Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

In the dark desert night, near an abandoned train station, the orange light of a campfire could be seen. Three inkfish were gathered around it for warmth.

“When should we be reaching Splatsville?” Victoria asked, blowing into her hands for warmth, for the desert night was cold.

“Probably tomorrow!” Galax exclaimed. “I’m excited!!”

“Are you sure?” Xavier said. “There’s lots of corrupted people there…”

“There’s also more food and resources than in the middle of the desert ,” Victoria said.

“Yeah!” Galax said. “And maybe we’ll be able to find a way to stop all this, too!”

“...I don’t know if we can, to be honest,” Xavier said. “Like, I know you’re eager, Galax, but—”

“We will stop this,” Galax said, placing a hand on Xavier’s shoulder. “Do you understand ?”

Xavier started to sweat. “Yeah…I guess…what do you think Victoria?”

But Victoria seemed to be distracted by…something. She had wandered away from the campfire, following…something.

“Hey Victoria, what’s that—” Xavier said, getting up and following Victoria.

Victoria had stopped walking, and seemed to be looking at…a Salmonid smallfry?? It was looking up at Victoria with eager eyes.

“Whose smallfry is that…?” Xavier muttered, coming up behind Victoria.

“I don’t know, it just came up to our camp earlier,” Victoria said. “I think it wants me to follow it…”

“Well then it must be somebody’s!” Galax said, startling both Victoria and Xavier. They were good at sneaking up on people. “Maybe it’s leading us to them!”

“I don’t know…what if it’s a trick??” Xavier said.

“I’m sure it’ll be fine, he’s just a little guy!” Victoria said.

“Okay then,” Xavier said.

The smallfry made some warbling noises and then scurried off again. The three friends followed it, past the train station, until—surprisingly—they saw the glow of another campfire.

“There’s other people out here…” Galax muttered.

“Well, let’s go say hi!” Victoria said.

The smallfry led the three inkfish all the way up to the camp, where there were two Inklings. One had yellow tentacles, one side long and the other side in a braid. The other one had long pink tentacles and a helmet with horns on it. Neither of them had the gold gradient of corruption on their tentacles.

The Inkling with yellow tentacles stood up as Galax, Victoria, and Xavier approached, a surprised look on her face. The smallfry jumped into her arms, warbling happily, as the pink Inkling also stood up and stepped in front of the yellow one.

“Who are you guys?!” the pink Inkling exclaimed, an angry look on her face as she stood in a protective stance.

“Hi there, I’m Galax—” Galax started, but they were interrupted.

“Are you corrupted?!”

“No, none of us are corrupted,” Xavier said, anxiety in his voice. “Your smallfry showed up at our camp and we followed it here, so sorry…”

“It’s okay, Hornmet, they look okay,” the yellow Inkling said. The pink Inkling—Hornmet, apparently—sighed, looking a lot calmer now.

“Apologies, we’ve been in the desert for a while, just the two of us, and we have to be careful of other people,” Hornmet said. “But none of you seem to have the gradient… ”

“C’mon, you can sit with us,” the yellow Inkling said, smiling. “By the way, I’m Mitsuami, this is Hornmet, and the smallfry is Kojake!”

Galax, Xavier, and Victoria sat around the campfire with Mitsuami and Hornmet, Kojake waddling around nearby. They introduced themselves and told their new friends their situation, including the fact that they were heading towards Splatsville.

“You’re heading towards Splatsville?” Mitsuami said. “Us too! Maybe we could travel together!!”

“Yeah!” Victoria exclaimed. “We totally could!!”

“We’re looking for a way to stop the apocalypse, and we’re hoping to find it there,” Galax said.

“Wow,” Hornmet said. “That’s…ambitious. Are you sure you can do that…?”

“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell them,” Xavier said. “I…just don’t know if there’s a way.”

“There must be some way!!” Galax said. “A way to…erase the chaos forces or something!!”

“...Yeah!” Mitsuami said. “Some kind of way!”

“And we’ll find that in Splatsville!” Galax said, grinning.

“The city of chaos…” Xavier muttered underneath his breath.

…

Soon enough, Galax, Victoria, and Xavier went to collect their things from their camp and bring them over to the camp of Mitsuami and Hornmet. And as the night progressed on, the newly formed friend group put out their bedrolls and chatted some more—before eventually falling asleep underneath the stars.

—

When the five friends arrived in Splatsville the next day, there was a raging thunderstorm. The rain pelted down almost like bullets, the thunder roared loudly, and lightning struck down in the distance—and occasionally not so distant.

“This is… insane !!” Galax screamed. “We have to find shelter somewhere!!”

Tears of fear in his eyes, Xavier looked around for somewhere to hide. Splatsville, the city of chaos, was filled with abandoned buildings, and obviously, there was nobody else out on the streets.

Meanwhile, Mitsuami was trying the doorknob on the nearest building. “Locked,” she seethed.

“That’s just wonderful!! ” Victoria exclaimed. “I wonder what other buildings are locked!!”

“Hey!” Hornmet exclaimed. “This one’s unlocked!!”

The door to the random abandoned building swung open, and all five members of the group rushed inside to hide from the howling wind and rain. Inside, they all huddled together for warmth as they watched the chaos outside.

“Why is there a thunderstorm in the middle of the desert, anyway?” Victoria muttered underneath her breath.

“At least we’re safe now…right?” Galax mumbled.

“Safe…” Mitsuami echoed, cradling a very scared Kojake in her arms.

“Hey!!” a voice suddenly rang out throughout the shelter. Galax turned around to see an Octoling with light purple tentatwists and a striped helmet, standing there with her hands on her hips.

“What are you guys doing here?!” the Octoling demanded.

“We’re just sheltering from the storm…” Xavier said. “We’re so sorry if this is your…camp or something…it was the first place we found—”

“No, it’s okay!” the mystery Octoling said. “I was just surprised that there were five new people in our shelter, without even being scanned.”

“Shelter?” Xavier said.

“ Scanned? ” Victoria said. “What’s going on??”

“Nothing to worry about,” the Octoling said. “It’s just a way to make sure no corrupted people come into the shelter. Speaking of which, we’ll gladly let you in if you aren’t corrupted.”

“We’d love a place to stay!” Galax said.

“Wonderful!” the Octoling said. “I’ll take you to get scanned—well, the word scanned makes it sound like it’s high-tech or something. It’s really just us checking the amount of gold on your tentacles.”

“Lead the way—what was your name?” Hornmet said. Mitsuami was noticeably silent.

“Oh, forgive my manners,” the Octoling said. “My name is Shellmet. Now, follow me.”

—

“Alright,” Shellmet said. The group was in a much safer place now, though the roaring thunderstorm could still faintly be heard. “All of you seem to be non-corrupted, luckily. Only chaos tinted, with minimal amounts of gold.”

“Why are you so wary of us being corrupted, anyway?” Victoria asked.

“Is that even a question?” Shellmet said. “Corrupted people are dangerous. Erratic and murderous. To let one into our refugee shelter…would be a disaster . We only let non-corrupted people in here to prevent said disaster—which would probably end in lots of blood and bodies.”

Shellmet sighed, looking away. “ Anyway , welcome to our shelter!! We have plenty of food and sleeping bags, and as long as you don’t leave, you will be safe!”

“Don’t leave?” Galax said, tilting their head. “Like, ever?”

“Wh-why would you want to?” Shellmet said. “It’s usually me or—well, it was Barreleye—who forages for food for the shelter. You don’t have to do anything but stay put.”

“But—” Galax sighed. “We want to find a way to stop all this…the apocalypse”

Shellmet smiled, and then placed a hand on Galax’s shoulder.

“I appreciate your ambition, I really do,” Shellmet said. “And maybe we can find a way to stop this together. But for now? Stay in the shelter, where it’s safe. Alright?”

Galax smiled up at Shellmet. “Alright. Thanks for letting us in.”

“It’s no problem,” Shellmet said. “The thunderstorm out there was crazy , wasn’t it?”

“It sure was!!” Hornmet said. “Anyway, could we have some food? I haven’t eaten all day…”

“Of course!” Shellmet said. “We should probably get out of the scanning room, anyway…”

And with that, the six of them left the room to get some food, the thunderstorm raging in the distance.

—

Little did the residents of the shelter know, there was a reason a thunderstorm was raging in Splatsville.

It was because of one person.

One person with the electric power of the shadows within his veins.

He lay on the ground, staring up at the ceiling. His mental breakdown was calming down a bit, though his tentacles and fingers still emitted sparks of electricity. And his tears were laced with it as well.

For despite all of his power, there was a deep, deep sadness within him, that sometimes just had to escape.

Chapter Text

The storm had stopped by the time Galax woke up the next morning. They rubbed their eyes and sat up—they had been sleeping in a not-exactly-luxurious sleeping bag on the floor. Victoria and Xavier were still asleep next to them. So were their new friends Mitsuami and Hornmet.

Galax sighed, remembering what Shellmet had said to them the previous day. She had told them to stay in the shelter. They couldn’t stop the apocalypse from this shelter!

…Maybe Galax was a bit too ambitious, trying to stop an apocalypse.

But they had to try! The chaos apocalypse had ruined so many lives—including the lives of Galax and their friends. It was in their good conscience to find a way to stop it somehow .

Even if it turned out to be impossible.

Galax eventually got out of their sleeping bag and aimlessly wandered around the shelter. It wasn’t big at all—and yet there were many people here, most of them still sleeping in their sleeping bags.

The sleeping area—where all the sleeping bags were—was the biggest room in the shelter, and attached to it was a kitchen. There was a hallway to the right, containing a few bedrooms for injured people, as well as the “scanning room.”

Despite it still being fairly early in the morning, Galax eventually found another person who was awake. An Octoling boy, with indigo tentacles in a similar style to Galax’s, as well as a beige button-down shirt. There was barely any gold on his tentacles; if there had been too much, he wouldn’t even be allowed to be here.

The Octoling looked up at Galax with curiosity as they approached. “You’re new here, I presume,” he said.

“Yeah! My friends and I just arrived yesterday!” Galax said. They put out their hand for the boy to shake. “I’m Galax, what’s your name?”

The Octoling boy shook Galax’s hand. “I’m Hiro. Cool costume, by the way, I love dragons.”

Galax’s smile disappeared as they realized Hiro was talking about their dragon mutations. “I…uh…it’s not a costume.”

“Oh.” Hiro’s eyes widened. “Then…what—”

“How did you end up in this shelter?” Galax said, trying to change the subject. They really didn’t want to delve into this right now, especially not with a new friend.

“Me? Well…my brother kind of…abandoned me to fall in love with some corrupted guy, so I was alone for a while,” Hiro explained. “A couple weeks ago I found this shelter, and of course I joined since I was starving and desperate…”

“Your brother?” Galax said. “What’s his name?”

“Ocho,” Hiro said. “I…hope he’ll come back to me eventually. Maybe he’ll learn the error of his ways…”

“Maybe he will!” Galax said. “I hope he does…is he corrupted?”

“Yeah…”

Galax sighed. “Dang…then he wouldn’t be allowed into the shelter…”

“...But I hope I’ll get to talk to him again. We were real close before all this.”

“Maybe we can search for him sometime!” Galax said.

Hiro smiled at this. “Yeah…we could…”

—

When Shellmet woke up, the first thing she did was check on Barreleye. Her childhood friend who had been brutally injured during a death game. Stabbed, to be exact; and then assaulted with ink.

When Shellmet arrived in the infirmary room, however, Barreleye’s sister, Polpo, was there. And she had her head buried in her hands, crying.

Barreleye still hadn’t woken up. He had barely shown any signs of life for the past few days since the Chaos Games—except for a soft, slow heartbeat.

But now, as Polpo turned to Shellmet with bloodshot eyes and a tear-stained face, Shellmet suddenly knew that that final sign was gone.

“He’s gone,” Polpo said, almost inaudibly.

Shellmet tried to hold in the tears that quickly filled her eyes, but it was impossible. Soon, loud sobs were shaking her whole body, and Barreleye lay there, motionless and cold.

Motionless, cold, and dead.

—

A few hours had passed since Galax met Hiro. Since then, Xavier, Victoria, Mitsuami, and Hornmet had all woken up.

“And the three of us are Team Galaxy!” Galax exclaimed, referring to themself, Victoria, and Xavier. “Future heroes of the apocalypse!”

“Heroes of the apocalypse…?” Hiro muttered. “Isn’t that a bit…ambitious?”

“Maybe it is!” Galax said. “But we’re going to at least try!”

“Could I maybe…help you guys…?” Mitsuami muttered shyly. “Stop the apocalypse…I mean…”

“Of course!” Galax exclaimed, placing a hand on Mitsuami’s shoulder—in response, the yellow Inkling blushed and let out a strange squeak. “We’ll need all the help we can get!”

“I agree that the apocalypse is bad…but can it really be stopped?” Hiro said.

Galax turned towards Hiro, a suddenly serious look on their face. “ What do you mean by that. ”

“I-I mean, it’s an apocalypse….” Hiro muttered nervously. “And we’re just a random group of kids...”

“I don’t think we’re random!” Hornmet said. “We’re pretty cool, actually!”

Galax huffed with annoyance. “Sure, it’s an apocalypse, and sure we’re just some kids, but we have to at least try! Why does everyone keep doubting my abilities…”

Hiro sighed. “Well, I don’t know about stopping a whole apocalypse…but we can at least find my brother, right? That’s something…”

A smile spread across Galax’s face. “Yeah…! Ocho, right?”

“Ocho is dead,” a voice said. A familiar one. Galax turned around to see Shellmet.

Except…something was wrong. Her eyes were red as if she had been crying, and the tear stains on her face further proved that. Her usually smiling face now looked bleak and defeated.

“Wh-what…?” Hiro muttered. “What do you mean by that…?”

“Your brother. Ocho. He’s dead,” Shellmet said, voice completely monotone.

“I…no…you’re lying, you’re lying —” Tears began to form in Hiro’s eyes as he rocked back and forth on his feet, arms wrapped around his torso as if he was cold. “Ocho is alive ! And we’re going to find him!”

A cold, sarcastic smile cracked upon Shellmet’s face. “Oh…the denial…we all deal with it when we lose someone in this apocalypse…”

“ He can’t be dead!! ” Hiro yelled, startling Galax and a few others also sensitive to noise.

“Oh, but he is…” Shellmet said. “He died a long, long time ago…and do you know who killed him?”

“No…how did I not…know…” Hiro muttered, tears now falling from his eyes.

“The Chaos Lord. The Chaos Lord killed your brother.”

“Th-the Chaos Lord?” Galax said, as Victoria and Xavier went over to comfort Hiro. “Who’s that?”

Shellmet looked at Galax with an annoyed expression.

“What?” Galax said. “I just got here…”

“The Chaos Lord…” Shellmet said, “is the evil tyrant that rules over Splatsville. Except he’s not fit to rule at all. He savors the death and agony of his so-called subjects, and even made a death game called the Chaos Games in order to get that.”

“He is nothing but pure, unadulterated evil .”

“Oh,” Galax said, blinking a few times. “Chaos Lord, huh? Well that’s no good, can we kill him?”

“ Please ,” Hiro said through tears. “Did he really kill Ocho…?”

“Yes he did,” Shellmet said. “And no, you cannot kill him.”

“Why not?” Galax asked.

“Did I mention he has lightning powers? Because he does.”

“ Oh ,” Galax said, eyes widening. “That would make him pretty hard to kill…”

“But we can try!” Victoria said. “Galax, you too have pow—”

Galax covered Victoria’s mouth. “Like she said, we’ll have to try killing this guy!” they said quickly. Nervously.

“I don’t think murder is a good idea…” Xavier said. “What are we, corrupted ?”

“Murder doesn’t count when it’s the Chaos Lord,” Shellmet said. “In fact, we had a plan to assassinate him…during the Chaos Games—”

“Who’s ‘we?’” Galax said.

Shellmet paused. “I…Barreleye…but…” Tears formed in her eyes again.

“What happened to Barreleye?”

“I…I must prepare meals.”

Then Shellmet turned around and simply walked away.

Galax blinked, and then looked towards their friends. Hiro was still crying, whilst being hugged by Mitsuami and Hornmet. Victoria and Xavier looked like they didn’t know what to do.

Neither did Galax. They had never been good at comforting people.

But now, they had a way to stop the apocalypse! No longer was it a vague. ambitious idea in the distance.

That way to stop the apocalypse?

Assassinate the Chaos Lord.

Chapter Text

“In order to assassinate the Chaos Lord,” Galax said, standing in front of their friends as if they were some kind of army commander— “we must leave the shelter.”

“Well, yeah, that’s kind of a given,” Victoria said. “We can’t kill him from here.”

“The problem is,” Galax said, “Shellmet won’t let us leave. For our ‘safety’ or whatever.”

“I think safety is pretty important,” Xavier said.

“Also, didn’t Shellmet say the Chaos Lord has…lightning powers??” Mitsuami added.

“That may or may not be true,” Galax said. “Maybe it was an exaggeration. Maybe he’s just…a really good electrician or something.”

“Why would he be—” Hornmet started, but Galax interrupted her.

“We have to escape the shelter.”

“I’m not sure if escape would be the right term,” Hiro said. “I mean…we’ve got food and safety here. Out in the city it’s, well, chaotic—and dangerous. Y’know, corrupted people everywhere…”

“And it’ll continue being like that if we don’t stop it!” Galax said. “And the way to stop all this? Assassinate the Chaos Lord! The way to assassinate the Chaos Lord? Escape this shelter!”

