Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

A young girl sat in a cell, carving into the back wall with her nails. Despite hearing the door open behind her, she ignored it and continued carving. She heard the tray being placed on the stone ground. It echoed in the silence.

“Your food.” The guard told her to no response, other than the grating sound of keratin on stone. “What are you doing?” The girl ignored him. “You’ve no one to blame but yourself, you know.” He shook his head, muttering, “Nothing sadder than a kid throwing themselves in prison.” If the girl heard him, she hid it perfectly. “I didn’t even know it was possible for someone as young as you to get solitary, but if anyone’s earned it, it’s you.”

He turned around, and walked towards the open cell door. The young girl grinned. She turned around and jumped on the guard in a single, fluid motion. She pressed her sharp nails against his throat, threatening to break through the skin. “Sorry I didn’t talk.” She drove her nails further, the guard sputtering as his blue ink-blood covered her hands. “I was busy sharpening my nails.”

She yanked her fingernails out of the skin, causing eight streams of ink-blood to stream out of his neck. The guard silently tried to scream or call for help. He fell to his knees, clutching his neck with both hands. The teenager walked over to kneel in front of the guard, letting him see her grin.

“I can’t believe you didn’t see me coming. Of course, now you won’t be seeing much of anything for a while.” She pointed her thin, sharp nails at his eyes.

An alarm blared throughout the prison. A small figure ran through the halls, pursued by armed guards. She waited until they reached the abandoned cafeteria, where she hid under a table in a darkened corner. The guards instantly noticed the purple glow of her tentacle-hair. The one at the front of the group fired a specially-modified N-zap ‘85 at her. Highly-pressurized orange ink launched out of the gray barrel. The sound echoed throughout the cafeteria.

The prisoner jumped off the table, allowing the shots to burst under her. She landed on the floor a few feet in front of the dozen guards, grinning and baring her fangs. “Okay, we’ve had our fun. But I think I’ve spent long enough here.”

“Hardly. Come quietly or we will use force.”

“Oh, come on. You’re really going to shoot a defenseless little girl? It’s because of my face, isn’t it?” She pointed at her face. One side was covered in red and purple cracks, her eye permanently bulging and dried out.

“Come off it. We all know what you’re capable of, and what you’ve done. Otherwise, you wouldn’t have a life sentence at your age.”

“Oh, trust me. You have no idea what I’m capable of.” She abruptly leaped onto the front guard, scratching his eyes. He fell to the ground, clutching his face and screaming in pain. The prisoner picked up the guard’s firearm and stood on his back. She held up her arm, pointing the weapon at a metal brace around her elbow. “Stop! What are you doing?!”

“Sorry. This thing looks cool and all, but it’s cold and uncomfortable.” She slammed the weapon against the brace, puncturing a hole in it. With the device no longer sending electromagnetic signals through her skin, preventing her from doing so, she turned into a squid while the guards’ ammo fired overhead. She shifted back instantly.

“Plus, not being able to shift is a real hassle.” She fired the weapon while dodging the guards’ shots. After half a minute, a young girl stood in the middle of a pile of armed guards lying on their backs. “I’m going to get out of here.” She kicked their lifeless bodies and took another modded N-zap ‘85 for herself.

“And when I do, the world will learn to fear the name Taylor Yonshi.”

The Myers siblings teleported into the living room of the base. “Lauren. You called us?” Marcus stepped forward.

“ Agent 4, we’re on duty; call me captain. ” Lauren stood up from the chair, her posture a facade of confidence, and held up her cell phone. “Apparently, there’s been a jailbreak at Inkopolis Penitentiary. One guess who busted out.”

Marcus clenched his fists and jaw. “Taylor.”

“Exactly.” Lauren read from her phone screen, “Last night, Taylor Yonshi, age 15, broke out of Inkopolis Penitentiary. Fifteen guards were killed in the process.” Lauren’s gaze turned down. She stared at her hand. She gradually curled and uncurled her fingers, as though ensuring it was still there.

“Lauren? Hey, Lauren, are you still with us?” Katherine’s voice called her back to reality. “Oh, sorry kati- I mean, agent 8. It’s just, y’know, after what happened…” Lauren clenched her fist until her palm turned white. “It’s okay, Lau- I mean, captain Laker. Do we have any idea where she is?”

“Possibly.” Lauren turned back to the task at hand, “Apparently, there’s been some weird stuff going on where mount Nantai used to be. As in, permanent storm clouds and unconfirmed sightings of undead monsters type of weird.”

