring them, they had time to themselves.

"Well we could try to do some battles." He was met with the confused glance of Brodie and the encouraging stare of Nova. "More practice wouldn't hurt, and we could group up with a random person for now."

"Won't the others get mad? Or at least Deborah…"

"She can't get mad at us for practicing and working hard can she? If she does-um..." He thought about what he was gonna say before muttering, "I'll take responsibility…I guess…"

"No need to take it all!" she gave him a delighted chuckle. When he looked at her like she'd grown a second head she clarified, "We are a team, so we should do things as a team. We're in this together, Luke."

As she smiled at him, he returned it. Which caused her face to light up with joy.

"Is that a smile I see?" she quipped.

Luke was quick to ty to hide his smile, but his body betrayed a certain excitement. "L-let's go!"

With that, they walked into the lobby.

Port Mackerel, a local shipping yard and a popular dating site by many people had recently prepared for turfing. This is where the trio were to have their first battle of the day.

3…

Luke took a deep breath, oxygen pouring from lungs to muscles.

2…

1…

Everyone had tensed on the respawn pads like a pack of hungry Morays.

Go!

Luke was the last one on the pad as the rest of the squad had rushed towards the center. He took the upper left path as it had yet to be covered. As all of the green team crossed the open field, Luke could see the opposing pink team; a Splash-o-Matic, a Splattershot Jr., and a Jet Squelcher. He couldn't see their 4th member however. Nova and Brodie had advanced past, leaving their Krak-On Splat Roller with him. He sprayed a shower of ink onto the ground before following behind Brodie. The mint-tentacled inkling had intercepted the Splash-o-Matic and was currently evading the rush of suction bombs littering the left corridor. Brodie tucked himself behind a crate, tossing his own salvo of burst bombs in an attempt to nail him, Luke dove into the green-inked left corridor and narrowly dodged a shot from the Jet Squelcher as they were fending off Nova, who got off her bubbler and was trying to push before it ran out. Hitting the right wall, Luke tossed two burst bombs down and was delightfully surprised to see he smacked the Jr. directly. The two exchanged shots, Luke strafing out into the open to splat his query. Luke swam into the opponent's field, breaching his ink to land a few shots at the Squelcher who diverted his attention to him who put a splash wall between him and Luke to keep his back protected. Brodie broke through just as the 4th member, an Aerospray MG, leapt down at him. He tossed down a seeker which had chase Luke, splatting him against a container.

Rising from the ink, Luke into the center via the right passage and surveyed; the pink team had been kept at bay by their roller. As the Kraken was activated, the Jet Squelcher was pushed back deeper into their territory. Luke dived into the ink to aid the others. With the other two shooters bearing down on their opponents, he took advantage of the opening down the middle to sandwich the Splash-O-Matic. With the roller helping Nova, the team were allowed to advance. With a little over half of their time remaining they had turned the turf green.

Now, they just had to keep it that way.

"Hey!" Nova beckoned him. "While we got a second."

He swam over to her inquisitively. "They're gonna hit us hard when they respawn. They'll probably try to flank us so keep your eyes peeled." He gave an affirmative nod.

He patrolled the main area with Brodie while their roller and Nova took point

As they reached the middle of the corridor, he could make out a shower of pink with the roller taken out by a leaping Seeker. He had no chance to take the MG out as he was glanced by an Inkstrike's splatter, followed by a steady stream of ink. He looked up at his assailant on the right-side corridor, the Jet squelcher with a Splash Wall, and made the split-second decision to retreat to the center corridor. The Jet squelcher bore down on him hard and eager to splat him. Luke tried to fend off the long-range inkling with his burst bombs, mind racing for a way out. His eyes landed on the approaching forklift, and before he was overwhelmed he changed trajectory and launched himself onto the ink-splattered vehicle. He positioned himself over his new vantage point, dispatching his harasser.

Luke turned to the chaotic splattlefield behind him and saw that the roller was nowhere to be seen and Nova was still holding her own, albeit barely; Luke could see she was trying to escape the tide of pink ink only to fall to a well place suction bomb. He winced. Her face was that of someone who had accepted their demise and it made the ink on Luke's tentacles churn and fizzle at the sight. He shook off his dazed staring as the final minute begun.

He leapt into the marbly green-pink swirl below him, throwing bombs to give himself and his teammates ground to work with. By now, the roller had rejoined the fray to keep the pink team contained had had amassed enough energy to transform into a kraken. Luke and Brodie used the opportunity to trail behind, wreathing the stage in green. The trio made it to the spawn point, which had been abandoned. Trail of pink trail behind them from the upper platforms.

Brodie was the first to move, "They got past us!" He dived to the right pathway. The roller pivoted left. Luke was left to decide what to do. Awkwardly, left behind and with no idea with what to do, he stumbled back the way he came.

Thirty seconds on the clock and the pink team had hastily marked the center. As they advanced from behind, Nova approached on the defense of their home turf, halting the Sploosh in its tracks. While the others to chased after the rest of the team, Luke checked the clock; the timer dwindled to the last 10 seconds. He could think of nothing better to do but ink the enemy's side more and ensure every surface that constituted as ground as coated until the time ran down.