“But how?” Victoria said. “Like you said, Shellmet won’t let us leave.”

“We’ll have to sneak out at night,” Galax said. “When everyone’s asleep, including Shellmet. We’ll leave the way she led us in, easy as that.”

“I—” Hiro started—

“Then? It’s a straight shot to kill the Chaos Lord.”

—

After finding out about Ocho’s death and the existence of the Chaos Lord, it was a long day for Team Galaxy. Especially since there was little to nothing to do in the shelter, and now that their days weren’t spent wandering the Splatlands, they were bored. It seemed Shellmet had highly prioritized survival over occupation.

Despite the boredom, the day did turn into night, and soon enough everyone in the shelter was getting to sleep. Shellmet had said herself that she was usually the last to go to sleep, so she could make sure everyone got to sleep alright. So Team Galaxy had even longer to wait.

For they had secured the plan to sneak out of the shelter at night.

Hours passed, and as it got darker and darker outside, more and more people fell asleep. There were maybe thirty people in the shelter in total, and after a while, all of them were asleep except six.

Galax, Victoria, Xavier, Mitsuami, Hornmet, and Hiro. The future assassins of the Chaos Lord. The future heroes of the apocalypse.

Shellmet was nowhere to be seen. Galax assumed she had gone to sleep somewhere.

It was time to escape.

“So do we just…” Xavier whispered, “...leave?”

“Yeah, I think so,” Victoria said. She slowly stood up, tiptoeing past the other sleeping bags in the large sleeping room. The others followed suit, until they were at the edge of the room, near the hallway. At the end of the hallway was the door where they had entered the shelter.

“What if Shellmet’s in one of these rooms?” Mitsuami whispered. “She’ll definitely catch us.”

“We could turn into our swim forms,” Hornmet said.

And so the team did exactly that. It was slow without any ink around, but hidden as small squids and octopi, they got to the door with ease.

Galax tried the door. “Locked. Of course.”

“We could try and find a—”

“I know how to pick locks,” Mitsuami whispered shyly, interrupting Hiro.

“That’s great,” Galax whispered. “Pick this one.”

It took about a minute, and the others had to hide in the corners in their swim forms just in case, but Mitsuami got the door open. And soon enough, the six inkfish had gotten out of the shelter and were walking through the streets nearby.

“Can’t believe that actually worked,” Xavier said. “How did that work?!”

“Shellmet was asleep, of course,” Galax said. “We must’ve been really good at pretending to sleep earlier.”

“She let her guard down,” Victoria said. “I wonder if she’ll notice we’re gone in the morning.”

“Of course she will,” Hiro said. “There’s not many people in the shelter, and Shellmet accounts for everyone.”

“If you say so,” Victoria said. “Anyway, Galax, how exactly are we going to kill the Chaos Lord?”

“Maybe we shouldn’t talk about that so loudly…” Mitsuami said.

“Well,” Galax said, completely disregarding Mitsuami’s warning, “we’ll have to find his evil lair or something. Sneak in somehow, and take him out. Easy as that…probably.”

“But what if he has people working for him?” Hornmet said. “He must, considering he’s an evil overlord and all that.”

“We’ll sneak in as a team, all six of us,” Galax said. “Take out any and all minions, and then—”

“You guys talking about the Chaos Lord?”

A muffled voice. An unfamiliar, muffled voice.

All six inkfish turned around to see a stranger.

She was wearing a gas mask, first of all. Her outfit was pretty ugly—a purple sweater, gold shoulder and forearm guards, and ripped black leggings with green rain boots. She had cyan tentacles in a ponytail—and noticeably, those tentacles had a golden gradient at the ends.

A golden gradient of corruption.

“Who the hell are you?” Hornmet said, crossing her arms with contempt.

“I’m Maaask,” the stranger said. “You know, you can’t just talk freely about killing the Chaos Lord here in Splatsville. The Chaos-Lord-worshipping place.”

“I’m sure not everyone worships him,” Hornmet said, leaning closer to Mask. The rest of the group, however, was now hanging back, wary of Mask’s apparent corruption.

Mask, surprisingly, chuckled at this. “I sure as hell don’t. Especially since I used to know the guy…no, no, I’m just here to kill you because of my own corruption.”

Hornmet’s eyes widened. “W-what?”

Mask took a Carbon Roller Deco out of seemingly nowhere. “You heard meeeee. We corrupted people can’t go long without a kill, you know. It’s like an addiction, almost.”

“Shit, shit shit shit shit—” Galax muttered, taking rapid steps back as they pulled out their dagger. “Guys, get ready for a—”

Suddenly, Team Galaxy was alone, for Mitsuami, Hornmet, and Hiro had all started to run away.

“You’re on your own!” Hornmet called to them before catching up to Mitsuami and Hiro.

“You’re the one who provoked her!” Victoria called back.

“Well, that’s not very loyal of them,” Galax said.

But it was still three versus one. Albeit, three non-corrupts versus one corrupt.

Mask suddenly ran towards the team, raising her roller above her head. It slammed down on the nearest person’s head—the nearest person being Xavier.

Xavier toppled to the ground, cyan ink dripping from his green-tentacled head—but he was still alive. Victoria rushed over to him, holding him in her arms while trying to wipe off the ink—while Galax ran at Mask with their dagger, their Forge Splattershot Pro in their other hand, just in case.

Galax tried to stab Mask, but they were too slow. Mask easily dodged, and Galax was the next one to get slammed with Mask’s roller.

“Hey!!” Victoria exclaimed, both of her teammates on the ground near her. “You’re not special! I main that same weapon, you know!”

Victoria pulled out a roller similar to Mask’s, from seemingly nowhere. Then she ran at Mask, prepared to whack her on the head and end this—

Mask quickly dodged Victoria’s attack again and appeared behind her.

This time, wielding a knife along with the Carbon Roller.

Mask brought the knife down, about to stab Victoria—

Until Victoria was pulled out of the way by one of her teammates. Xavier, to be exact.

“We need to retreat,” Xavier said, Galax appearing behind him as well. “The others had a good idea…”

“Ending the fight so soon?” Mask said. “We were just getting started, thoooouugh…”

“Yeah, it was fun, but we gotta go!” Galax said. “Uh, see ya later, Mask!”

And with that, Team Galaxy ran away from the Carbon-Roller-wielding Mask.

—

Shellmet had spent enough time lying on her bed crying.

It was time to do what she had been dreading.

Sitting up on her bed, Shellmet glanced at the nearby digital clock. Almost midnight. The whole shelter was probably asleep by now.

Except for Polpo. The Octoling was standing in the doorway of Shellmet’s room, with a concerned look on her face.

“You okay?” she asked.

Shellmet just shook her head as she walked towards the doorway. As she walked, Polpo caught Shellmet in her arms and gave her a hug.

And Shellmet accepted this, for that was what she really needed.

Shellmet and Polpo embraced for what could’ve been forever, but still wasn’t long enough. Then Polpo looked up at Shellmet and sighed.

“It’s time.”

Shellmet nodded in agreement.

…

However, when Shellmet and Polpo arrived in the infirmary room, Barreleye— Barreleye’s body —wasn’t there.

Shellmet was speechless.

“Where—” Polpo muttered.

“Check the main room of the shelter,” Shellmet said. “Make sure each and every person is there.”

Polpo hesitated, but then wordlessly left the room. Shellmet sat down on a nearby chair, staring at the empty bed, unable to process what had just happened.

The body of her best friend. Gone.

In just a few minutes, Polpo came running back. Shellmet slowly turned to look at her.

“The new ones are gone,” Polpo said breathlessly.

“ What .”

“Galax, Xavier, Victoria, Mitsuami, and Hornmet. All gone. Hiro too.”

This news caused Shellmet to quickly stand up and storm towards the doorway, down the hallway, and out of the shelter.

Six people had escaped the shelter right under her nose.

She had to find them.

—

Team Galaxy was walking through the streets, trying to decide on what to do next—when they suddenly heard footsteps behind them. Galax immediately took out their dagger, thinking it was another corrupted person here to kill them—

But it wasn’t. It was Shellmet, and she looked angry .

Somehow, that was worse.

“You guys !” Shellmet yelled, and as Galax put away their dagger, they braced themself for the consequences of escaping Shellmet’s shelter.

“Please…” Xavier said. “We didn’t…it’s not what…”

“ What did you do to Barreleye .”

“W-what??”

“I know you guys did something,” Shellmet said. “Took it away or something . He disappeared at the same time you did. I don’t think that’s a coincidence.”

“We don’t even know who Barreleye is ! You never told us!!” Victoria exclaimed. “Why would we do something with him?!”

“I don’t know, to be completely honest. But I also don’t know why you would deliberately escape the only safe space in Splatsville,” Shellmet said. Then she sighed. “We were about to bury him…but he was gone from the bed.”

“Oh…” Galax said, realizing that this mysterious Barreleye person was, in fact, dead. “Sorry for your—”

“I don’t need your pity. I need your explanation.”

“H-how about we explain our intentions on the way back to the shelter?” Xavier said.

“Seems like a good plan. We’re practically sitting ducks for corrupts right now,” Victoria said.

—

Mask was slightly disappointed she wasn’t able to get a kill tonight— three kills, actually—but it was fine. She walked back in the direction of the Chaos Tower, idly spinning her knife in her hand, dragging her roller along with the other.

She should probably tell the others about those kids’ plans, she thought to herself. It seemed at least mildly important that they wanted to kill the Chaos Lord.

Mask sighed, put her knife and roller away, and took out her handheld radio. The way that members of the Chaos League contacted each other, since cell service these days was unreliable.

Mask pressed the button on the radio and began to speak. “Uh, heyyyy, somebody wants to assassinate the Chaos Lord.”

“Again?!” a British-accented voice came through the radio. Mask immediately recognized the voice as Army.

“Heyyy~” Aloha’s annoying voice said. “What’s upppp, Masky~?”

“Did you not hear what she just said ?” Army said.

“Nope~!”

“Somebody wants to assassinate the Chaos Lord…multiple somebodies, actually.”

“Oh,” Aloha said. “That’s…not good.”

“Barely an issue,” Skull said. “The Chaos Lord is impossible to assassinate. He would never let that happen.”

“Not just the Chaos Lord,” Army said.

“ We won’t let that happen.”

Chapter Text

“You’ve got to be kidding me.” Shellmet rubbed her temples and sighed.

“I’m not kidding!” Galax said. “We attempted to escape—”

“It’s not escaping when it’s from safety —”

“—your shelter to assassinate the Chaos Lord!” Galax completely ignored Shellmet’s remark, finishing their sentence.

Silence followed. Xavier and Victoria sat there guiltily, while Galax put their hands on their hips somewhat defiantly.

Shellmet sighed again, seeming exasperated. “I already told you, you can’t kill the Chaos Lord.”

“And I told you that I’m going to try anyway!” Galax exclaimed. “C’mon, he’s clearly caused so much pain—”

“And he’s going to cause more if you fail,” Shellmet said. “ When you fail.”

“C’mon, don’t you believe in me?” Galax whined.

“No.”

Galax frowned, crossing their arms. “Didn’t you say that you tried to assassinate him?”

“ What? ”

“During the ‘Chaos Games’ or whatever?” Galax continued. “What happened to that determination? That determination to end the suffering of the people of Splatsville?”

A look of anger—yet still calm and collected—came across Shellmet’s face. “Do you want to know what happened, Galax?”

“Yes please !” Galax said. They turned to Xavier and Victoria behind them. “So would they! Right, guys?”

Victoria and Xavier were quiet for a few seconds. Then Xavier shrugged and said, “I mean, wouldn’t hurt to know.”

“So.” Galax slammed their hand on the table between them and Shellmet— “tell us.”

Shellmet looked down at the ground. “Well…we failed. That much is obvious, seeing as the Chaos Lord is still alive. But it cost us—Barreleye and I.”

“It cost the life of Barreleye. And he…” Tears sprung to Shellmet’s eyes— “he was my friend for years, ever since we were children. He was a ray of sunshine, optimistic and passionate…and he, too, wanted to end the suffering of Splatsville citizens.”

“He was in the Chaos Games. Stabbed in the abdomen, almost killed. But he persisted, for he had a goal.”

“He tried to stab the Chaos Lord…but he failed. And four members of the Chaos League went after him—and killed him.”

“And now?” The tears were flowing steadily from Shellmet’s eyes as she buried her head in her hands. “I know it’s futile to try and stop the Chaos Lord.”

Galax blinked, and the tears forming in their own eyes fell down their cheeks. “Shellmet, I’m…I’m so sorry…”

“Don’t be. You didn’t know. It wasn’t your fault.” Shellmet got up from her chair, about to walk out of the room—

“But is this what he would’ve wanted?”

Shellmet turned around. “Excuse me?”

“Barreleye wanted to help the people of Splatsville. End their suffering. He wanted the Chaos Lord gone . Shouldn’t you continue on that legacy?”

Shellmet’s eyebrows furrowed. “I told you, it’s impossible—”

“Shouldn’t you at least try?”

Silence.

“Try and stop the Chaos Lord?” Galax continued. “For Barreleye?”

Shellmet took a shuddering exhale. “I appreciate your determination, Galax, but—”

“I think I agree,” Victoria said, standing up. “Barreleye…he would’ve wanted you to continue trying to stop the Chaos Lord.”

“To rebel against his evil rule,” Xavier said. “You’re not going to let that tyrant win, right?”

Slowly but surely, a small smile appeared on Shellmet’s face. “You know what…maybe you’re right.”

Galax grinned. “So, do you agree? We should try to kill the Chaos Lord?”

“We should take things one at a time,” Shellmet said. “No assassination yet .”

“We’ll need a bigger group for that.”

“We’ll need a whole rebellion.”

—

The next morning, there were more people standing around that table. Actually, just three more people, but it was something.

“Soooo…we’re actually going to do this?” Mitsuami said nervously, holding Kojake in her arms. “You’re on board to…assassinate the Chaos Lord?”

“You said just the other day that it was impossible!” Hornmet exclaimed. “What made you change your mind?”

“These three gave me some inspiration,” Shellmet said, gesturing to Galax, Victoria, and Xavier. “After I told them my story.”

“D-did you lose someone else to the Chaos Lord, too?” Hiro asked.

“Yes, I did,” Shellmet said. 

She then looked around at everyone gathered around the table. “So, these are the members of our rebellion so far.”

“This doesn’t seem like nearly enough people,” Xavier said.

“It’s not,” Shellmet said. “So, first order of business: gathering people to support our cause.”

“Well, that’ll be easy!” Galax exclaimed. “We have a whole shelter of people here who hate the Chaos Lord!”

“Not everyone would be able to kill him,” Victoria said.

“Well, most of them would!”

“I’ll make an announcement to the shelter about this,” Shellmet said. “Obviously we can’t do much advertising outside of here, but if there are people not in this shelter who would like to join…we’ll find them somehow.”

—

We’ll find them somehow.

Two Inklings walked through the early morning streets of Splatsville. Two Inklings with strong gold on their tentacles.

“Question,” 8-Bit said, crossing her arms with scorn, “what the hell are we supposed to do now?”

“That’s a good question,” Shady said. “The Chaos Games…they gave us a purpose, huh?”

“It’s not like the Games themselves had a purpose,” 8-Bit said. “The Chaos Lord was literally just bored, I think.”

“Not the point,” Shady said, monotone as always. They weren’t one to show much emotion at all.

“Yeah, yeah,” 8-Bit grumbled. “The point is that we have no purpose now. Just wandering the streets. Not even Wire wants us.”

“Well, we should find somewhere to set up camp,” Shady said. “Somewhere to gather our food and sleep at night.”

“We’ve got to make sure it’s nowhere near graffiti of the Chaos Lord. Remember when those three Inklings got caught?”

“Yeah…” Shady seemed distracted by something. 8-Bit followed their gaze.

They seemed to be looking at an empty, abandoned building at first. But then, from within, talking could be heard.

It was too quiet to make out the exact words, but both corrupted Inklings made out the words “Chaos Lord,” “rebellion,” and “shelter.”

“A shelter?” 8-Bit said.

“We could stay there. Would help us socialize with other people than each other, too,” Shady said.

8-Bit scoffed. “It’s not like they’d let us in, seeing as we’re both corrupted. The very people they’re probably sheltering from .”

“It’s worth a shot,” Shady said. “Also, did you hear the thing about a rebellion?”

“Against the Chaos Lord?” 8-Bit said. “If it is against him, well—”

“I’d be more than willing to kill the bastard who ruined our lives.”

—

In the Chaos Tower, a mint-green Inkling was flung down onto the ground. One of his pairs of sunglasses fell off of his head, and he reached out to grab it—

Until a shoe stomped on the sunglasses, breaking them.

“M-my…” the Inkling, Trisun, stammered.

“Your precious sunglasses?” a voice said in a mocking tone. The person who had stomped on said sunglasses. “Tell me, why do you need three pairs?”

“S-so I can look…dazzling…”

“Dazzling?!” The figure laughed as he took a seat upon the throne in front of Trisun. The throne was huge and elegant, black and gold in color. The colors of chaos.

“You’re pathetic .”

“And a criminal ,” one of the members of the Chaos League said, standing a few feet away from Trisun. He had orange tentacles, and wore a beret and a camouflage army hoodie. “You know he was defying your rule. Talking shit about you, or whatever you call it.”

“Oh, is that so ~?” the figure upon the throne said. The Chaos Lord. He had large black wings and a crown of dark gold upon his head. “Tell me, dazzle man, what did you say?”

“I…I’m sorry—”

“What the fuck did you say about me?!”