“Undead… you mean like those things guarding the Necronomicon at Innsmouth county?”

“Possibly, but we shouldn’t jump to conclusions. Now come on team, let’s go out and investigate. Agents 1 and 2 are doing a concert at New Sardine, so we can’t get them to back us up.”

“That’s fine.” Marcus shrugged, taking his phone out of his pocket, “I’ll just call Eric.” After a few seconds of silence, the cell phone buzzed with a dial tone. “What the…?”

“I’ll try calling Tyler.” Lauren glanced at her phone, only to nearly drop it. “What?! No! I… it was just on 90%! How is it dead?!” She shook her head, “Let me try the communicators.” She tapped the device on her wrist, to no avail. “Dammit. Taylor must be messing with our signals somehow.” She looked up at her fellow agents, “Come on, team. Looks like it’s just the three of us.”

Three agents clambered through the ruins of Mt Nantai. Miles away from Inkopolis, the mountain had been reduced to an inconceivably massive pile of stone and defunct machinery. “Man. How long has it been since we were last here?” Lauren wondered aloud.

“Not long enough, if you ask me.” Katherine replied, “I think it’s safe to say all three of us have bad memories of this place.”

“Yeah.” Marcus quietly agreed, unconsciously covering his chest with his hand. Looking down, he noticed a hole in the landscape of charred rocks that seemed to lead to a tunnel. “Hey, I think I found something.”

Lauren walked over and kneeled down to look into the tunnel. She nodded, “Good work, agent 4. Let’s see.” Marcus and Katherine both nodded, and followed Lauren down the tunnel. It gradually sloped downwards, the sunlight growing dimmer and the air growing staler as they descended into the bowels of the ruined mountain. 

They tried to remain as silent as possible, for a not entirely-unfounded fear of disturbing the uncountable millions of tons of rock and machinery overhead. After what felt like days, they reached a wall in the tunnel. “Okay.” Marcus whispered, reaching up to touch the ceiling, “Clearly I was mistaken. Let’s just go back up and-”

“Wait.” Katherine grabbed his wrist before he could turn around; not quite forcefully, but hard enough that he stayed. “There’s a gap in the rocks, and I think I see something in there.” She pointed at a thin gap created by the curves of two separate boulders. From the yellow glow generated by Lauren’s tentacle-hair in the dark, they could see a vague shape moving around indistinguishably.

“Right.” Lauren decided quietly, “Let’s shift in.” The three shifted into their cephalopod forms long enough to slide through the gap, immediately turning back to humanoid as soon as they reached the other side.

Taylor kneeled in the middle of the chamber within the remnants of mt. Nantai. Months ago, she had felt the tremors even in the confines of her prison, as a great and terrible machine had burst from the mountain like a leviathan hatching from a massive egg to lay waste to all before it. She used her weapon of choice, an inkbrush as long as herself, to spread purple ink all over the floor in distinct, deliberate patterns.

After some indeterminate amount of time, she saw a yellow and green glow through a crack in the wall. The glows were accompanied by voices, their words unintelligible for the hushed whispers they spoke in. Taylor narrowed her eyes and tightened her grip on her brush in rage, until her knuckles turned white. Even if she couldn’t understand the words, even if she hadn’t seen him since the trial all those months ago, she recognized the voice of the boy with the green glow. Before she could speak, the glow disappeared, leaving her purple the only remaining bioluminescence. 

After a second, the three interlopers shifted back into their humanoid forms. Marcus yelled, “Taylor! The hell do you think you’re doing?!”

“Oh, of course. I should’ve known you’d show up.” She snarled, jabbing her inkbrush at the agents, “I’m trying to avenge David, and prove my worth as a member of Are We Cool Yet?! I’m going to kill you, Marcus. I’m going to kill you for everything you’ve done to me!”

“What have I done to you?!”

“You ruined my life! You got me arrested! All because you couldn’t just let me be in control! But now, I can finally take my revenge.” Her voice lowered as she grinned, pulling taut the cracks in the broken half of her face. “After all, did you really think I’d let that demon possess me if I couldn’t get something out of it?” She raised her arm over the painting she’d created on the floor. It glowed a bright orange. She spoke in a strange, unnaturally deep and raspy voice, “Awaken.”