At the shriek of the finishing whistle the two teams stood in place. As the last drop of ink fell, and each player looked intensely at Judd's portly figure rising onto one of the top crates. He surveyed the turf intently with a trained eye. Luke could only shiver with an anticipation he only assumed was natural for anyone hooked on this sport.

When Judd lifted the flag of green team, Ocean's Sonata and their tagalong player cheered in joy.

As they began to travel back, Luke felt his friends latch onto his shoulders. Brodie had grasped his left while Nova slung herself around his right.

"Mission success!" She whooped, "We should go again!"

Luke thought about that; he could already see an infuriated Deborah crushing their high with a demeaning comment before going in for the kill.

As if to voice the concern Brodie spoke up with a hesitant, "I dunno…" Nova looked to him, with the confused cock of the brow. "Won't Deborah get mad?"

Nova had laughed off his caution with a grin. "Can't say it'd be a good idea to care, especially with how she treats us!" Earning a full-hearted laugh from Brodie and a nervous one from Luke, "Besides, she should be happy we got in some extra practice ourselves."

She had a point. Deborah had constantly nipped at their hills over anything and everything she could dig at with nothing to really show for it save for the trio's resentment. He couldn't exactly disagree with it when he felt like there wasn't any good point to go over at this point.

"C'mon! Next game!"

/ \

The day whittled by and the three had gone from game to game to game.

Brodie leaned against the wall heaving, "Ok guys, I need a break."

Luke wasn't feeling quite worn down yet, surprisingly, and Nova seemed to not even be affected by the back-to-back matches. That aside, it probably would be a good idea to take a breather, if only to let Brodie rest.

Nova seemed to already agree as she was already leading and coaxing the two of them out.

Awaiting them was a furious Deborah and Tytus along with a friendly, yet oblivious Cass.

If looks could kill, Luke was sure the other half of Ocean's Sonata would have been mere smears on the ground by now.

Deborah sneered menacingly and strode up to them, her gaze particularly being locked onto Nova and uttering words barely above a whisper.

"And what, pray tell, do you think you're all doing without us?" she hissed. "You're my team, and you're not going to play unless there are four of us-"

"First of all." Nova said, matching her assailant's tone. "Not your team, this is Luke's team."

The blood vessels throbbing on her head couldn't be any clearer indication that she was FUMING.

"Second of all," she continued. "Who asked you to play puppeteer? Commanding everyone like you even have a shred of say in what we do, when YOU aren't even doing anything to help us get better."

Seeing the both of them go at each other was intimidating, but it was inevitable that he'd have to step in or they'd both cause a scene. So, he took a breath, steeled his nerves and grasped Deborah by the shoulder.

Now, he had only meant to simply gently pull her away, but his nerves had him grabbing a lot more briskly than he was trying to. Despite that he decided to try to loosen up and roll with it.

"If I may be so bold… I think we should keep in mind we are still in front of the turf war lobby."

She looked like she wanted to protest but was quick to ease her stance at the murmurs of the pedestrians staring at them.

She moved past him, less than politely tearing his hand from her shoulder, "Don't touch me…" she growled walking away back out to the plaza. Tytus and Cass followed her; where she was going, nobody could really tell.

Brodie watched in mild astonishment as she walked off, "Dude, I'm surprised you actually stood up against her like that."

'I am too…' he wanted to say. He was arguably more surprised she was being somewhat reasonable and decided not to choose violence. But he knew he couldn't leave things here. She'd just hold a grudge.

"Brodie could you follow me and help to persuade her to come back?"

Brodie's response was high-pitched, "What?! Why me? Why not Nova?" She waved non-chalantly at the mention of her name. "She's the negotiator!"

"They also both hate each other. I kind of don't need anymore sparks to fly."

"And you think she'll lis-HEY!" Brodie gave up as he was dragged away towards wherever Luke dragged him off to.

/ \

Deborah had dragged the boys down one of the numerous alleyways that connected to the plaza, her face a dark storm broiling over the active caldera of her temper.

"Hey Deborah?"

"Yes Cass~?" although her entire demeanor changed, both of the boys could tell she was just swallowing her venom down to hide her true feelings.

Uncomfortably, he rubbed his arm. "I didn't say it before, but are you alright? You didn't seem to like that the others were practicing without us?"

She was caught off guard. A fluttered response came. "I-I mean they left us out of practice. That's definitely unacceptable. Luke should have definitely included all of our team instead of gathering just his two favorites and going off with some random."

"Well true." He shrugged, gesturing his thoughts with his hands. "But you did seem a little bit too angry about it. And I'm sure he didn't mean to hurt your feelings."

"Well I mean-" she looked like she wanted to pout and cry. Sniffling a bit, she sighed, "I guess I can accept an apology if he ever offered it…if you think it'd be worth it."

"Of course! We should be getting along, not fighting."

Tytus rolled his eyes at this soap opera until where his eyes had drifted had shown him that they had a familiar face approaching.