Trisun’s breath caught in his throat as he shook from pure fear. And yet, he knew he could be killed if he disobeyed the Chaos Lord.

“I…just some stuff about how…stupid you are…”

The Chaos Lord’s smug smirk turned into a deep, dark frown. The lights in the throne room began to flicker, and Trisun yelped out of surprise and fear.

“Stupid…?” the Chaos Lord said, voice eerily calm.

“Your Evilness, what shall we do about this criminal?” the Chaos League member from earlier said. Other members of the League—tentacle colors of pink, cyan, and purple—stood beside him. “Is an execution in order?”

“An execution…sounds like a good idea,” the Chaos Lord said, voice still quiet despite his anger. His golden pupils were glowing menacingly now. “But…I don’t think it’s necessary.”

“What do you mean?” the pink-tentacled League member said. “I thought you loved seeing people die.”

“Well…our Chaos League could always be bigger.”

Trisun was shaking uncontrollably now, barely able to speak from the lump in his throat. And yet, he managed to stammer out, “Wh-what do you mean?”

The Chaos Lord laughed. “Trisun, have you ever wanted to work under the most powerful guy in the Splatlands?”

Trisun shook his head.

“Well, too bad!” An evil smirk reappeared in the Chaos Lord’s face. “Show me your wrist, Trisun.”

The green Inkling followed the Chaos Lord’s order, holding out his wrist.

The Chaos Lord grabbed his wrist, and a sound of electricity and burning could be heard as Trisun screamed in pain.

When the Chaos Lord took his hand away from Trisun’s wrist, there was a brand in the shape of a lightning bolt.

“Welcome to the Chaos League, dazzle man.”

“Enjoy your punishment.”

Chapter Text

Golden mist—wild chaos forces—snaked around 8-Bit’s and Shady’s feet as the two of them walked up to a building. It was seemingly abandoned, but the two corrupted Inklings knew better.

It was a shelter of some sort.

“Are you…sure about this?” Shady said, tilting their head as they looked at 8-Bit.

“What choice do we have?” 8-Bit said.

“They could ki—”

“The non-corrupted don’t kill. You know this.”

Shady sighed, and stood back as 8-Bit brought her fist up to the door and knocked on it. Several times. Hard and insistantly.

“Isn’t that a bit—”

“Rude? Who gives a fuck?”

A few seconds later, the door opened. Just a crack, but Shady and 8-Bit could see lavender tentacles, and light brown skin. A purple eye stared at the two corrupted Inklings before the door was slammed again.

8-Bit grumbled. “Well, that was a waste.”

“Wait!” Shady called out, to the person behind the door.

To the surprise of both Inklings, the door opened again, this time more than a crack. Shady and 8-Bit could see the person was an Octoling, with a scowl on her face.

“I’m not letting you in.”

“Uh…why not?” Shady said.

“Are you stupid? You two are clearly corrupted. We don’t let corrupted people in here.”

“Why n—”

“What kind of question is that ?!” 8-Bit scoffed. “You know why. Corrupted people like us are dangerous, Shady.”

“That’s correct,” the Octoling said. “Now get out of my sight .”

“There’s a reason we want to get in here, though,” 8-Bit said, placing a hand on her hip. “And it’s not so that we can kill all of you.”

“Are you sure about that?”

“Yeah. We heard about a rebellion.”

The Octoling’s eyes widened at this. “H-how did you hear about that??”

“Thin ass walls.”

“ What? ”

“We, uh, didn’t hear the whole conversation,” Shady said. “Just…something about a rebellion, we’re guessing against the Chaos Lord…?”

The Octoling scowled. “I thought you corrupts all worshipped the land the Chaos Lord walked on.”

“Not us,” 8-Bit said. “We hate that fucker.”

“I find that hard to believe,” the Octoling said.

“Trust us,” Shady said. “The Chaos Lord ruined our lives.”

“Really?” The Octoling crossed her arms as she leaned against the doorway. “...Why do I feel like I recognize you two?”

“We were in the Chaos Games,” Shady said.

“We were part of the Splatsville Hierarchy,” 8-Bit said at the same time.

“The Splatsville Hierarchy?” Shellmet said. “Isn’t that the group that—”

“Terrorized Splatsville until the Chaos Lord came along?” 8-Bit said. “Yep, that’s us.”

“But the Hierarchy is no more,” Shady said. “The Chaos Lord messed everything up…and now we’re just looking for a purpose.”

“And rebelling against the Chaos Lord could be that purpose,” 8-Bit said. “So that’s why we should be let in—”

“No.” The Octoling seemed very certain.

“What will it take to convince you?!” 8-Bit exclaimed.

“I’m not letting corrupts into my shelter.”

“We could be a big help to your rebellion,” Shady said. “Just saying.”

…

Neither 8-Bit nor Shady were going to question where the Octoling—Shellmet—got the handcuffs.

But the two of them were cuffed to each other—8-Bit cuffed to Shellmet—as Shellmet led them into the shelter.

So this was technically a win. 8-Bit and Shady were being let in.

As they got deeper into the shelter, the two Inklings got more and more looks. Looks of judgment…and even fear.

Soon enough, they got to an area that must’ve been a common area. There were many people staring at them now—probably everyone that was hiding in this shelter. A group of three people—two Octolings and an Inkling—came up to Shellmet.

“What are these two doing here?!” one of the Octolings said. Noticeably, they had dragon wings and a dragon tail. Neither 8-Bit nor Shady decided to question this. “Can’t you see they’re corrupted ?!”

“Yeah, I thought they weren’t allowed in here!!” the Inkling exclaimed.

“Galax, Victoria, calm down,” Shellmet said. “I’m about to explain this.”

Indeed, seconds later, Shellmet turned to address the whole shelter. She announced that, even though Shady and 8-Bit were corrupted, they were being allowed in the shelter to help with the rebellion against the Chaos Lord. Shellmet was going to keep a very close eye on them, hence the literal handcuffs.

After Shellmet made the announcement, things seemed to calm down…just a little bit. Suspicious murmurs could be heard every now and then, and the two corrupted Inklings still got plenty of bad looks.

But it didn’t matter now. Because the corrupted Inklings were now being led to another room—where planning for the new rebellion would commence.

—

Galax felt uneasy with two corrupted people in the room. Two corrupted people in the same room where they were planning a rebellion, no less.

But they had heard Shellmet’s announcement. She was keeping a close eye on these two Inklings.

So Galax had no choice but to trust that Shellmet would prevent these corrupts from killing anyone.

“So,” said one of the corrupted Inklings—8-Bit was the red one, right?— “What exactly are we going to do in this rebellion?”

“Well, we have been looking for more people to join first,” Shellmet said. “And we got these two right here—” she gestured to the corrupted Inklings— “as well as many other people in this shelter who still need to make up their minds.”

“Okay, but what do we do after —”

“We need a name!” Galax exclaimed, interrupting 8-Bit.

Shellmet turned towards Galax. “What?”

“A name for the rebellion!” Galax said. “Something cool !”

“Well…is that really of the utmost importance?” Xavier said. He was here along with Victoria, Mitsuami, Hornmet, and Hiro. “I mean—”

“We should probably figure out how to kill the Chaos Lord first,” Victoria said.

“Wait,” Shady—the other corrupted Inkling—said, “we’re going to kill him?”

Everyone in the room gave Shady an annoyed look. Then Shellmet finally said, “What did you think we were doing?”

“Killing the Chaos Lord seems kind of…difficult,” Shady said. “He has lightning powers.”

“Well, we’re still gonna try!!” Galax exclaimed. “Because the Chaos Lord can’t be a tyrant over Splatsville any longer!”

“Yes,” Shellmet said. “Now, back to your idea, Galax. Do you have any name ideas?”

Galax sighed. “No…but we do need one.”

Silence fell across the room for a few seconds.

“The Justice Rebellion?” Mitsuami suggested after these few seconds.

“Nah…” Galax said.

“What about…the Rose Rebellion?” Shellmet said quietly.

“Why roses ?” 8-Bit said.

“I like roses,” Shellmet said, shrugging.

“Oh! I have an idea!” Galax said. “The Thorns of Justice!”

“Thorns?”

“Because they’re sharp and threatening!” Galax exclaimed. “And we’re fighting for justice!!”

“So…that’s our name now?” Hiro said.

“I think I like that name!” Hornmet said. She turned to Shellmet. “What do you think?”

Shellmet smiled, for the first time in a while. “I like that. I like it a lot.”

Galax grinned, and pumped a fist into the air. “Then the Thorns of Justice—that’s us!!”

“Okay, great, now when’s the part where we kill the Chaos Lord?” 8-Bit said.

“Patience, corrupt,” Shellmet said.

—

Hachi stared at the contraption in front of him, a metallic object he had built with his bare hands—well, hand.

It was long and slender, with segments of various types of metal before it ended in a five-clawed hand, electric wires within. A socket at the other end waited to be plugged into…something.

This contraption was to be Hachi’s new arm. He knew it would function much better than his current one, the one that was currently tied in a sling.

He was going to replace that one. No matter how painful it would be.

Hachi would do anything to make himself stronger.

With his functioning arm, Hachi reached over and took the large, sharp knife next to him. He placed it just below his left shoulder—

No hesitation. Don’t be a fucking coward.

SLICE!

The knife cut through flesh and cartilage easily, and Hachi couldn’t stop the scream of pain from escaping his chest. How could he? He had just cut off his own arm, after all—

“HACHI!!!”

What a perfect moment for Gloves and Prince to burst into the room, huh?

Gloves’ eyes were wide and panicked as they looked at Hachi’s bloody, detached arm on the floor, then at Hachi himself.

“Hachi, what the fuck ?!”

“You know I had to do this,” Hachi said, through ragged breaths of pain.

And with his remaining arm, he grabbed the metal prosthetic he had made and shoved it into his arm socket. He felt electricity flow through his shoulder as the metal arm registered that it was connected.

Then, finally, he felt that electricity in the arm itself.

Hachi twisted the arm left and right, moving it around to test it, wiggling the fingers.

His eyes went wide with amazement when he realized it really did work.

He had built a functioning prosthetic arm, all by himself.

“Hachi?” Prince’s voice this time. Hachi turned to look at them. When had they sat next to him?

“Yeah?” Hachi said.

“What do you mean, you had to do this?” Prince said.

“Well,” Hachi said, sighing. “Do you think I could get revenge on the Chaos Lord with a paralyzed arm? No, I need a new one.”

Prince hesitated, and Hachi frowned.

“Yes, we have to get revenge on him. He was the sole cause of your boyfriend’s death.”

“Okay, fine.” Prince sighed and got up, walking over to Gloves—who still stared at Hachi in shock.

“You…you—”

“Cut off my own arm, yes. Can we move on from that now?”

Hachi got up from his sitting position on the floor—using his new arm to support himself—and walked over to Gloves.

“Hachi…your eyes,” Gloves said.

“What about them?”

“Well…you know how the corrupted’s eyes glow gold when they get a kill? Uh…your eyes are glowing in the same way.”

Hachi sighed. “Can we not worry about my apparently glowing eyes right now, dear? We have a Chaos Lord to kill.” He pressed a kiss to Gloves’ lips before walking past them and out of the room.

—

Wireglasses opened the door to his room. A small, pathetic room in a small, pathetic building. Small and pathetic like Wireglasses was now.

He dropped the small bag of food he had acquired into the corner of the room. He didn’t feel like eating right now; he never did.

Then Wireglasses flopped onto his bed—if it could be called that, it was a dusty mattress on the dustier floor—and sighed, taking off his namesake glasses and placing them on a nearby table.

Who even was he now? Without his hierarchy? Without his power? Without his Ocho?

He was nothing . That was the answer.

Wireglasses couldn’t even cry, as he lay there on the dusty mattress. He felt too numb, too empty to cry.

Cod, he missed Ocho.

Too bad that bastard had betrayed him, all that time ago. It seemed like almost an eternity.

“Hey. Get up.”

Wireglasses was thoroughly startled by this, and he did sit up on his bed. He glanced around the room with wide eyes, until he saw a person .

An Inkling with long pink tentacles and a dark axolotl hood. He wore ripped leggings and many scars on his arms and face. His pink eyes were smug and arrogant, and his tentacles ended in a familiar golden gradient.

“Who—”

“Call me Marunomi. But that’s not important. Who are you ?”

“Me?” Wireglasses sighed. “I’m nothing now. You must know this.”

“Bullshit.”

“What?”

“You know who you are. You’re Wireglasses. Leader of the feared Splatsville Hierarchy. A corrupt, ruthless and powerful.”

“Not anymore. Have you been living under a rock?”

“Nope. Only in Splatsville.”

“Under the rule of that Chaos Lord.” The one who had ruined Wireglasses’ life.

“Not for long.”

“W-what?”

“We can stop the Chaos Lord, Wireglasses,” Marunomi said. He reached a hand out towards Wireglasses. Wireglasses just gave him a skeptical glare.

“We can?” Wireglasses said.

“Together,” Marunomi confirmed. He wiggled his fingers. “You’re supposed to take my hand.”

“How do I know I can trust you?”

“We’re both chaos corrupted. And we both hate that winged, electric bastard of a ruler.”

Wireglasses sighed.

He hadn’t had anyone to trust in a long, long time. Not since Ocho.

And stopping the Chaos Lord’s tyrannical rule…hadn’t really come to his mind.

But with this mysterious new companion…it could be possible.

Wireglasses reached forward and took Marunomi’s hand.

Chapter Text

Hachi's mechanical arm quietly whirred as he walked through the early morning Splatsville streets. It was quiet, with barely anyone out, as the sun had just finished rising over the horizon.

Good. Hachi couldn't afford any distractions. He had one goal in mind, and nothing was going to divert him from this.

He then heard footsteps behind him. Hachi swiveled around quickly—eyes darting around, heart pounding with adrenaline and anticipation.

It was quiet for a few more seconds. Too quiet.

Then he heard the footsteps again. They sounded like someone dragging their feet along the ground.

Hachi took out his knife and held it in his non-mechanical hand. That was when something jumped out at him, clearly intending to tackle him to the ground. Hachi dodged swiftly, and as his attacker landed, he got a closer look at them—or it.

It was clear it was once an Octoling. It still had tentacles in that surfcurl style, and they had once been yellow—but they were now being nearly overtaken by that golden color of chaos. It had a humanoid form—four limbs and a face—and that face had cracked tinted goggles where the eyes should be. Its teeth were too big for its mouth, sharp and jutting out in many directions. Its red chest armor looked somewhat normal, while its large claws dripped with yellow-gold ink.

Hachi had never seen anything like this…it looked almost like some kind of chaos corrupted zombie.

The…zombie thing slowly turned towards Hachi, and began to shamble towards him. Zombies were usually slow, but whatever this thing was, it was actually quite fast.

Hachi started to back away, trying to come up with a plan. When he had left the shelter, he was mentally prepared to fight a dictator with lightning powers and wings, not a zombie-like thing. Not like this was that much of an issue, just…unexpected.

So, somewhat impulsively, Hachi threw his knife at the zombie. He aimed for its goggles lens, and he struck his target. The knife pierced through the glass and into the thing's eye, blood and goopy eyeball material splattering all over the knife.

The zombie howled in pain, and Hachi took this as his opportunity to grab his knife again—covered in the stuff that had splattered out from the wound, gross—and poise himself to stab the thing in the heart—

He felt somebody grabbing his arms, and pulling him back.

"H-hey!!" Hachi exclaimed. "Who—what—"

"Hachi, it's me," Headphones' voice came from behind Hachi. "I'm just trying to keep you safe—"

"Safe?! I need—I need to kill this fucking thing!! Just let me—"

"Maybe it doesn't need to be killed. Let's go," Headphones said.

"What the hell are you talking about?!" Hachi exclaimed, struggling against Headphones' strong grip as she dragged Hachi away.

Surprisingly, the zombie thing didn't give chase. It just stood there, whining from the pain of its stabbed eyeball.

Hachi felt no sympathy for it at all. It was as much of a monster as the Chaos Lord.

—

After a few minutes, Headphones and Hachi hid behind a building, far away from the zombie Hachi had stabbed. Hachi grumbled as he cleaned the blood and eyeball goop from his knife, and Headphones began talking to him.

"Hachi, have you considered you don't need to kill everything you see?" Headphones said.

"First of all, I don't do that," Hachi said. "Second of all, that zombie thing attacked me first. Don't you know how this works?"

"It honestly looked…miserable," Headphones said. "Even before you attacked it. Did you see all its wounds?"

"No, because I didn't care," Hachi said. "…If there's zombies in this damn apocalypse now, that's really bad, Headphones."

"If its a zombie, that means it died," Headphones said. "Which means it was a victim of this apocalypse."

"Well, whether the thing died from murder, starvation, or raw chaos forces, it attacked me afterwards," Hachi said. "That's all that matters. That's why I tried to kill it. Simple self-defense."

"You could've at least tried to figure things out—"

"And get myself killed?"

Their argument was cut short by two other people walking up to them. Familiar people, luckily—Specs and Bobble.

"Oh good, you found him!" Bobble said.

"C'mon Hachi, let's go back to the shelter," Specs said.

"Back to the shelter?" Hachi scoffed. "I'll never go back. I have a task to do, and I won't stop until I'm finished with it."

"I don't think killing the Chaos Lord is a good idea, Hachi," Specs said.

"What?!" Hachi exclaimed. "You know what he's done, right?!"

"Yeah, but…we used to know him…" Bobble said—

"I don't give a shit, because we don't know him anymore," Hachi grumbled.

"Can we discuss this at the shelter?" Headphones said. "Gloves and Prince are waiting."

