Living Situation || Agent 3 x Agent 8

[25]

The trip lasted a couple days longer than usual. Cap took all of them around Calamari County to the most popular destinations. There was even a small talent show in the main town they were in. Not the Annual Folk Singing Contest, that had happened a few months ago. The idols obviously couldn't participate, but Callie and Marie were all happy and nostalgic watching the contestants.

Going back to Inkopolis was strange. Tara was so used to the calm town she had been living in for the past week that the bustling sounds of the city were temporarily jarring to her. But she had missed the apartment so walking through the door made her feel a bit better.

She and Richie had, against her better judgement, stayed up a little bit past midnight. Both of them were excited for Tara's first real Turf War tomorrow.

"Alright, so Ashton, Pearl, and Marina are going to be playing with us," Richie explained. "Marina will be on the opposite team...as for three other people, Ashton's got us covered. His own teammates will be playing."

That was a small surprise to her. She didn't know that Ashton had his own team. Maybe he had mentioned it before, but she just forgot.

The two of them eventually had drifted off to sleep holding each other. The worry and excitement that had manifested inside of Tara made it slightly difficult to properly sleep, but she felt more comforted knowing that Richie was by her side.

After breakfast the next morning and freshening up, Richie excitedly dragged her to the closet. "I'm one of the people who wears gear for fashion and not abilities...but let's see if we can find something with good abilities and is super cute!"

She shook her head. She had bought her own gear (well, with a little bit of help from him). His eyes lit up when she showed him the pictures from her phone. "Heh, alright. We'll go on a shopping spree the second you start getting winning streaks, though!" he exclaimed.

Once they had finished getting dressed, they went to go walk out the door. But Richie suddenly turned and ran back to their room. He came back with the gold toothpick in his hair.

"H-Huh? I thought you said you weren't going to wear that in public," Tara said, giving it a slightly nervous glance.

"Well, yeah...but this is a special occasion. We need good luck!" he explained, smiling. He took her hand and they left the apartment in high spirits.

They met up with Ashton, who was standing with three unfamiliar Inklings. He introduced them as his teammates with a proud smile on his face.

There was Nath, an uptight-looking guy with the Special Forces Beret, who used the Splat Charger. Junko, a Dark Tetra Dualies user, apparently never got out of his middle school emo phase. And then there was the only girl Lucy, who had sparkly tentacles and wielded the Bloblobber.

Tara had never seen Ashton so excited about something before. Well, maybe aside from the recent party. But he seemed to genuinely care about his team. She now noticed that the boys had glitter on their cheeks to match Lucy's freckles. They all seemed to care about each other as well, which Tara was happy about.

Pearl and Marina arrived shortly thereafter. They were wearing the costumed disguises from the train station. If they had shown their faces, it would certainly catch attention of everyone in the Square. And that would lead to unwanted spectators...

"Don't worry, I made them promise not to tell anyone else," Ashton whispered to Richie. "I had to spill in the first place, y'know? We tell each other mostly everything."