"Yo, Deb. It's them."

The trio whipped around to see Luke and Brodie approaching them. The two were greeted in kind by Cass' pleased grin, Tytus' defensive scowl, and Deborah's surprised yet displeased countenance.

"Why are YOU here?" she asked, barely keeping herself from sounding nearly as nasty as she did before.

As calmly as he could, Luke replied, "I simply want to work things out, if that would be fine with you."

Luke could see her planning her next words. He was on alert for her at this point.

"Sure, i-if you're willing to apologize, I'm sure I would be willing to feel like I can forgive you for excluding us."

So, she was running with that huh? "Ah, that's what your mad about? Alright, then if you two could let us talk to her alone, then we can possibly reach an understanding."

"Alright, I hope you guys work it out." Cass walked to the other side of the alleys to give them time.

Tytus however stayed behind. "Nuh-uh. Staying here. Not leaving her with you guys." He narrowed his eyes as if it would sell his point.

Luke twitched his nose in slight irritation but allowed it. "Ok then. That won't be a problem." Brodie gave him a sharp nudge and he took a deep breath.

"Ok…I think we need to start working together a lot better than we have been. We don't have much time before our big match with Death's Tide, and I think it'd be in all our best interest to work together."

An uncomfortable silence hung for a few seconds as Deborah, who had been rather uncharacteristically relaxed, slung her back onto one of the alleyway walls.

She looked Luke dead in the eyes with a silent, indignant stare that made him feel like running for the nearest cover.

"So, no apology then? You know how disrespectful it is to go cavorting around with your PALS and not consulting with someone who knows this game more than all of you? How. Dare. YOU. Who do you th-"

"If you can CALM DOWN." Luke emphasized, not caring that Tytus growling inches away from his face. He couldn't care about it right now, not if he wanted if actually get through to her thick mantle. "I just want to-"

"You've got a lot of nerve, you know that?" She had gotten into his face looking ready to get physical. Luke was way shorter compared to her and had to keep himself from shivering in her intimidating presence. "A lot of nerve to-"

She couldn't finish as Luke pushed her back into the walls. The silence that settled didn't last long as a rather puffy-faced, teary-eyed, and shivering Luke tensely spoke.

"YOU have a lot of nerve. Despite being here for 4 days, despite being barely less experienced than you, and despite us literally trying to prove ourselves to this hotshot team. You can't seem to get along without bossing us around."

Taking breathes he stared at her, with a look that was fairly intimidating, at least Luke could guess by how terrified she was beginning to look. Tytus had gone to deck him in his face, but Brodie was holding him back, verbally dissuading him. It didn't look like a fight was going to break out after all, so Luke continued.

"Listen: we went to the dojo, and I beat you fair and square, everyone else there even acknowledge me as our team leader and Cass even does." He looked down at his right arm "But you guys don't. That's fine with me." He glanced at her again, allowing for his anger to slip through. "You can leave if you don't like that. Nothing is stopping you."

He watched the both of them as he waited for an answer. Truth be told, he was expecting the worse from them. He was expecting violence and it seemed he was going to be proven right when Tytus reeled back his fist.

"Alright Luke." Tytus' response was immediate as he whirled around. "I'll cooperate."

All three boys shared looks of confusion among one another. She held her finger up as if to interject between their share question.

"But! I want you do help me out with something. You give me your word and maybe I'll play nice."

Tytus' fist dropped to his side as he turned to her with a withered gaze, "…you sure Deb?"

"I have nothing to lose doing what he says at this point. He's made his point pretty clear."

This just got weird.

"What is it you wa-"

"Ah! Ah! Ah!" she slid up to him, getting into his face. "I'll tell you at the fest, if you agree to help me."

He narrowed his eyes. It was mainly out of perturbance out of how she still seemed to be trying to get an advantage out of this situation and the way Tytus went nervous at the proposition. His tentacles bubbled in unease and folded his hands inward.

"It's the only way you'll get my support."

He didn't like the slyness in her voice. Tytus was looking on anxiously an yet tried to stubbornly mask it to look tough.

"Fine." He said, his voice shaky.

"Alright. That wasn't so tough, was it? Better tell the bright-tentacled birdy that I'm more than willing to cooperate with you." She was practically skipping away to where Cass had walked off to. "I'll let Cassy know we solved our differences. C'mon Tytus."

Tytus obediently followed, sparing a glance at the two before fully catching up with Deborah.

"That girl is seriously has her tentacle wrapped around us." Brodie croaked out. "But at least she decided to actually work with us. Sure it wasn't a good idea to just kick her out?"

"We only have enough time to screen for people…" Luke told him. "And if Deborah goes, it's possible she'd take Cass with her and we'd be a teammate short. I…I might as well see what she wants and hope it works out."

Brodie gave him a concerned glace but gave him a sympathetic pat to the back. "Well, alright man. You're the bossman. Just know that me and especially Nova has your back." He chuckled, cheeks tinted mint. "Between her and Deborah, I'd be scared of her more if she was mad."

Luke felt something like relief as they walked back to the plaza.

"I definitely appreciate it."