"Did…did you guys come out here just to find me?!" Hachi exclaimed.

"Yes, because we didn't want you to get into trouble again," Specs said. "Trouble such as—"

"Don't you dare fucking mention that."

—

"What we've learned about the Chaos Lord so far," Shellmet said, addressing the members of the Thorns of Justice in front of her, "is that he doesn't work alone. He is heavily guarded by a group called the Chaos League."

"So we kill the Chaos League and then the Chaos Lord himself. Easy," 8-Bit said.

"You're only saying that because you're a bloodthirsty corrupt," Shady muttered.

"Excuse me?! You're literally the same!!" 8-Bit exclaimed.

"Don't argue!!" Galax scolded the two of them. They turned back to Shellmet. "What do you think we should do about this group? How big is it, even?"

"Decently big, at least ten people," Shellmet said. "Taking out all of them at once isn't much of an option, since many of them are likely to be corrupted. But we still have a chance against them."

"Facing them one by one?" Xavier asked.

"Exactly," Shellmet said. "And we don't even have to fight or kill all of them. I'm sure there are members of the Chaos League who are part of it against their will—"

Galax's eyes widened in inspiration at this. "So we can get them to betray the Chaos Lord and join our cause?!"

"Yes," Shellmet said.

"But…how will we even get to this Chaos League?" Victoria said. "I imagine they wouldn't leave the Chaos Lord's lair very often…"

"Well, I have a map of the Chaos Tower back from my assassination plan during the Games," Shellmet said. She placed a paper down onto the table, and indeed, it was a map of the Chaos Tower.

"So, we're going to kidnap Chaos League members from the tower itself?" Victoria said. Her eyes darted from the map back to Shellmet.

"Wh-what if the Chaos Lord catches us?" Mitsuami said. "He'll kill us for sure…"

"We'll be very sneaky!" Galax said.

"And perhaps we'll catch them at opportunities when they are away from the Chaos Lord himself," Shellmet said. "Sneak them away from their boss."

"And if that doesn't work?" Hornmet said.

"There'll be a Plan B," Shellmet said.

"Uh…assuming we're all alive by then," Hiro said.

"Don't worry. We will be."

—

A few hours later, Galax, Victoria, and Xavier were sent on a brief trip to get supplies for the shelter. The three of them were very quiet as they walked through the street, being careful not to talk about their assassination plans this time.

The team soon found an abandoned grocery store with some wares still inside, and so they entered it. But before they could get even a single box, Galax suddenly tripped.

"You okay?" Victoria said, helping Galax up—

Before she was shot in the head with orange ink. She tumbled to the ground, right on top of Galax, and Xavier panicked for a split second before a figure stood up and punched him in the face.

All of Team Galaxy was down now, and their attacker's motivation was clear as he began to tie them up and drag them out of the grocery store.

They were being kidnapped.

Chapter Text

Specs, Headphones, Bobble, and Hachi made their way back to their shelter, only to be met with a surprise when they got there.

Their shelter had been raided. Almost all their food was gone, as well as other vital supplies, and the place was in general disarray.

"Bobble, I thought you locked the door!!" Specs exclaimed, turning towards Bobble with anger on his face.

Bobble shrunk back. "I-I thought I did too—"

"Well, apparently you should've double checked," Hachi seethed, before walking away from the others to look for Gloves and Prince.

"Guys, let's not place the blame on anyone," Headphones said. "Are Gloves and Prince okay?"

"Yeah, they're right here," Hachi said, opening a nearby closet door. Indeed, in the small closet, Gloves and Prince were hiding.

"H-Hachi!" Prince exclaimed. "The shelter—"

"Got raided. I can see that," Hachi said. "Why didn't you fight back?"

"Well, we tried to, but it was a whole band of corrupts," Gloves said. "Almost died trying to fight them. Luckily they didn't see us hide in here."

"Yeah, you're lucky they didn't see you hiding in the incredibly obvious closet," Hachi said.

"So…what do we do about this?" Specs said, as he, Headphones, and Bobble walked up to Hachi.

"I don't know…" Prince said.

"Looks like we find another shelter," Hachi said. "And some more supplies."

Headphones sighed. "It was so difficult just to find this place…"

"We don't have a choice," Specs said.

"Or," Hachi said, "we could—"

"We're not killing the Chaos Lord and taking over his tower," Bobble said.

Hachi turned towards Bobble with annoyance. "Wha—"

"I know you well enough, Hachi."

—

A mere hour later, the group had packed up their surviving belongings and set off on a quest to find somewhere new to stay. The previous shelter had been too beat up to stay in, after all.

Surprisingly, the group of six was able to walk through the streets of Splatsville without being the target of especially bloodthirsty corrupts. Perhaps it was the simple size of the group—or Hachi and Bobble's strong golden gradients on their tentacles.

Either way, they didn't get attacked, and that was good. After about a half hour, they found an Inkling walking the streets, with long pink tentacles and a helmet with horns on it. She seemed intimidated when she looked up and saw the large group.

"Where are you headed?" Specs asked the Inkling. "A shelter, by any chance?"

"Wh-why do you need to know?!" the Inkling said, fear turning into defensive anger. "Are you corrupted?!"

"No," Specs said. "We just need a place to stay. Our shelter was raided…"

The Inkling sighed. "How should I know you're trustworthy?"

"We only kill people who deserve it," Hachi said, crossing his arms. "Who cross a certain line."

"Hachi!!" Bobble exclaimed. "You can't—"

"So you are corrupted?!" the pink Inkling said.

"Well, most of us aren't," Specs said.

"Yeah, and if you don't lead us to this shelter—" Hachi started—

"No threats, Hachi," Headphones said. "C'mon."

The pink Inkling sighed. "Fine. Let's see if Shellmet lets you in."

—

"What?!" Hachi exclaimed.

"We don't let corrupts into the shelter," Shellmet said. "Well, we usually don't."

"That's not fair!" Bobble shouted. "Th-those are our friends!! We have to be with them!!"

"They shouldn't have befriended corrupted people, then," Shellmet said.

And with that, Shellmet slammed the door to the shelter in Hachi and Bobble's faces. Leaving them out on the street.

Hachi turned towards Bobble with anger. "Bobble, we have to find a way—"

"I'm not even corrupted…" Bobble mumbled. Her eyes were open, and tears were starting to flow out of them.

"Okay, neither am I, they're just dicks," Hachi said.

Bobble stared at Hachi for a few seconds, at his intense golden gradient and his mechanical arm. "Y-You sure?"

"Yes, I'm sure. Corrupted people are evil psychopaths, which I'm not," Hachi said. "Now, we're gonna have to find a way into the shelter."

"How?"

"I dunno, we gotta break in or something."

"Or we could…talk to her…"

"Bobble, that clearly didn't work." Hachi sighed. "If we have to force our way in, so be it."

—

Meanwhile, Specs, Headphones, Gloves, and Prince were led down a hallway by Shellmet. The pink Inkling—who had introduced herself as Hornmet—walked beside them.

"So…why didn't you let Hachi and Bobble in?" Prince asked.

"You heard our policy," Shellmet said. "No corrupts allowed."

"But…they were with us," Specs said.

"That's not an exception," Shellmet said.

With that, no more arguing was done until the group got to the main room of the shelter—filled with sleeping bags and scattered people. Shellmet showed a spot in the corner for the four to settle, and then she turned to Gloves.

"I have a question."

"Well, ask away," Gloves said.

"What's your situation? With your tentacles?" Shellmet gestured to Gloves' tentacles, which had black and gold spots on them, along with the ghost of a golden tint. "It's not corruption…but it isn't anything else I've seen."

Gloves sighed. "Well…it's kind of a long story."

"I'm fine with long stories."

"Okay. Fine. It all started in the abandoned Inkopolis Square…where, in a back alley, I saw a group of shadows congregating. A bunch of shadows of people I knew, including Specs, Headphones, and Bobble. I thought them dead, but the existence of their shadows proved me otherwise."

"I didn't have long to dwell on this revelation before…the shadows attacked me. I was practically choked by the chaos forces they are made up of…and of course, I absorbed some of that. Hence the…golden spots. And since this weird half corruption is from the shadows…I assume that's why there's black spots, too."

"Luckily I made it out alive…and not corrupted. Well, not entirely."

"So, that's my story." Gloves shrugged. "Nothing super specia—"

"No, this is amazing," Shellmet said. "I…didn't know this was possible. All this time I simply thought it was corrupted or not…I didn't think there was an in between."

"Welllll, uhh—"

Gloves cut themself off when their eyes fell on two Inklings nearby, two Inklings that they hadn't noticed before. One had short red tentacles, the other long teal tentacles—

But most notably, they had strong golden gradients on their tentacles.

"H-hey!!" Gloves exclaimed, gesturing to the two Inklings. "Are those two corrupted?!"

Shellmet hesitated for a second. "Well, yes—"

"Doesn't your policy state that no corrupts are allowed?!" Gloves shouted. "Why are they here?! What makes them so special?!"

"Gloves, you really don't need to get so worked up—" Prince said, before being interrupted.

"Yes I do! If my boyfriend isn't being let in but these two losers are—"

"Losers?!" the red Inkling exclaimed.

"Whoa, let's not start a fight here," Shellmet said. "Gloves, the reason I let these two in is because they promised to be part of our rebellion."

Gloves stopped raging when they heard this. "Rebellion…?"

"Yes, the Thorns of Justice," Shellmet said. "They're going to help us kill the Chaos Lord."

—

When Galax woke up, they soon realized that they were in some kind of prison cell.

This wasn't good. This wasn't good at all.

Immediately upon realizing this, a surge of fearful adrenaline went through Galax's veins. The first thing they tried to do was bang on the bars of the cell, but they were apparently charged with electricity, and Galax was thrown back by a shock.

Thrown back right into Xavier, who had still been unconscious on the stone floor. Galax landing on him, however, woke up him.

"Galax, what the fuck—"

"We've been kidnapped, Xavier!" Galax exclaimed. "And put into an electric cell against our will!"

"Kidnappings are usually against the victim's will," Xavier pointed out, sitting up and rubbing his head. "Do you…know where we are?"

"In a prison cell!"

"No, but where is this prison cell?"

Galax hesitated for a few seconds. "I…don't know." They then turned to Victoria, who was also unconscious on the floor, and gave her a shake. This, luckily, woke her up, and Galax explained the situation.

"We need to get out of here," Victoria said.

"Of course!" Galax exclaimed. "But how?"

"Well, I don't know," Victoria replied.

Before any further banter could be exchanged between the three, somebody walked up to the prison cell. He was an Inkling with orange tentacles, wearing a beret and a camo hoodie. His arms were behind his back as if he was in the military, and the face paint he wore further gave off that vibe.

"I see our prisoners are awake," the Inkling said, a smug smirk on his face.

"Who are you? Do you have a name?" Galax demanded.

"Our?" Xavier asked. "Who are you working for?"

"The name's Army," the Inkling answered. "And I work under the Chaos League. Hopefully that answers your questions."

"The Chaos League?! As in…under the Chaos Lord?!" Victoria exclaimed.

"The very same," Army said. He then hesitated. "Well…it's actually called the Shadows of Chaos now…"

"W-what—?"

"Now, you know why you've been imprisoned here, right?" Army continued, interrupting Xavier.

The three prisoners glanced at each other before Galax stammered, "Uh…n-no."

Army sighed. "Fools. Nonetheless, do not worry. You will be dealt with soon."

And with that, Army walked away, stiff and straight as if, again, he was part of the military.

"Shit," Galax muttered, once Army was out of sight. "Shit shit shit shit shit shit—"

"Did they find out about our plans?" Xavier exclaimed. "H-how?!"

"That girl we fought…remember her?" Victoria said. "Corrupted…cyan…Carbon Roller? She must have been part of the Chaos League…Shadows of Chaos…whatever…"

"Then we should've killed her!!" Galax exclaimed suddenly. "We…cod, we're such idiots—"

"We didn't have a choice but to run. She was stronger than all three of us combined," Xavier said.

"Doesn't change the fact that we could've done something…" Galax said. They sighed, tears forming to their eyes. "And now we're trapped here…until the Chaos Lord comes and kills us…"

"Well, we can escape before that happens," Victoria said.

Galax turned to Victoria with a scowl. "How? How are we going to escape the Shadows of Chaos' clutches?"

Victoria was quiet, for it was clear neither she or Xavier knew.

Unless they got outside help…the three of them were doomed.

—

"They have what?!" Hachi exclaimed into his walkie-talkie.

"A rebellion against the Chaos Lord, apparently," Gloves replied, their voice tinny through the old speaker.

"Well, now they have to let us in," Hachi said. "Bobble and I both can help them kill the Chaos Lord."

"That is a possibility, actually," Gloves said. "They actually have two corrupted people in here—"

"WHAT?!"

"—because they're working with the rebellion," Gloves said. "It's called…the Thorns of Justice or something, I dunno."

"Corny fucking name." But Hachi had heard all he needed to. He put his walkie-talkie away, and with Bobble still staring at him, he pounded on the shelter door.

Shellmet answered fairly quickly, surprisingly. She saw Hachi and Bobble and was about to slam the door in their faces—

—before Hachi shoved his foot in the way, forcing Shellmet to talk to him.

"We heard you have a rebellion," Hachi said.

"Against the Chaos Lord!" Bobble piped in. "We can help!!"

"A better way to say it is that we're going to help," Hachi seethed. "You're going to let us into the shelter and let us help with your Rebellion—or else Bobble and I are going to burn it to the fucking ground and kill everyone in it."

"…are we?" Bobble said—

"Yes we are, shut the fuck up."

Shellmet sighed. "Are you sure you're going to help?"

"Why wouldn't we? We hate that son of a bitch. He ruined our lives," Hachi replied.

After hesitating, Shellmet said, "Fine. But we're going to handcuff you as well."

"H-Handcuff?!" Hachi exclaimed.

"So that you can't betray us and kill everyone in the shelter, obviously," Shellmet said. "Now, come on in before I change my mind."

—

"Hachi!" Gloves exclaimed, running towards their boyfriend once they saw him enter the shelter. They wrapped Hachi in a hug, and Hachi returned it—well, he tried his best, considering one wrist was handcuffed to Shellmet's.

"You two are in a relationship?" Shellmet asked.

"Yeah, of course!" Gloves said.

"Wonderful. You'll look after this corrupt, then? Make sure he doesn't kill anyone?"

Gloves stammered, but before they could even say anything, Shellmet handcuffed Hachi to them. Hachi just sighed with exasperation.

"With that logic, Bobble should be handcuffed to Headphones as well—" Hachi said.

"Oh, they're dating?" Shellmet said.

"Uh, n-no—" Bobble stammered—

"Yeah…?" Headphones said.

Shellmet clearly decided to trust Headphones' judgment before Bobble's, and in mere seconds, Bobble and Headphones were handcuffed together as well.

"I'm…not even corrupted," Bobble muttered.

"Neither am I," Hachi said. His attention was then shifted to Shellmet as she walked away. "Hey!!"

"And what do you want?" Shellmet said.

"I need to tell you about…something that happened today," Hachi said. "I feel like you'd want to know."

"Oh yeah?" Shellmet said. She walked back towards Hachi. "Well, tell me then."

Hachi sighed. "It seemed to be some kind of zombie. Once an Octoling…but now with huge teeth and claws, and completely feral—it tried to attack me and I had to defend myself. Its tentacles were almost completely golden, I should mention."

Shellmet's eyes widened. "Oh…oh no."

"Yeah…this is a threat nobody's ever seen before," Hachi continued. "If this is a zombie apocalypse as well as a chaos apocalyp—"

"What did it look like?"

Hachi glared at Shellmet. "I, uh, just told you."

"Beyond the huge teeth and claws. What did it look like before it turned into…that?"

"Well…its tentacles were in the surfcurl haircut, and seemingly yellow before being overtaken with gold," Hachi explained. "It had tinted goggles, and red chest armor—"

"I think that's enough details. Thank you…what was your name?"

"Hachi." The Octoling's brow was furrowed with confusion.

Upon collecting Hachi's name, Shellmet nodded and promptly walked away. There was a look of anxiety on her face, and her breathing was becoming short and panicked by the second, her eyes wide.

But Hachi barely saw any of this before Shellmet disappeared down a nearby hallway. And he couldn't even follow her, being handcuffed to Gloves.

—

An Octoling.

Yellow surfcurl haircut.

Tinted goggles…red chest armor…

Huge teeth. Huge claws. Aggressive.

Alive, somehow.

Shellmet…could hardly believe this. The description that Hachi had given…it sounded like some zombified version of Barreleye.

But…that was impossible. There was no evidence of dead people turning into zombies at all during this apocalypse…why would it suddenly happen with Barreleye?

Shellmet then decided that this couldn't be Barreleye. It just…couldn't.

Because Barreleye was dead and gone.

Not an aggressive, monstrous zombie.

Chapter Text

Tears were steadily flowing out of Galax's eyes now, as they collapsed against the wall and curled into a ball. Sobs wracked their body as the true situation set in.

Team Galaxy was trapped. Team Galaxy was doomed. They were going to die at the hands of the Chaos Lord—the very one they were planning to assassinate.

They were supposed to save Splatsville. To stop the horrible apocalypse.

But instead, they were just going to be three more victims of it.

And it was all Galax's fault.

"Galax…" As they heard Xavier's voice, Galax felt a gentle hand on their shoulder. But despite the attempt at comfort, Galax pushed the hand away.

"Just leave me alone," Galax mumbled through their sobs.

