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Chapter Twenty-Five, Part One

Peppie stood straight up, face trying best to be neutral.

Guppi's Octobrush looked as if it would fall out of his half-jellyfish, though presently inkling hands if he didn't clutch harder.

Mesonii was studying the area, seemingly unchanged sans the lack of timer and speakers, but then her eyes began to eat Delpha with hate.

"Delpha."

She was still smiling, and there was no change in her expression.

"Why. The hell. Are we HERE?" Mesonii thrusted her Splash-O-Matic towards Delpha's neck, trying her best to prove a point but still choosing not to place the rather sharp point of the gun on her -friend's?- neck.

"Wow, you really do want to make this dramatic, don't you?"

The mint inkling lowered her gun.

"I told you, Mesonii, it's a special battle. You need to be proven."

"...what? WHY?!"

"Your definition of a squad is incomplete. The proper squad don't go around fighting random people. That's called 'solo queue'. We fight other squads."

Mesonii stammered for a couple of seconds, then finally found her words that had been lodged all the way in the back of her throat. "Then who are we fighting?!"

"You'll see." Delpha then grabbed onto her Zink Mini Splatling, still holding that cocky smile, and looked up to the stage lights set near the pool, illuminating the scene.

DING DING DING!

As long as she had been turfing, Mesonii had never heard that sound before. Either way, the team found it as a signal to get off their Spawn Point and begin fighting.

The stage began with a gradual ramp from the Spawn towards the main central area. Guppi, with his fast brush, seemed to find the only flicker of enjoyment running down the incline and creating a trail.

Mesonii looked to her right, considering using the risky platforms below to get to the main field, and then decided it was better to get to the center without dying. Following Delpha's ink, the long ramp was met with a wall that both of them climbed, Peppie heeling the recent moves.

The other team, the "special team", had made it down to the center already. What the mint inkling found most baffling about them were their face-concealing helmets- one aqua, one green, one pink, and one yellow- all tinged with the dark blue for the team they were representing.

Aqua Helmet and Yellow Helmet, the two snipers on the team, had created a steady boundary on top of their wall.

Green Helmet, a male inkling with an N-ZAP '85, was using the platforms across from his spawn position to get to the other side of the field. Pink Helmet was using a roller, which Mesonii couldn't deduce to any specific type due to its fancy magenta paint job.

I guess this is who we're fighting, right, Delpha? Trying not to let her thoughts get the best of her, she dashed towards a small ledge to the left of the other team's wall, hoping to prepare a flank.

She didn't even notice the Splat Bomb at her feet until after she exploded into dust.

Splat.

-

Ok, try two. Let's not let that happen again!

Swimming through the trail Guppi had lay down, Mesonii contemplated her recent incompetence. It was just a little bomb that Green Helmet threw to take care of the situation, and surely, this couldn't end her hope that the infinite match wouldn't be too bad.

She climbed the wall and peered over the edge to catch the action, noticing two blobs, a mint and a yellow one, at the right. Delpha had positioned herself strategically and was in a feud with Yellow Helmet, whose charger type was similarly indescribable to their pink teammate. Even though the fight was heated, they obviously weren't going to splat each other.

Peppie and Guppi were inking around the center, being just swift enough to evade the laser of Aqua Helmet's charger, an E-Liter 3K. In hot pursuit of their trails, though, was Pink Helmet with their roller. Things seemed to be ok.

Mesonii started to run towards Delpha's cover zone to break the fight between them and allow her to advance.

SHEEERWEEP!

Amongst all the unfamiliar sounds, she definitely recognized that noise- the start of the other team's 'Echolocator', from the Green Helmet. The Echolocater was a special tool that could only be deployed at certain moments by certain weapons (that N-ZAP being an example), but it could track the other team's movement for a small time.

The two girls noticed mint-colored arrows circling around them, and Delpha knew exactly what to do to her friend. As the arrow circumvented around her torso, she pointed her hand to the ground.

"Get down! It's an Echolocator! I'll take it from here!"

Mesonii, realizing that there was a small barrier in front of her away from the action, sat down and hoped for the best as Delpha made her way back onto the battlefield.

She counted the number of seconds that flashed by, seeming like a small eternity for every interval she had to wait. One. Two. Three.

Four. Delpha was shooting at Aqua Helmet, who still wasn't retaliating.

Five. Peppie and Guppi had somehow been able to continue their flank, no longer being chased by Pink Helmet. Was she- they- whoever it was, even trying?

Six. Seven. Someone was jumping onto the platforms. The boys couldn't be here already.

Eight. "Sorry I had to do this." The voice of who seemed to be Yellow Helmet pulled the trigger.

Ni- SPLAT.

-

Third time's the charm, r-right!? Gotta focus now.

For a third time, Mesonii rose from the Spawn Point, now agitated and panicked- she was sure that none of her other teammates were having this issue. The center was completely covered in mint ink.

She looked straight ahead at their wall, and saw someone running amok and laying down their own ink. Aqua Helmet. Strange, how they could get past with the other team winning.

There was no choice but to sneak away, so Mesonii threw herself into the ink below and tried to keep the trails behind her nonexistent.

As the helmet-clad sniper threw the charger around like a maniac, wondering where the enemy had gone, the teen was relieved, almost too relieved to realize that her ripples had reappeared in the ink.

And, frankly, Aqua Helmet was less dull than that.

Splat.

-

Ah, carp! Carp, carp, CRAP on a cuttlefish!

Fourth time now. Mesonii couldn't even bother with being tricky, and simply swam down the ramp as if nothing had happened. Maybe that was the key!

Everything seemed normal as she climbed the wall and jumped to a podium in the center of the battlefield, scanning the place for any of the helmet-wearers. The area was clear enough now for her to cross, so off she went to the right half.

A need still existed, though, to look around once more. Mesonii took a gaze to her right, seeing Delpha brawling with Pink Helmet on the other side of the stage.

"Smart move."

Mesonii immediately turned to see Aqua Helmet, once again, holding the E-Liter 3K out in front of them. By the basis of the voice, the wearer now looked to be female.

The only thing she was satisfied about was that she didn't run into the thin metal point of the rifle as a blast of blue-violet sprayed into her face.

Splat.