"But…there must be some way," Xavier said. "Y-you were always so…ambitious. So…hopeful. Willing to fight for a better future."

Galax sighed. "Yeah…that was real dumb of me, huh?"

"You can't just give up now," Victoria said. "Not after all we've done. Not after we helped form a rebellion."

"They'll be fine without us." Galax attempted to wipe their tears with the sleeve of their hoodie, but more just came in their place. "Shellmet…was much smarter than me anyway, more competent. She'll be able to lead it just fine."

"But you were the beating heart of the Thorns of Justice," Xavier said. "You gave Shellmet the courage to even begin it."

"Stop it with all that cheesiness." Galax gave Xavier a glare. "You know that there's no hope now…"

"Unless we get outside help," Victoria said, crossing her arms as she looked over at the bars of the cell.

"And who is going to be able to help us?" Galax exclaimed. "The Chaos League—Shadows of Chaos, whatever—they are all working for the Chaos Lord. I doubt any of them could help us."

"Well, we still have those walkie-talkies, right?" Xavier said. "We could contact Shellmet or someone—"

"And how will they get here? This place has its defenses, probably," Galax mumbled, looking away from Xavier and Victoria.

Silence fell over the three for a few moments. Then Galax muttered, "I'm sorry."

"You're going to stop being pessimistic now?" Victoria said.

"No…I'm sorry I made our last conversation an argument." Galax tried to take a deep breath, but it was choked with tears. "I ruined our friendship…huh?"

More silence.

"I…don't think you ruined anything," Xavier said, so quiet it was almost a whisper.

"And I think there's hope," an unfamiliar voice said. Startled, all three prisoners looked towards the bars.

There was somebody standing on the other side.

A mint-green Inkling with two pairs of sunglasses.

Galax's tear-filled eyes widened. "Are…are you—"

"Part of the Shadows of Chaos?" The Inkling chuckled quietly, before raising his forearm for Team Galaxy to see.

Right below his forearm, there was a burn shaped like a lightning bolt.

"Is that—" Victoria stammered—

"Yep. He brands you when you join. Brutal, huh?" The Inkling gave Team Galaxy a small smile. "Anyway, we don't have much time. They think I'm simply guarding you kids right now."

"Are you going to…free us?" Xavier said, his eyes wide.

"Yep. Exactly why I requested to 'volunteer.'" The Inkling took some keys out of his pocket. "By the way, I'm Trisun."

And with that, Trisun unlocked the cell with a simple click of the keys.

Team Galaxy was free.

"Th-thank you…" Galax stammered.

"How do we get out of…wherever we are?" Victoria asked.

"The Chaos Tower? Well, there's a stairway that will lead you out of these dungeons and to the outside world," Trisun said. "Follow me."

Trisun led Team Galaxy down the hallway of cells for a few minutes—surprisingly mostly empty. Then, at the end of the hallway, there was another door, this one thick and metal. Trisun opened it with his keys, and as it swung open, it revealed a staircase.

"I've done all I can," Trisun said. "I'm not allowed to leave, but you kids are. So go ahead."

Galax looked at Trisun in astonishment—they still couldn't believe how kind he was.

They were about to thank them again when an unfamiliar voice suddenly boomed through the hallway.

"Trisun?"

A look of fear came across Trisun's face.

Victoria and Xavier ran up the stairs immediately, and Trisun gestured for Galax to follow them.

But for whatever reason, Galax felt a morbid curiosity towards this voice—because they had a feeling it belonged to the Chaos Lord.

So instead of escaping up the staircase, Galax turned into an octopus and hid, watching as two figures approached Trisun. One of the figures was the person who had talked to Team Galaxy earlier—the orange Inkling named Army.

As for the other one—his face was shrouded in shadow, so it was difficult for Galax to discern his identity. But he was hovering a few inches off the ground, and he had black feathered wings that gave him an imposing silhouette—and his eyes were glowing with a golden electricity.

This was surely the Chaos Lord.

"Or should I say…dazzle man," the Chaos Lord said, an evil smirk spreading across his face.

Galax was shaking—they were glad their hiding spot seemed decent so far. They were in the presence of the Chaos Lord—the tyrannical ruler of Splatsville.

They weren't supposed to be scared right now. They were going to kill the Chaos Lord, they couldn't feel scared around him! What was wrong with them?!

"Y-Your Evilness," Trisun said, bowing to the Chaos Lord.

"What happened to the prisoners?" the Chaos Lord asked, smirk fading. "They're gone."

"Oh! Uh…" Trisun stammered—

"Why is the door to the escape staircase open?"

"I was just, uh, checking," Trisun said, fear in his voice. "Checking if they…managed to escape somehow."

"You know that door is locked, right?"

"They could've…uh…slipped under…?"

"That's impossible."

"W-well, I didn't know that!" Trisun exclaimed. The Chaos Lord's frown deepened.

But the Chaos Lord didn't get a chance to speak before Army spoke up, a hint of fear in his quiet voice. "Your Evilness, my deepest apologies for letting the prisoners escape."

The Chaos Lord turned around to face Army. "It wasn't your fault, Army. Trisun was the one tasked with guarding them—"

"They were gone when I got down here!" Trisun exclaimed.

A look of utter fear came across Trisun's face when the Chaos Lord gave him a glare. The lights above began to flicker slightly.

"What did I say about interrupting me, dazzle man?" Despite the unserious nickname, the Chaos Lord's voice was low and intimidating.

"U-uh…don't…don't do it…" Trisun stammered. "Y-Your Evilness…please…"

Trisun didn't get to say anything else before he was struck with lightning from the Chaos Lord's hand. The mint-green Inkling was thrown back, his head landing on one of the stairs behind him—and as Galax watched in horror, they were pretty sure they could see blood pooling beneath Trisun's head.

The Chaos Lord didn't say anything as Trisun lay there helplessly. He continued to glare at him until Army spoke again, his voice small.

"Chaos Lord…are you going to punish me as well?"

The Chaos Lord sighed, floating towards Army. A smirk subtly spread across the Chaos Lord's face as he tilted Army's chin up so that the two of them made eye contact.

"No. I like you too much, Army."

Galax could've sworn a blush spread across Army's face—but it didn't matter.

They had decided they've seen enough. They needed to leave now.

And so, still in their octopus form and panicking, Galax slid out of their hiding place and towards the staircase. They silently cursed the lack of ink making them slow—but luckily, the Chaos Lord was distracted and didn't see them.

They then slid underneath Trisun's probably unconscious body, and wriggled up the stairs as fast as they could.

Only when Xavier and Victoria were in sight did Galax transform back into their kid form. They ran up the stairs as fast as they could, and soon enough they were out in open light.

"Galax, what—"

"We need to get away now," Galax said, interrupting Xavier. They didn't say anything else before they ran away from the staircase, Victoria and Xavier following them.

After a few seconds of running, Galax finally decided it was safe to slow to a walk. "Why were you guys just hanging out there? You could've been caught."

"We were waiting for you!" Victoria exclaimed. "Why were you taking so long?!"

Galax hesitated. "I saw the Chaos Lord."

Xavier's eyes widened. "W-well why didn't you run away sooner?"

"I needed to know who we were up against," Galax answered. "By the way, he does have actual lightning powers. That wasn't a metaphor for being an electrician."

"I don't think it ever was," Victoria sighed. "But…you saw the Chaos Lord, huh? How scary is he? Do you think we could—"

"We probably shouldn't talk about our plan so loudly out here," Galax said.

"Just realized that?" Xavier muttered.

Galax sighed. "My point is, we have to be more careful from now on. Talking about our plans in the open…that almost cost us our lives."

"Well, we should probably get back to the shelter now," Victoria said.

"Agreed," Galax said.

—

"Shellmet to Team Galaxy," Shellmet said, hand shaking as she held the radio. "Can you hear me? Are you okay? Are you alive?"

"You've been trying that over and over again for ages now," Polpo said. "I…I don't think they can hear you."

Shellmet sighed. "But if they can't hear me…something terrible must have happened."

"Those kids…they're strong," Polpo said. "I'm sure whatever situation they found themselves in, they'll be able to get out."

"Yeah, but it would be helpful to at least know what situation it is." Shellmet set down the radio on a nearby table. "Keep an eye on this. I'm going to check on the others." Polpo nodded as Shellmet walked away.

Shellmet walked into the main room, and there she could feel anxiety in the air—probably because Team Galaxy hadn't come back yet. They all seemed to be as worried as Shellmet herself.

And indeed, as Shellmet walked into the room, Mitsuami came up to her. "D-do you know what happened to Galax, Victoria, and Xavier?" she asked her.

Shellmet just shook her head. "I've been trying to contact them, no reply."

Mitsuami's expression became more anxious, as she turned and walked towards Hornmet. The pink Inkling wrapped the yellow one in a comforting hug.

Nearby, Shady and 8-Bit were talking quietly about…something. Shellmet couldn't tell, but whatever it was, Hachi was straining to hear, but it was difficult when he was still handcuffed to Gloves.

And Gloves…seemed to be in some kind of trance. Eyes staring at the ground, wide and unblinking—

But the thing that startled Shellmet the most was the subtle electricity that seemed to be coming off of their tentacles.

—

Team Blue was alive.

Gloves knew this when they saw their shadows in the Square. There were a bunch of shadows congregated in the abandoned Square, and all of them seemed to be thriving—laughing and talking as if nothing was amiss.

They fed off of the suffering of people in the apocalypse, Gloves knew this. They fed off of the deaths, and off of the corruption. Every time a corrupt killed out of instinct, the energy of the shadows became stronger.

Shadows died when their originals died.

So that's why Gloves knew Specs, Headphones, and Bobble were all alive. Their shadows were in the Square—along with Shadow Goggles himself.

However, Gloves and their team didn't get to watch the shadows long before all four of them were attacked. Electricity slammed against Gloves and surged through their blood—

—And when they blacked out, they thought they had died.

But they weren't dead. They were back in their shelter when they opened their eyes again.

Half-Rims, Clip-Ons, and Straps were nowhere in sight.

The only other person—well, not really a person anymore—here with Gloves was a yellow-green ghost.

And he told Gloves that they had been the only survivor of that attack.

—

Gloves blinked, and they were back in the shelter. Shellmet's shelter. They were still handcuffed to Hachi, apparently—judging by the way they felt an insistant tug on their wrist.

"Hachi, what's the matter?" Gloves said. "Gotta go to the bathroom or something?"

"No, they're talking about the Chaos Lord," Hachi said, gesturing to Shady and 8-Bit nearby. "Specifically how we can kill him. And I can't hear them."

Gloves sighed. "Hachi, do we really need to—"

"Yes."

"Okay, lemme move closer to them," Gloves said. They then scooted closer to Shady and 8-Bit, allowing Hachi to join the conversation.

However, Gloves themself wasn't listening much. They were focused on something else.

The yellow-green ghost that had saved them—he was here again. His squid-shaped soul drifting through the room, looking straight at Gloves before phasing through the wall.

If only that ghost would actually talk to Gloves again.

They didn't doubt that he had a valuable opinion about the Chaos Lord.

Chapter Text

“Okay, finding a better shelter would probably be important," Marunomi said, as he and Wireglasses walked into the room.

"Why?" Wireglasses asked, setting the bag of food they had acquired into the corner. "What's wrong with this one?"

"We won't be able to stop the Chaos Lord from a pathetic, dusty room with only a mattress and a table," Marunomi said.

Wireglasses sighed. "Fine. But where the fuck are we supposed to go?"

"That's the question. And the answer is—we leave and find somewhere to stay," Marunomi replied. "Maybe some kind of refugee shelter."

"We're both corrupted," Wireglasses said. "Nobody would accept us."

"It's worth a shot."

—

Soon enough, Wireglasses and Marunomi had left the pathetic, dusty room behind—for good. Wireglasses carried his bags of food on his back, and Marunomi's eyes darted left and right, looking for…something.

"Well? Any ideas?" Wireglasses asked.

"Not yet," Marunomi said. "It's going to be hard to find a shelter that'll take us in…we may have to establish our own."

"How about we go back to that room?" Wireglasses said. "I mean, sure it's small and dusty, but at least it was out of the way—"

"No. We have more dignity than that."

Wireglasses sighed. "Fine."

"You're a member of the Hierarchy, Wireglasses. You out of all people should know about dignity."

"I told you, the Hierarchy is no more."

"We could revive it, y'know."

Wireglasses blinked. "But…Ocho is dea—"

"I could be a good replacement for that guy, don't you think~?"

Marunomi gave Wireglasses a wink, and Wireglasses scowled at him.

"Nobody could replace Ocho," he grumbled.

"You sure?"

"Yes."

Wireglasses did not want to think about his dead boyfriend right now…well, technically ex-boyfriend. It was complicated. He heard Marunomi sigh, and he looked up to see the pink Inkling looking at a nearby bar.

"How about we check that place out?" Marunomi said. "We could find somewhere to stay, or some good information. At least some decent drinks."

Wireglasses sighed. "Whatever can help us defeat the Chaos Lord, I guess."

With that, Marunomi took Wireglasses' hand—why did that make Wireglasses blush?—and the two corrupts entered the bar.

—

Team Galaxy walked through the streets of Splatsville, trying to find their way back to the shelter. It didn't help that none of them knew the streets of Splatsville very well, and they soon found themselves lost.

"We're fucked," Xavier muttered. "We're so fucked."

"Aw, don't say that!" Galax said. "I'm sure if we wander around this city for long enough we'll find the shelter!"

Xavier sighed, and nobody talked for a few more minutes as they continued walking.

Soon enough, the three of them passed a bar. There was a lot of noise coming from inside, and the team was about to disregard it—until two Inklings nearby entered the bar, and one of them said something that piqued Galax's interest.

"Whatever can help us defeat the Chaos Lord, I guess."

"Guys," Galax muttered. "Did you hear that?"

"Sure did," Victoria said. "It seems those two guys want to…defeat the Chaos Lord."

"Just like us," Xavier said.

"This means…we could invite them to our rebellion…" Galax whispered, watching the red-orange and pink Inklings enter the bar.

"Did you see their tentacles, though?" Xavier muttered. "They're corrupted."

"So?" Victoria said. "Shady and 8-Bit are already in the shelter."

"And Shellmet won't take kindly to more corrupts in the shelter…" Xavier added.

"It's worth a shot, though," Galax said. "Should we follow them?"

"That bar looks really dangerous…" Xavier said. "Like it's full of corrupts."

"Drunk corrupts, probably," Victoria said.

"C'mon, we should at least try," Galax said.

And with that, Galax took their friends' arms and pulled them through the entrance of the bar.

—

The bar was crowded, and Marunomi didn't let go of Wireglasses' hand as they weaved in between people and tables. Wireglasses' eyes went over to the actual bar, with a bunch of corrupts like him drinking, talking, and laughing loudly—but Marunomi seemed to have another destination in mind.

Near the back of the bar, there was a group of corrupted Inklings and Octolings playing some kind of card game, a pile of money in the middle of the table—along with a few weapons. They were playing somewhat quietly and inconspicuously—until Marunomi pulled up a chair and placed a hand on the table.

"Deal me in, fellas," Marunomi said, eyeing the money and weapons in the middle of the table.

"Wh-what?" Wireglasses muttered. "Marunomi, you can't just do that—"

"We're gonna need that stuff, Wire," Marunomi said, gesturing to the middle of the table.

"The twink's right," one of the Inklings at the table said. "You can't just intrude on our game like that."

Wireglasses grimaced at being called a twink, but didn't say anything. Instead, he watched as Marunomi refused to get up or wait his turn. Cod, this guy was insufferable.

"Hey," another Inkling at the table said, pointing at Wireglasses. "You're part of that Hierarchy, huh?"

Wireglasses' eyes widened. "Uh…um—"

"At least, he was," the Inkling from before said. "Now the Hierarchy is nothin' but a memory, right Wireglasses?"

Wireglasses sighed, glaring at Marunomi. "C'mon, let's go."

"No," Marunomi said. He gave the Inklings at the table a smirk. "We're trying to rebuild the Hierarchy, y'know—"

"No we're not—"

"And we're gonna need this," Marunomi continued, completely ignoring Wireglasses. "So, if you will, deal me in."

Silence echoed across the table for a few seconds, everybody utterly confused by Marunomi's confidence. Then one of them, apparently the dealer, simply sighed and handed Marunomi a few cards.

Wireglasses groaned and sat in a chair behind Marunomi. He had a feeling this would take a while.

He glanced over at the bar again—he craved something to drink. He was reminded of the bit of money he had in his pocket, maybe he could sneak off and buy something while Marunomi was playing that card game and probably losing.

So Wireglasses got up and walked towards the bar, having to dodge a stumbling drunk on the way there. He sat down, and tried to get the bartender's attention.

As the bartender walked over, however, Wireglasses overheard the conversation of two Octolings nearby.

"How can anybody take the Chaos Lord seriously? Do you know what happened in this bar with him?"

"Oh…that? I thought that was some stupid rumor…"

"Nope, it's true. You can ask any of the regulars here."

The other Octoling sighed. "Well, the Chaos Lord could kill all of us effortlessly...guess we have no choice but to respect him."

"I suppose so…especially not with that new Turf law he's putting into place."

Wireglasses sighed, before turning around and telling the bartender to grab him some kind of basic beer. Part of him doubted that event the two Octolings mentioned was true…although it would be really funny if it was.

New Turf law…? That was probably none of Wireglasses' concern.

Soon enough, he got his drink, and he absently sipped it and looked around at the patrons of the bar. He was half-listening to the Octolings' conversation, though barely processing any of their words this time.

However, Wireglasses' eyes widened when he saw three people in particular in the bar. A purple Octoling, a yellow-green Inkling, and a green Octoling. None of them looked older than seventeen years old, what were they doing here?

The thing that intrigued Wireglasses the most, however, was the fact that the purple Octoling had small dragon wings and a dragon tail.

—

"There he is!!" Galax whispered, vaguely gesturing over to the red-orange Inkling sitting at the bar. Said Inkling had given Team Galaxy a look before going back to his drink.

"There who is?" Victoria muttered.

"The guy who mentioned defeating the Chaos Lord!" Galax answered. "C'mon, we should ask him about that—"

"Galax, we can't just go up to a corrupted person and tell him to join our rebellion," Xavier muttered.

"Especially not in a crowded bar like this," Victoria added. "We should be careful."

Galax's tail twitched, and they glanced out the window of the bar. They furrowed their eyebrows—they had thought they heard some kind of noise outside.

Oh well. Probably nothing. They decided to disregard the yellowish-gold shape looming across the street, nothing to worry about right now.

"It'll be fine," Galax said. "Probably…"

"For all we know this bar could be full of Chaos Lord worshipers," Victoria whispered. "We have to be careful—"

"Hey!!" somebody suddenly called out.

Galax looked up at the noise with confusion, and they saw a small group of Inklings staring at them with scorn.

"Uh…hi?" Galax stammered. "W-what did I do—"

"Hey octo, what are you doing wearing that stupid costume here?" one of the Inklings said. "Don't you know this is a serious bar for strong Inklings?!"

"I thought you'd have better things to worry about than Octolings. You got a problem with us?!" Xavier exclaimed. He was trying to seem strong, but Galax could hear the shaking in his voice.

"When they're wearing stupid costumes, yeah!!" another Inkling exclaimed. "Are y'all even corrupted? What are you doing here?!"

"I'd back off if I were you," Victoria growled.

The group of Inklings all laughed. "Or what?" the same one as before said. "What can you weak kids even do to us?"

"A lot of things," Galax muttered. Xavier looked at them with anxiety as their eyes started to slightly glow. The bullies didn't seem to notice this, however.

And soon enough, it was far too late to notice it.

Because in the next second, the glass window of the bar suddenly shattered, and something dove into the building. Screams erupted from the people inside, of course, but it wasn't long before one of Team Galaxy's bullies was pinned to the ground.

The invader of the bar was a large, zombie-likke creature that somewhat resembled a yellow Octoling with the surfcurl tentacut.

And as the zombie tore at the bully's chest, blood splattering all over the floor, Galax realized they shouldn't have disregarded that yellowish-gold shape across the street.

Chapter Text

After absolutely massacring one of the Inklings who had been harrassing Galax, the zombie-like creature ran forward to find more victims. Luckily, Team Galaxy had hidden themselves at that point, and the zombie hadn't seen them…yet.

"We need to escape," Xavier murmured as he, Victoria, and Galax hid in swim form behind the bar. "Fuck that guy who hates the Chaos Lord…he doesn't matter."

Galax looked over to where the red-orange Inkling—along with a pink Inkling with long tentacles and a hood—were trying to escape the bar through the immense crowd of people.

"I think he's going to die anyway…you have a point," they said.

And yet, the exit door was blocked by everyone in the bar trying to frantically escape at once. Team Galaxy had no choice but to keep hiding…and hope that the zombie wouldn't notice them.

When some people managed to escape the bar, Galax took this as their cue to try and escape—the zombie was at the other side of the bar, devouring a corpse. They shifted from their swim form and tried to make it towards the door—

Suddenly, they heard a scream from right behind them. They whirled around to see that the zombie had Xavier pinned to the ground. Xavier was trying deseperately to fight back, but it seemed as if the zombie was winning.

A look of rage came across Galax's face, and they now knew they had no choice but to reveal their secret.

They thrust their hand forward, and a blast of sparkling purple energy came from their hand and hit the zombie. A horrific shriek came from its mouth as it stumbled back, freeing Xavier. Victoria offered a hand to Xavier, and the two of them ran towards Galax.

"T-thanks for saving me," Xavier said. "Now, let's escape before—"

The zombie roared and ran towards Team Galaxy again. Galax shot another blast of starry energy at it, and it recoiled again, giving the three inkfish time to run.

And so they did, and they had almost reached the door before somebody grabbed Galax's arm. Galax turned towards their captor in terror—only to see that it was the red-orange Inkling from earlier.

"What was that?" he exclaimed. "Those…those powers—"

"Let go of me!!" Galax yelled, right before ripping their arm from the Inkling's grasp.

Galax then turned to run out the door, but they heard another Inkling calling after them.

"Wait!! You could help us fight the Chaos Lord!!"

Galax barely registered the significance of those words, they were too busy trying to get out of the bar alive. They managed to escape through the door, luckily.

Team Galaxy ran and ran and ran, until they physically couldn't run anymore. By that point, luckily, they were far away from the bar, and they allowed themselves to rest.

But that rest didn't last long once Galax realized they had been followed.

"Who the fuck are you guys?!" Victoria exclaimed. The ones that had been following Team Galaxy were the red-orange Inkling and his pink companion.

"Apologies, I'm Marunomi, and this is Wireglasses," the pink Inkling said. "We mean you no harm."

"Both of you are corrupted," Xavier said. "You're going to kill us, aren't you?"

"Quite the opposite, actually," Marunomi answered.

"Yeah, we're just curious about your powers," Wireglasses added, gesturing towards Galax. "Which you definitely have. We both saw you attack that…thing."

Galax sighed. "Okay fine, maybe I do have powers. Why do you care, though?"

"You can help us defeat the Chaos Lord with those powers," Marunomi said.

When Marunomi said this, Galax's eyes widened as they looked towards Victoria and Xavier. A confirmation that both of these Inklings were against the Chaos Lord…

"You're…you're planning to kill him, too?" Xavier stammered.

"We shouldn't be talking about this so loudly," Victoria muttered.

"Indeed," Marunomi said, ignoring Victoria's remark. He was still looking at Galax. "You'd be valuable to have on our side."

"Well…" Galax trailed off, remembering that they shouldn't mention the rebellion out here in the open. "We have something to show you, regarding all that. Follow us."

The five of them then proceeded to walk down the street—Team Galaxy leading the two new Inklings to the shelter.

"Never caught your names, by the way," Wireglasses said.

"Or an explanation for those weird powers," Marunomi added.

"I'm Galax, this is Victoria and Xavier, and you're not getting an explanation for my powers," Galax said.

"We're Team Galaxy, and we're planning on finding a way to stop this apocalypse," Victoria said.

—

A few minutes later, luckily, Team Galaxy managed to find their way back to the shelter, Wireglasses and Marunomi following them. Galax felt wary about this—after all, Shellmet has been so adamant about no corrupted people being allowed…

At the same time, however, Shady and 8-Bit were in the shelter—because they were working against the Chaos Lord.

Pushing their worries aside, Galax knocked on the door to the shelter. They glanced behind them—but there were no enemies watching, luckily, just Marunomi crossing his arms impatiently.

"What is this place?" Marunomi scoffed.

"You know we need somewhere to stay," Wireglasses said, rolling his eyes.

A second later, the door was opened, and a familiar purple eye could be visible through the crack. The eye widened in surprise, and Shellmet opened the door wider.

"Yep, we're back," Galax said, smile on their face.

"You're…you're alive," Shellmet muttered.

"We're lucky we are," Xavier said, glancing around nervously. "C'mon, let's get inside—"

A frown suddenly appeared on Shellmet's face, and Galax realized she was looking at Wireglasses and Marunomi. "What are they doing here?"

"We're here because we were led here," Marunomi said. "Apparently these guys also want to ki—"

"Not so loudly, Marunomi," Wireglasses muttered, elbowing the pink Inkling.

"You," Shellmet seethed, pointing a finger towards Wireglasses. "You were the terror of Splatsville before the Chaos Lord. The Hierarchy…"

"Nothing but a distant memory now," Wireglasses said. "What's your point?"

Shellmet narrowed her eyes. "We don't need any more corrupts here."

"More?" Marunomi said. "So you already have some?! Hypocrite."

"We're keeping a close eye on them, but there's only so much surveillance we can provide," Shellmet answered. She placed a hand on her hip, glaring at Galax. "Why did you bring them here?"

"They want to help our cause!" Galax said. "I promise they're good guys, just like Shady and 8-Bit—"

"Wait, what?!" Wireglasses exclaimed. "They're here?!"

"You know them?" Victoria said, looking inquisitively at Wireglasses.

"No shit," Wireglasses said. "They…they were part of the Hierarchy…before—"

"Before the Chaos Lord," Marunomi interrupted. He turned towards Shellmet with a frown. "You've better let us in."

Shellmet sighed. "We don't need any more of you corrupts."

"Well, if that's the case," Wireglasses said, smirk forming on his face, "I have a better idea."

—

"Hey, this isn't fucking fair!!" 8-Bit exclaimed.

"I'll have to agree with her," Shady said. "We've been here for ages."

"Well, I'm the leader of your Hierarchy—"

"You ain't the leader of shit anymore!" 8-Bit yelled.

"And if I'm not allowed to be in there anymore, you aren't either," Wireglasses finished, completely ignoring 8-Bit.

"Well, where are we supposed to go?" Shady asked.

"We'll find a place," Marunomi said. "We're the new, reformed Hierarchy, after all—"

"You think you can replace Ocho?!" 8-Bit exclaimed. "Who the fuck even are you?!"

"His name is Marunomi," Wireglasses said. "And he has a point, with this reformed Hierarchy stuff."

"Yeah," Marunomi said, giving 8-Bit and Shady a smirk. "Don't you worry, we're going to avenge Ocho."

As the so-called 'reformed Hierarchy' walked away, Shellmet scoffed to herself. Good riddance. Two less corrupted people to look after…

…however, that was also two less people to be part of the Thorns of Justice.

Shellmet could probably find two more. She was about to close the door to the shelter and tend to more important matters when she saw something.

A flier, hastily attached to the wall of the building. She ripped it off, frowning in confusion as she read it.

First Turf War of Chaos streaming party!! Food and fun!! Tomorrow, come one come all!! Honor our powerful Chaos Lord!!

Shellmet's small frown turned into a scowl, and she was about to crumble up the propaganda and toss it—before she heard Galax's voice behind her.

"What's that?" they asked.

Shellmet turned to face Galax.

"I…think you may want to see this."

Chapter Text

Minutes later, Team Galaxy sat around a table along with Shellmet, the flier placed on the table between them.

First Turf War of Chaos streaming party!! Food and fun!! Tomorrow, come one come all!! Honor our powerful Chaos Lord!!

Victoria furrowed her eyebrows. "This is…definitely suspicious."

"More than suspicious," Shellmet said. "It's propaganda."

"Most propaganda isn't an invitation to a party," Xavier pointed out.

"Doesn't even specify a location…I think this is a scam." Victoria sighed. "Why are we so focused on it?"

"Because this 'streaming party' can give us more insight on how to defeat the Chaos Lord," Galax said.

"What?" Xavier said, turning towards Galax. "How?"

Shellmet's eyes narrowed. "Are you suggesting…you accept the invitation?"

"Yeah!" Galax answered. "It's probably run by the Shadows of Chaos, judging by the way they praise the Chaos Lord so much. So we—"

"Wait," Victoria interrupted. "The Chaos Lord knows who we are. He literally had one of his henchmen capture us. Going to this party or whatever is basically an invitation to be killed."

"So we wear disguises, obviously," Galax said.

"You sure that will work?"

"Of course it will!" Galax exclaimed.

"Your, uh, wings and tail are pretty eye-grabbing," Xavier said. "The Shadows of Chaos will surely be able to identify you."

"You're forgetting that I can hide them," Galax said.

Xavier sighed. "Right…"

Shellmet placed her hand on the table. "So…you three are going to wear disguises to the party…and do what, exactly?"

"Gather insight on the Shadows of Chaos," Galax replied. "Who they are besides that Army guy, as well as their strengths and weaknesses."

"And the Chaos Lord too?" Victoria asked. "I mean, I know our plan was to take down members of the Shadows of Chaos first, but we want to figure out how to defeat the Chaos Lord eventually."

"Of course!" Galax said. "We may be able to interrogate one of his henchmen."

"Interrogation seems…risky," Xavier said. "Very risky. We probably won't be able to pull that off with just the three of us."

"That's why we bring more people," Galax answered. "We have a whole rebellion, after all!"

"And are you sure they'll be down to go undercover at a Chaos Lord propaganda party?" Shellmet said.

"Whatever is necessary to bring justice to Splatsville!" Galax turned to Shellmet. "Will you be able to come with us?"

"I need to stay here and take care of the shelter," Shellmet answered. "And I still think this plan is very dangerous."

"Well, assassinating the Chaos Lord and stopping the apocalypse in general is very very dangerous," Xavier pointed out. "But—"

"We have to do this. For the good of Splatsville and beyond." Galax placed their hands on their hips, taking a few steps back from the table. "Now, we need to gather a group to go to the party with us."

Shellmet sighed. "I suppose I have some disguises you can use as well."

—

"Where did Shady and 8-Bit go?" Bobble asked. She, Headphones, and Specs all sat in a circle—Bobble and Headphones were still handcuffed together. "I haven't seen them in a few hours…"

Headphones sighed. "I think they've been kicked out."

Bobble raised her eyebrows—despite her everlasting smile, the surprise was apparent on her face. "What?! Why? I thought they were being looked after—"

"It's because they were corrupted," Hachi interrupted, he and Gloves walking up to the three blue Inklings. Prince trailed behind the couple, wringing their hands together nervously.

"But…you and Bobble—" Specs started—

"We're not corrupted," Bobble and Hachi said simultaneously.

Specs blinked. "B-but…Shellmet thinks you are. That's the reason for the handcuffs, right?"

"Yeah, but she's wrong. We're completely normal and sane," Hachi grumbled. "Everyone knows that corrupted people are rid of all morals."

"I think that's a bit of an exaggeration," Gloves said, sitting down next to Bobble along with Hachi and Prince. "Also, I don't think Shady and 8-Bit were kicked out due to corruption."

"Then…why were they kicked out?" Headphones asked.

"Something to do with the Hierarchy." Gloves shrugged. "Not sure exactly."

"Yeah…Shellmet was pretty vague about it…" Prince muttered.

Hachi sighed. "They should've been kicked out a long time ago…"

At that moment, Team Galaxy walked up to the group. Bobble and Headphones were the first to notice them, and they looked up at them with mild confusion.

"Is something the matter?" Headphones said.

"Not particularly," Xavier said. "We, uh, were just wondering—"

"We're going to gather more intel about the Shadows of Chaos and the Chaos Lord," Galax said. They showed a flier to the group—advertising some kind of party to stream a Turf War.

"Oh, right," Prince said. "The, uh, Chaos Lord implemented a new law about Turf Wars…"

Galax's eyes widened. "He did? Why didn't we know about this?"

"Apparently, all Turf Wars must be overseen by the Chaos Lord," Prince continued, avoiding eye contact with Galax. "And with those 'Turf Wars of Chaos'…basically, whichever team loses is executed, and the winner has to battle the S4."

"The S4…" Xavier muttered. "They're really strong…what happens if they survive the battle somehow?"

"Then they get to join the Shadows of Chaos," Prince said, sighing.

"Then they're forcibly indoctrinated into the Shadows of Chaos, I bet," Galax said. "That…isn't good."

"Not at all," Prince mumbled.

"And this…party…you want to go to it?" Specs said, furrowing his eyebrows.

"Seems like a trap," Hachi pointed out.

"That's what I said," Victoria said, crossing her arms. "But Galax is so determined that this will give us insight…"

"Because it will!" Galax exclaimed. "Now, who wants to come with us?"

Silence. Galax visibly deflated.

"I…uh…suppose I could go," Bobble muttered after a few awkward seconds.

"If you're going, I'm going with you," Headphones said. She looked up at Galax. "I agree, we need to find out more about what the Chaos Lord is doing." There was something strange about the way Headphones said "Chaos Lord," but nobody seemed to acknowledge it.

Specs nodded. "I'll come with you two as well."

"Great! That's six people now!" Galax said. "Shellmet said she could give us some disguises—"

"And I'm coming too," Hachi said.

Victoria frowned. "Uh…I don't think we can take more than six people."

"I need to find out more about this stupid Turf War law or whatever," Hachi insisted.

"If they say six is the limit, it's the limit," Specs said. Hachi turned to glare at him.

"Then you don't have to go," Hachi said.

"Wherever Bobble and Headphones are going, I'm going too," Specs snapped. "Team Blue needs to stick together."

Hachi rolled his eyes and scoffed. "Then where's Goggles right now, Specs?"

A look of rage formed on Specs' face. "Shut up about—"

"Okay, we don't need to argue," Xavier interrupted. "If…if Specs said he's going first, then he's going. Hachi, you stay here."

Hachi sighed. "Fine."

"Uh, awesome! Six people!" Galax said, anxiety in their voice. "Now we just gotta get those disguises!"

At that moment, Shellmet walked up to the group, carrying black clothing in her arms. "Here they are," she said.

"Just in time," Victoria said.

"Now, you must be careful," Shellmet said. "The Shadows of Chaos know who you are, if you're caught—"

"We'll be killed, probably," Galax interrupted. "We know. That's why these are going to be very good disguises."

"You…sure about that?" Xavier muttered.

"They have to be good disguises," Galax answered, taking the clothes from Shellmet. "Or else we're kinda cooked."

Xavier sighed as he took a black hoodie from Galax and pulled it over his head, not saying anything else.

Shellmet crossed her arms as she watched Team Galaxy and Team Blue put on their disguises. She then turned to the latter three. "You guys are coming with them?"

"Yep!!" Bobble exclaimed, as if this party was going to be actually fun.

"We…have a bit of a history with the Chaos Lord," Headphones muttered.

"Oh really?" Shellmet said. "Did he…kill the last member of your team?"

"You could say that," Specs said, adjusting the sleeves of his black hoodie. He didn't make eye contact with Shellmet, and neither Bobble nor Headphones elaborated on his statement.

—

"Now," Shellmet said, as she walked with Team Galaxy and Team Blue towards the exit of the shelter, "don't be reckless at this party."

"No worries, we won't!" Galax said, a smile on their face.

Shellmet sighed. Galax's dangerous ambition often went hand in hand with reckless behavior…Shellmet just hoped this plan wouldn't cost them their life.

"Before we go, though, there's something I need to tell you," Galax said, an air of seriousness suddenly in their voice.

Shellmet stopped walking out of mild surprise. "Yes?"

"You may have heard about this situation already…but there seems to be some kind of zombie monster roaming Splatsville."

Shellmet's eyes widened in horror as she remembered what Hachi had told her.

A zombie of chaos corruption…that looked a lot like her dead friend Barreleye.

"It attacked Victoria, Xavier, and I when we were on our way back to the shelter," Galax continued. "It's extremely aggressive, and—"

"Yes, Hachi has told me about this phenomenon," Shellmet interrupted, eyes staring at the floor. "Thanks…thanks for the update, Galax."

Galax sighed. "No problem, Shellmet."

"Now, go along with your plan. Stay safe, please."

Galax gave Shellmet a smile as they and the others walked through the door of the shelter. Shellmet merely waved back before the door closed.

And once the door closed, Shellmet buried her face in her hands and cried.

It seemed Barreleye really had turned into some kind of corrupted zombie…Shellmet couldn't deny it anymore.

"Shellmet?"

Shellmet turned around to see Polpo. In all the recent panic, she had barely even gotten to talk to her.

"What's the matter?" Polpo asked, clearly seeing the tears on Shellmet's face.

"Barreleye's turned into something horrible," Shellmet muttered. "We have to find him."

—

Luckily, the six of them—Team Galaxy and Team Blue—managed to figure out that the party was taking place in a club close to the Chaos Tower. Galax, who had been leading the way, adjusted their hood and mask before looking back at the other five for confirmation.

And when Galax opened the door, their senses were immediately assaulted by all the stimulation of the party. The air was filled with the sounds of overlapping voices and booming music, as well as the smells of alcohol and sweat. A group of people near the door laughed loudly as Galax entered with their group, and one of them eyed Galax with slight suspicion. Luckily, that person's eyes quickly went back to their group of probably drunk friends.

Galax gritted their teeth and clenched their fists as they walked forward, trying their best to resist the urge to flee the overstimulating environment. They reminded themself that this was an investigation for the sake of the people of Splatsville and beyond.

"Excuse me," Galax heard Victoria say behind them. They realized she was talking to one of the nearby party guests. "Do you know where the host of this event is?"

"Ohhhh, ya didn't knowww~?" the party guest said, turning towards Victoria with a drunken smile. He was an Inkling with short, gold-tipped tentacles, and his T-Shirt was stained with the same alcohol his breath reeked of. "It's Alohaaa!! Of the S4, ya knowww? He's faaamous 'round these parts, do ya live under a rock or whaaat?"

"Oh, uh, thanks," Victoria said.

"Do you happen to know where he is?" Xavier asked.

The drunk Inkling scoffed, scratching at his chin. "I don't fuckin' know, he went somewhere that wayyyy." He then vaguely gestured in the direction Galax had been walking.

"Great, thank you!" Victoria said, clearly on edge from the Inkling's behavior. Team Galaxy and Team Blue then promptly walked away from him, looking for Aloha.

It occurred to Galax that they didn't even know who this "Aloha" guy was. Victoria and Xavier probably wouldn't know either, so they instead turned to Team Blue for this inquiry.

"What does Aloha…look like?" Galax muttered to Bobble.

"Oh yeah, Aloha!" Bobble said. "He's got pink tentacles, and he wears a visor and a Hawaiian shirt!"

"He's also probably drunk right now," Headphones said, sighing.

Galax shrugged. If Aloha was a member of the Shadows of Chaos and drunk, he was probably a quite irresponsible henchman of the Chaos Lord. Getting information out of him would be easy.

As Galax continued to walk, searching for Aloha, they noticed a large screen mounted on a wall. It showed a countdown to the Turf War stream, and it was just about a minute left. Galax then registered that there were many people around them counting down along with the screen, which made them made feel even more overstimulated.

And soon enough, Galax's ears were assaulted by sudden cheering. They glanced up at the screen to see that it was now much brighter.

The stream of the Turf War of Chaos had begun.

—

Backwards, the valiant leader of Team Green, shielded his eyes from the bright light suddenly shining onto him and his team. He gripped the handle of his Sloshing Machine tighter as the spotlight continued to shine, and he heard his team nervously murmuring behind him.

Team Green had been chosen to be part of the first "Turf War of Chaos," a system that the Chaos Lord had created. Backwards hadn't been given much context about this, all he knew was that he had to really focus for this battle.

Because if he lost, there would be terrible consequences.

The battle was starting now. Backwards and his teammates—Safari, Beanie, and Cleats—launched out of the spawning machines and onto the stage, which was Scorch Gorge. He could feel many eyes on him as he started to ink the ground; he knew his every move was being watched by the Chaos Lord.

And of course, there was casting to this battle as well. Recently the Chaos Lord had apparently appointed Deep Cut to cast these Turf Wars of Chaos—yes, the same Deep Cut that had been well-known in Splatsville so long ago.

Backwards tried to ignore what Deep Cut was saying as he arrived to the middle of the stage. There, he noticed the yellow ink on the ground contrasting with his green, and he finally saw who his opponents were.

Team Yellow. He had battled with them once or twice far before the apocalypse…their leader was Paintball Mask, right?

It didn't matter. Because Team Yellow was doomed. Team Green was certainly going to win…right?

—

Bobble couldn't help but to get caught up watching the Turf War on the big screen. It was against Team Green and Team Yellow, two teams that Team Blue had battled often before everything went to shit.

As she watched Backwards splat somebody and his eyes glow golden—he must have been chaos corrupted—Bobble couldn't stop tears from forming in the corners of her eyes.

Not even Turf Wars were allowed to be fun anymore. Because after this battle, one of the teams onscreen was going to die.

One would think Bobble would be used to this, but she wasn't. She especially wasn't used to the way her tentacles glowed golden sometimes and she got horrifying, violent intrusive thoughts.

But that didn't matter right now. Bobble and the others were here with a mission, that being to find Aloha and—

"Heyyyyy, didn't see you guys come in hereee~!"

That voice was familiar. Bobble turned to see none other than Aloha himself stumbling towards her and Headphones. She saw Specs gesture to Team Galaxy that this was him—right, they had never met Aloha.

"How we doin'? Enjoying the battleee~?" Aloha leaned in close to Headphones. HIs breath reeked of alcohol, and Bobble suddenly felt the urge to push him away from her girlfriend.

"Uh, yeah. Whatever," Headphones muttered, taking a step away from Aloha. Bobble realized that Aloha didn't recognize Team Blue with the disguises on—either the disguises were quite good, or he was really drunk.

"Awww, don't be such a party pooper!! This is funnnn!" Aloha exclaimed. "Have a drink or two, ya guys!! And why y'all wearing all black, anywayyy?"

"None of your business," Bobble found herself snapping. A shocked expression appeared on Aloha's drunk face, and then he frowned and stumbled away from Team Blue.

"C'mon!" Xavier whispered towards Galax and Victoria. "Why didn't you do anything?! That's the guy we came here for—"

"The Turf War's about to end," Galax muttered, interrupting Xavier.

"Somebody's about to be executed."

—

As the whistle tweeted, signifying the end of the Turf War, the dread in Backwards' stomach grew more and more.

Surely he had lost. Team Yellow had been relentlessly splatting Team Green over and over during the last minute of the match, and their ink color had dominated the map.

Surely Team Yellow had won—and therefore, they would get the privilege of living.

Indeed, seconds later, Lil' Judd held up a yellow flag. Backwards could hear Team Yellow cheering, and resentment began to churn in his stomach.

Why were they cheering? They were going to be the cause of Backwards' death, the cause of Safari, Beanie, and Cleats' deaths. Why were they happy about that?!

They deserved to be the ones dying. They deserved to have Backwards kill them beyond silly Turf Wars, to have their blood splattered on Backwards' face and their corpses underneath his feet—

Suddenly, Backwards felt a hand on his shoulder. It was Safari, and her eyes were puffy and red from crying.

"Saf…" Backwards stammered.

"W-we lost…" Safari muttered. "We're going to die…"

"Oh, uh…" Backwards had no idea how to comfort his teammate in this situation, because she was entirely correct. Team Green's death was imminent.

For the first time since realizing Team Green would lose, Backwards let tears fall down his face. Then he enveloped Safari in a hug, both of them sobbing now.

Beanie and Cleats both joined in the hug, sobbing as well. Backwards found it hard to breathe after just a few seconds, but he didn't dare pull away from his teammates.

Team Green didn't get to hug and sob for long, however. Backwards heard footsteps behind him, and he didn't look up until he heard a stern voice.

"Crybabies."

At the insult, Backwards looked up to see the Chaos Lord himself. He was hovering a few inches off the ground, glaring at Team Green with electricity glowing in his eyes.

Backwards, somehow, found the courage to spit at the Chaos Lord's feet.

"This is your fault, idiot."

The Chaos Lord's frown deepened. "This one first, Army."

Army. Backwards saw the orange Inkling standing next to the Chaos Lord. He had swapped out his Forge Inkling Parka for a camo hoodie, apparently—but more importantly, he was working under the Chaos Lord.

Backwards found his hands were shaking as Army grabbed his arm and pulled him closer to the Chaos Lord. He didn't even have the energy—or the courage—to protest against this.

The Chaos Lord placed his hands on Backwards' head…and then he felt the worst pain he had ever felt in his life.

Backwards immediately collapsed to the ground, his legs suddenly failing to work. With the last remaining coherent thought he had, he realized that the Chaos Lord must have given his brain an electric shock.

And that was how Backwards was going to die. He lay on the ground, helpless, paralyzed, and in horrible pain. His teammates screamed his name in terror, but everything now seemed very far away, almost like a dream.

The world around Backwards began to fade away, and the last thing he saw before finally closing his eyes was the Chaos Lord's face, giving him a smirk of satisfaction.

To think that long, long ago, Backwards joyfully played Turf Wars against this very Inkling.

The same Inkling who would ultimately kill him.

—

Galax couldn't tear their eyes from the screen as the Chaos Lord, one by one, electrocuted each of the green Inklings. They watched in horror as each Inkling fell to the ground, convulsing before ultimately going still.

This team was getting brutally killed…just for losing a Turf War.

More evidence that the Chaos Lord was utterly horrible.

Galax clenched their fists, trying to keep their tears from falling. They felt a tap on their shoulder, and looked up to see Victoria giving them a look of concern.

"You okay?" Victoria muttered.

"Oh?" Galax mumbled. A shaky smile appeared on their face. "Y-yeah, just fine! Just…y'know—"

"It's okay to not be fine," Victoria said. "It's hard, watching innocent Inklings be killed on live TV."

Galax sighed. "We…we need to find Aloha."

"There he is," Xavier, standing on the other side of Galax, said. He gestured a handful of feet away, where Aloha seemed to be attempting to discreetly slip away.

Galax furrowed their eyebrows. Aloha sneaking away from his own party…? That was definitely suspicious.

"This is our chance," Galax said, turning towards Victoria and Xavier.

And with that, Galax ran away from the big screen, pushing past people as they followed Aloha. As Victoria and Xavier followed close behind them, Galax realized that they had left Team Blue behind. Oh well.

After a few moments, Galax saw Aloha exiting the crowded room through a door. Galax followed him through the door, then saw the pink Inkling stumbling down a poorly lit hallway.

It took a few seconds for Aloha to realize Team Galaxy was there. When he did, a look of surprise appeared on his drunken face. "W-what are y'all…who are you guys?!"

"We just have a few questions for you," Galax said, pulling down their hood as their eyes began to glow with their powers. "It'll be quick, as long as you cooperate."

Chapter Text

Aloha backed away from Galax, stumbling before falling on his butt. Panic rose on his drunken face as he stared at Team Galaxy.

"Y-you…" he stammered, "are you the pris—"

"The prisoners that escaped? Yeah, that's us," Victoria said, pulling out a dagger and taking a step towards Aloha. "I suggest you answer our questions, though."

"And, uh, don't imprison us again," Xavier muttered. "P-please?"

Aloha, surprisingly, nodded, his eyes still wide. "W-what—hic—kiiiind of questions?"

"Nothing much, just some things about the Chaos Lord," Galax said. "What are his weaknesses, and how would we be able to defeat him?"

"R-Raven…" It was clear that Aloha meant for this to be unheard, but Galax caught it anyway.

"Is that his name?" Galax asked.

Aloha's eyes somehow widened even more at Galax's question. He stayed silent, though, and Galax frowned.

"Is Raven the Chaos Lord's name?" Galax said again, voice quiet and dangerous as their eyes glowed stronger.

Aloha whimpered before nodding, and Galax sighed with satisfaction. "Well, that's one piece of information," they said.

"S-so Aloha," Xavier said. "Since you know the Chaos Lord's actual name, are you—"

"Y-yeeees," Aloha interrupted. "I'm…p-part of the Shadows of Chaosh..."

Before Xavier could express confusion, Aloha held up his wrist, showing a lightning-shaped burn on it—similar to the one Trisun had.

"Good to know we've come to the right guy," Galax said.

"Now, Aloha, tell us," Victoria said. She stepped close o Aloha and held her dagger towards him. "What is Raven's biggest weakness?"

"Uh…I don't know if all this intimidation is necessary—" Xavier stammered.

"He's…honestly a bit of an—hic—an idiottt," Aloha blurted out, interrupting Xavier. "And…he d-doesn't really know what he's doing, being the, uh…dictator of Splatsville and allat. B-being shadow corrupted, you'd thiiiink he'd be less stupid, but—hic—but noooo—"

"So…he doesn't even know how to rule a city," Galax said, interrupting Aloha's drunken rant. "And he turns to cruelty?"

"I-I don't think he has a choice," Aloha stammered.

Galax raised their eyebrows, looking towards Xavier and Victoria. Xavier looked almost as scared as Aloha, while Victoria still held that dagger towards Aloha with a frown.

"U-uh…don't tell Raven I called him a st-stupid idiot, by the wayyyy," Aloha muttered. "He really doesn't like that…almost killed Trisun f-for it…"

Galax simply nodded. They remembered Trisun—he was the Shadows of Chaos member who had freed Team Galaxy from the Chaos Tower. He was also likely dead now, considering the pool of blood Galax had seen when he hit his head on the stairs.

"You mentioned the Chaos Lord being shadow corrupted," Xavier said, ignoring Aloha's previous remark. "What…exactly does that mean?"

Aloha blinked. "Y-you don't know what being shadow corrupted isss?"

"We just arrived in Splatsville a little while ago," Victoria said, rolling her eyes. "We're not exactly caught up on everything."

"W-well…it used to be just a rumorrr," Aloha replied. "Har…harnessing the power—hic—of your shadow…it gives you wings." He chuckled. "He did not get those wings from Wing Depot—"

"Focus, Aloha," Galax muttered.

"And uh, lightning powers too," Aloha continued, going back to a panicked, bug-eyed stare. "Th-that's how he's able to—hic—zap peopleee."

"So…like chaos corruption but worse," Xavier said. "And far more dangerous."

Aloha hastily nodded. "Can I go now? I'm, uh, kinda lateeee—"

"For what?" Victoria demanded, stepping closer to Aloha—the dagger now dangerously close to his throat. In the dimly lit hallway, Galax thought they could see Victoria's eyes and tentacle tips glowing golden—but that was probably just their imagination, right?

This imagined glow reminded Galax of their own glowing eyes, which accompanied their actual powers they could use to threaten Aloha. They blinked and let their eyes glow stronger, and their fingertips glowed too as they held up their hand.

"What are you late for, Aloha?" they asked, the threat of their stardust powers hovering over Aloha now.

Aloha's hands shook as tears formed in his eyes—and Galax found that they felt a little sorry for the guy.

"I-I…I'm part of the group meant to battle the winners of the Turf War," Aloha said. "Part of the S4…"

"So, you've been part of this system all along?" Victoria said, scowling. "Do you plan on killing those winners, Aloha?"

"N-no!" Aloha exclaimed. "I…I don't want to kill them. I never asked to be a part of all this, never even asked to throw this party to lure y'all in—"

"Excuse me?" Galax said. "You threw this party to lure us in!"

Aloha was on the verge of sobbing now. "Yes!! The…the Chaosh Lord ordered m-me to…in fact, other guys from the Shadows are coming to capture you now!!"

Galax's eyes widened. "We…should probably get going, then."

"Did we get all the information we need…?" Xavier muttered, looking towards Galax nervously.

"For now, yeah," Galax said. "But even if we didn't, I would not like to be captured again."

"Thanks for cooperating with us, Aloha," Victoria said, putting away her dagger. "You may go now…as long as you promise not to kill Team Yellow."

Aloha stumbled to his feet and quickly nodded. But before he could scamper away, Galax put a hand out.

"How about you make a deal with us?" they asked. "You can help us defeat the Chaos Lord. Sabotage him from the inside."

Aloha, for the first time in this whole interrogation, frowned. "And what do I get from thiiiiss?"

"Staying alive," Victoria said, placing a hand on her hip as if death threats were nothing.

Aloha sighed and took Galax's hand. "F-Fine."

Galax finally found it in them to smile. "Good! Thanks for your help!"

Once Galax let go of Aloha's hand, the pink Inkling ran away as fast as he could—which, considering he was drunk, wasn't very fast at all.

—

The stream on the TV screen had turned off about ten minutes ago, but Bobble still stared at it with horror on her face. Her eyes—one blue, one red—were wide open for all to see, but she could barely bring herself to care. She could hardly even breathe from the panic deep within her chest.

The scene of Team Green getting violently executed kept replaying in Bobble's mind. Over and over, she saw them getting electrocuted, then convulsing horribly before going still.

It was the Chaos Lord who had done that. It was him who had mercilessly killed the team Team Blue had joyfully battled, all that time ago.

Bobble noticed her hands were shaking. She blinked for the first time in probably a few minutes, forcing tears out of her eyes and down her face.

At that moment, Bobble felt a hand on her shoulder and she flinched. She turned around in a panic, but it was only Headphones, looking at her with concern.

"Bobble…?" Headphones asked quietly. "Are you o—"

Headphones was interrupted by bobble suddenly enveloping her in a hug, her body shaking with sobs. Her girlfriend seemed surprised at first, but it took only a few seconds for Headphones to return the hug.

"It'll be okay," Headphones muttered, gently rubbing Bobble's back.

"B-but they're dead," Bobble mumbled through her tears. "G…the Chaos Lord killed them…"

Headphones sighed, and neither of the two girlfriends said anything for a few seconds.

The quiet hug was interrupted by Specs walking up to Bobble and Headphones. In response, Headphones pulled away from Bobble and looked at Specs in mild confusion.

"Is something the matter…?" Headphones asked.

"Y-yeah…the X-Blood's here," Specs said. He gestured across the bar—and indeed, four familiar Inklings, colored aqua blue and red, stood there.

"And I think they're looking for Team Galaxy."

Bobble's eyes widened in panic as she realized Galax, Victoria, and Xavier were nowhere to be seen. She watched as Headphones glanced around in a similar panic, before walking away from Bobble and Specs.

"Where are you going?" Bobble said, following Headphones through the bar.

"Looking for Team Galaxy," Headpnones responded.

Bobble didn't say anything else. Instead, she let her signature smile fall upon her face again.

When all else failed, at least Bobble could be that cheerful, optimistic one of the team. That was her job, after all, to be constantly happy.

She had to be happy. For Specs, for Headphones…

…and for Goggles.

—

A headache pounded in Aloha's head as he stumbled into the Chaos Tower. There, he felt the glares of Army, Mask, and Skull. Aviators stood next to Skull, but he didn't seem nearly as pissed off as the rest of the S4 was.

"What took you so looong?" Mask grumbled.

"Probably caught up with that party his Evilness mentioned," Army muttered.

"The one the X-Blood were sent to?" Skull asked.

"Yeah, the Chaos Lord sent them to capture those assassins," Aviators said.

"The ones who escaped the dungeons?"

"Yep…"

Just then, Raven walked up to the five Inklings, a frown on his face. The other four bowed upon him entering, and Aloha hastily did so as well, but his drunken clumsiness caused him to fall on his face.

"Aloha, are you drunk?" Raven said, anger rising in his voice.

"It seems so," Army answered, as Aloha struggled to get to his feet. "Your Evilness, if you wish we can replace him."

"No, we will not replace Aloha," Raven said, though he gave Aloha a glare. "The S4 are set up to battle the winners of the Turf War, so all four of them must do so."

Aloha finally got to his feet and sighed. "I-I…sorry for—hic—being late."

Raven rolled his eyes. "It's fine, just don't disappoint me again."

"That's gonna be pretty hard for hiiiiim," Mask said. "Considering he is nothing but a disapp—"

"That's not necessary," Skull interrupted, glaring at Mask. "We should get going."

Nothing else was said as the S4 went to get into the spawning machines that would travel to Scorch Gorge. Through his alcohol-induced headache, Aloha felt some kind of nervousness—or perhaps panic.

For Team Yellow's goal wasn't to ink the most turf this time.

—

The battle, in the S4's case, ended up going well. Meaning, all four of them had survived the lack of respawns.

However, it hadn't been the S4's survival Aloha was worried about. It was their opponents.

Aloha had tried his best to stay away from the opponents during the battle, because if he splatted one, he'd be responsible for their permanent death.

It was difficult to avoid such a key part of Turf Wars, however. And apparently, Aloha had blacked out during the last thirty seconds.

Because when he opened his eyes again, all four members of Team Yellow were dead, and he was standing over the body of one of them.

Aloha could barely recognize the body from how mangled it was—the only identifying feature was a bloodied cap nearby. He could hardly breathe as he stared at the corpse, and then his own shaking hands—which were covered in yellow ink and blood.

Then he felt a hand on his shoulder, and he knew without a doubt that it was the Chaos Lord, even before he spoke.

"It seems you're useful after all, Allie~"

It was then Aloha realized that his drunken headache was gone…and he remembered making a deal. He remembered shaking hands with someone, saying that he would help defeat the Chaos Lord from within his organization.

He had made a deal to betray the Chaos Lord.

And as the Chaos Lord himself walked away with a smirk of satisfaction, Aloha wasn't sure how he felt about that drunken decision.

—

"A-are you sure about this…?" Hiro stammered, his voice hushed as he walked through the streets of Splatsville behind Shellmet. Polpo, Mitsuami, and Hornmet also accompanied her.

"If I wasn't sure, we wouldn't have gotten this far," Shellmet muttered, a scowl on her face. Her eyes were still puffy from crying, but she couldn't bring herself to care.

Soon enough, the five of them walked up to a bar—at least, what used to be a bar. The windows were shattered and the place looked absolutely destroyed, with chairs strewn about, tables toppled over, and blood coating the floor.

Shellmet hesitated and took a shaky breath. "Barreleye must have been here. Galax and Hachi both mentioned him being feral and violent…"

"It doesn't look like he's here anymore, though," Polpo muttered. She then turned to Shellmet. "Look, we should really go back to the shelter—"

"Barreleye was your brother, Polpo," Shellmet snapped. "Don't you care about what happened to him?"

Polpo hesitated. "W-well, yes I do—"

"Then be a good sister and help me find him."

"D-do you hear that…?" Mitsuami stammered. Shellmet looked up towards the yellow Inkling in confusion—moments before she got tackled by a large, yellowish-gold figure.

It took Shellmet a second or two to register what was attacking Mitsuami.

An Octoling. Yellow surfcurl haircut. Tinted goggles and red chest armor.

The hollow shell of Shellmet's childhood friend dug his claws into Mitsuami's chest.

Chapter Text

Mitsuami screamed and tried to pull Barreleye off of her, but his claws dug deeper into her. Hiro hastily took out his 96 gal and shot Barreleye with the indigo ink from it. This seemed to hurt enough for him to screech—in an utterly alien way—and jump off of Mitsuami, turning to face Hiro and Polpo behind him.

And Shellmet could only watch in shock as Hiro fought Barreleye with his weapon. Polpo ran towards Mitsuami and picked her up.

Shellmet walked forward to Polpo, placing a shaking hand on her shoulder. Polpo just glared at her.

"Go help Hiro fight!" she exclaimed. "I'm getting Mitsuami somewhere safe so I can—"

"We don't need to fight," Shellmet said.

"What are you talking about?! He attacked Mitsuami!!"

"If I could just talk to him—"

"He's clearly not himself anymore, Shellmet," Polpo spat. With that, she turned and walked away from Shellmet, carrying a barely conscious Mitsuami in her arms.

Shellmet looked towards Hiro fighting Barreleye—it seemed as though Hiro was losing the fight.

But despite that, Shellmet didn't believe what Polpo had said to her.

There must be a way to reason with Barreleye.

"Barreleye!!" Shellmet yelled.

At first, Barreleye didn't acknowledge her at all, instead swiping his claws towards Hiro and missing. But then his head finally turned in Shellmet's direction, and he started to walk towards her.

"It's me, Barreleye," Shellmet said, voice shaky. "Shellmet. You remember me, right?"

"What are you doing?!" Hiro exclaimed. Shellmet glanced at him and realized he had multiple wounds on his arms and legs.

A growl came from deep within Barreleye's throat, and he lunged towards Shellmet. Luckily, she managed to dodge, causing Barreleye to tumble to the ground.

"We don't have to do this!!" Shellmet exclaimed. "I don't know what's happened to you, but you must recognize me, right?"

"He clearly doesn't," Hiro muttered, stepping next to Shellmet and pointing his weapon towards Barreleye. "If you stop trying to reason with him…I can end this quickly."

"No," Shellmet said, pushing Hiro's weapon away. "There must be a way—"

"If there was a way, he wouldn't have attacked Mitsuami!!" Hiro exclaimed.

"He'd listen to me. He always has."

"Not anymore, Shellmet."

At that moment, Barreleye ran towards Shellmet again, swiping his large claws at her. They scratched her skin, and blood oozed from the wounds. Shellmet stared at Barreleye with fear, and he lunged towards her again.

And that's when Shellmet decided it was time to run.

Shellmet left Hiro behind as she ran. She left Polpo and Mitsuami as well, wherever they were. She ran as fast as she can, past the destroyed bar, in the general direction of the shelter.

In the shelter she would be safe. She had always been safe there.

As Shellmet ran and ran, she soon realized that Barreleye was chasing her. She could hear his growling behind her, his large fangs snapping, his harsh footsteps as he ran on all fours.

It was clear that Barreleye was too far gone to be reasoned with—but Shellmet didn't want to believe that.

She kept running nonetheless. Her legs were beginning to tire and her lungs were starting to ache—but the shelter was coming into view. She couldn't stop now, or else she would be torn apart by the shell of her dead friend.

Dead friend. Barreleye was dead. He had been replaced by this monster, and Shellmet had to accept that.

Tears came to Shellmet's eyes as her hand grasped the doorknob of the shelter. She took a fraction of a second to catch her breath—

—before being tackled to the ground, sharp claws digging into her flesh.

Shellmet screamed in pain as Barreleye's weight nearly crushed her, and as his claws ripped through the flesh of her arms. Dark spots began to cloud her vision as she stared up at Barreleye's goggles.

Through the goggles lens, Shellmet could see Barreleye's eyes. One of them had seemingly been stabbed or otherwise injured badly, but that wasn't important.

What was important was that the eyes were solid white—and they hold no recognition in them whatsoever.

The tears were flowing down Shellmet's face now, mixing with blood, as she realized that this was the end.

She was going to die at the hands of Barreleye. Not an evil chaos corrupt, not even the Chaos Lord. Her childhood friend, her best friend. Somebody whom she had trusted.

It was ironic how things turned out in this apocalypse.

…

Shellmet was just closing her eyes and accepting death when she heard a blast—it sounded somewhat like a gun going off. She opened her eyes just in time to see Barreleye screech and get off of her.

"Wha…" Shellmet muttered, painfully sitting up and looking in the direction Barreleye now ran.

Galax was standing there, eyes and hands glowing with a strange purple-ish energy. Xavier and Victoria stood nearby too, holding their weapons.

"We got you, Shellmet!!" Galax exclaimed. Then they reached their hand towards Barreleye and shot a blast of energy at him, knocking him to the ground.

Powers?

As Barreleye lay on the ground, Xavier and Victoria began to shoot him with ink from their Carbon Roller and Mini Splatling. He didn't get splatted, but he also didn't get up.

Using the door of the shelter as a support, Shellmet slowly got to her feet. She realized she was covered in bloody wounds, but that didn't matter to her right now.

She couldn't let Team Galaxy kill Barreleye for her. She refused to be a damsel in distress.

Even if it had been her friend trying to kill her.

Shellmet limped over to where Barreleye lay. His claws were stained with Shellmet's blood, and there was a large scorch mark on his chest, as well as green ink splatters covering his body.

Slowly and painfully, Shellmet got a dagger from her belt and aimed it towards Barreleye.

Tears were flowing out of her eyes again, stinging as they mixed with the wounds on her face.

Why did this hurt so much?

There was no time for hesitation. Shellmet threw the dagger into Barreleye's chest.

Once the dagger flew into Barreleye's chest, landing near where his heart would be, he finally stopped struggling. He went completely still, blood oozing around Shellmet's dagger.

Everyone was silent for a few seconds. Then Galax ran up to Shellmet, eyes wide. "Are you okay?!" they exclaimed.

"Yes…I'm fine," Shellmet wheezed, a bit of blood coming from her mouth as she did so. She was most certainly not fine.

"I…think you need some bandages," Xavier muttered. "Let's get into the shelter and patch you u—"

"I can take care of myself," Shellmet interrupted. "But you're right. We should get into the shelter."

"Shellmet, you got attacked," Victoria said. "Stop being so arrogant! You can't take care of yourself!!"

"Excuse me, who is the founder and leader of the shelter here?" Shellmet snapped, glaring at Vicoria. "Who is the one that kindles safety from corruption for so many citizens of Splatsville? Because I'm certain it's not you."

All three members of Team Galaxy went silent, and Shellmet sighed, coughing up a bit more blood.

"Now, you three pick up Barreleye's body and take him in with us."

"But—" Galax started to say—

"We're going to have a funeral for him soon."

—

Mitsuami groaned as Polpo wrapped bandages around her arm. The harsh sunlight gave her a headache, so she squeezed her eyes shut.

"Wh-where did Shellmet run off to…?" she mumbled.

"I don't know," Polpo said. "I assume the shelter. Wherever she went, though, Barreleye must have chased her."

"I-I hope she's safe," Mitsuami muttered.

Polpo sighed, securing the bandage around Mitsuami's arm and picking up the roll again. "Me too."

Just then, Mitsuami heard footsteps, and she opened her eyes to see Hiro walking towards the two of them.

"Oh. You're alive," Mitsuami said, a small smile appearing on her face.

"Yeah," Hiro said. "Shellmet better be as well. You know she tried to reason with that…thing?"

"She thinks there was still Barreleye left in there," Polpo muttered, dabbing at Mitsuami's other arm with a damp rag. "Trust me, there was not."

"Yeah, I don't think her best friend would've attacked me…" Mitsuami muttered. She closed her eyes again, sighing as she realized she felt quite fatigued—if she ignored the horrible pain, she could take a nap right here and now.

"We should get back to the shelter," Hiro said. "There could be more weird zombies out here. Or corrupted people."

"You're right, it isn't safe," Polpo said. She looked back at Mitsuami. "You ready?"

"I guess so," Mitsuami mumbled, seconds before Polpo picked her up. Pain surged through her head again and she groaned.

"We need to be quick." Polpo turned to Hiro. "Mitsuami needs better care than this, fast."

"Got it. Let's go," Hiro responded.

—

Soon enough, Shellmet was walking into the shelter, with Team Galaxy carrying Barreleye's bloody body. As soon as she stepped into the main room, she felt dozens of eyes fall upon her.

The first person to come up to Shellmet was Prince. Their eyes were filled with concern, probably due to all of Shellmet's wounds. "Are you okay?" they asked.

"Just…fine," Shellmet muttered, her whole body still aching. She turned to Team Galaxy. "Place his body in my room. I'll deal with it."

Victoria looked at Shellmet with confusion. "But—"

"I don't care if it's unsanitary. I said I'll deal with it."

"A-are you sure you don't need healing…?" Xavier asked.

"I said I'm fine and I'll deal with it!!" Shellmet exclaimed, before stumbling away towards her room. It was difficult to walk, and she soon collapsed against a wall. Tears leaked from her eyes, but she tried her best not to let anyone see.

And yet, she heard a sigh behind her. After a few seconds, she turned to see Hachi—a mixture of worry and annoyance on his face. Gloves was still handcuffed to Hachi, and they looked worried and also a bit awkward.

"You need to let others take care of you," Hachi said.

"I-I'll be fine," Shellmet stammered.

"You really won't. You almost died out there."

"Just…let me rest. Please." Shellmet stood up straight again and stumbled down the hall towards her room, not letting Hachi or Gloves say anything else.

As soon as Shellmet arrived into her room, she collapsed onto her bed, not caring that she had splattered it with blood—she'd deal with that later. She rolled onto her side, staring at the wall—and only then did she allow herself to sob.

She had tried to hold onto hope for so long…but now it was useless.

Denial wouldn't work for any longer—because Barreleye was gone.

Shellmet could barely bring herself to care about her immense pain as she sobbed and sobbed. When the door to the bedroom opened a few minutes later, she found it difficult to breathe.

When she sat up, she saw Galax holding Barreleye's body. Her lower lip trembled, and Galax gently set the body onto the ground.

"A-are you sure you want him here—"

"I'm sure," Shellmet snapped. She then sighed. "Thank you, Galax. You may go."

Galax hesitated, clearly concerned about Shellmet's physical wellbeing, but they left the room and closed the door anyway. Shellmet was grateful for this.

Everybody was insisting that Shellmet needed medical care, but for the longest time, she had been the one giving care, not receiving it.

She didn't want to leech off of others. She was the leader of this shelter.

Besides, there were bandages in this room. Shellmet could take care of herself.

And she decided she was going to stay in here for as long as she needed to.