The glow transferred from her arm to the outline of her painting, filling the chamber with an unnatural orange tint. The glow disappeared after a few seconds, leaving a humanoid in its place. He stood in place, his eyes vacant and expression neutral.

“David?! You brought him back?!” Marcus fired two bursts of plasma that knocked the pseudo-David into the back wall. It dropped to the floor like a ragdoll before instantly standing up straight, showing no signs of having registered the impact.

“Well, I didn’t really bring him back. This is just a copy. I’m an artist, not a necromancer. David, help me kill these three so we can have our revenge.” David lunged at Marcus, pinning him to the cave floor. Taylor laughed, “Looks like the student has become the master.”

Lauren and Katherine fired three separate bursts of plasma. The end of Taylor’s brush glowed orange, as she used it to deflect the plasma into the walls. Marcus shifted into squid form before turning back into a humanoid, standing up, and slamming his foot into the pseudo-David’s back. “Taylor’s mine!” He jumped off of David’s back to fire a blast of plasma at Taylor. She jumped over the explosion, dropkicking Marcus to the ground.

“Actually, it looks like you’re mine.” Taylor’s leg glowed orange. She roundhouse-kicked Marcus in the gut, sending him flying backwards. Katherine screamed, “Marcus! That’s my brother, you little-” David slammed his elbow into the back of her head, knocking her forward.

Kat turned around to lunge, driving her daggers into the copy’s sternum. A viscous orange fluid dripped down from around the blades. The pseudo-David opened its mouth, releasing a deafening screech that sent Katherine reeling backwards, the skin threatening to peel off her face. The daggers fell out of David’s chest and clattered to the floor, while the hole in the thing’s body closed with wet, visceral squelching sounds. Katherine winced, stepping backwards while David walked towards her, keeping them at an even distance. It stepped on the daggers, ignoring the sharp edges that stabbed through its fake shoes and into its fake skin.

A pair of arms wrapped around the pseudo-David’s neck from behind. It screeched, grabbing Lauren’s arm and slamming her onto the hard, stone floor before striking her in the stomach with its foot.

Lauren screamed in pain, her weapon falling out of her hand as she desperately flailed and struggled. Black spots appeared in her vision, and she found it increasingly difficult to breathe. She heard a guttural, animalistic screech, before the weight was lifted off her stomach. Lauren sputtered, blinking and raising herself onto her palms. 

Katherine had grabbed Lauren’s weapon off the ground and pinned the pseudo-David to the cave floor. Lauren stood up on trembling legs. She watched as Katherine shoved the hero shot DX into the pseudo-David’s mouth, her entire body shaking with fury, and pulled the trigger without hesitating.

Marcus fired bursts of plasma from his splatling, stumbling back from the recoil each time, while Taylor effortlessly dodged and deflected each strike. Her brush flew through the air at blinding speeds, and at times she moved so fast as to seemingly be in two places at once.

Eventually, she managed to get behind Marcus and punch him in the back, sending him sprawling to the floor. He stood up, green ink-blood dripping from his bottom lip. “What… is your problem? Why do you have it out for me so bad? Why can’t you just leave me alone?!”

“Why? Why not?!” Taylor’s eyes glowed orange, and her voice grew louder, until the entire chamber was shaking, “Because you ruined my life! You got me arrested! You just couldn’t handle me being in charge!” She lunged at Marcus, dragging him across the cave floor as the skin on his back burned from the friction.

“It’s your own fault! You’re just a selfish, entitled, abusive sociopath! You can’t handle taking responsibility for anything you do! Screw you!” Marcus jabbed her broken eye with his middle finger, causing her to recoil and hiss in pain. She raked her nails across his face, cutting through the skin. He threw a punch into her face, knocking out a tooth and standing up. Taylor’s arm glowed orange. She swung it into Marcus’s stomach, launching him a dozen feet into the rock wall. He fell to the ground, coughing up a puddle of green ink-blood and a few teeth.

Taylor conjured a rope made of orange light, lashing out one end to constrict around Marcus’s throat. He sputtered and gasped for breath, writhing in pain and grasping desperately at his throat as his vision clouded over.

A blinding flash of light filled the pseudo-David’s face for a split-second, before its head exploded into a puddle of orange sludge. Its body hung limp. Katherine saw red. She heard Marcus and Taylor arguing in the background, their words muffled as though separated by dozens of feet of distance.

“Katie…” Lauren stumbled forward, placing a hand on Katherine’s shoulder. She panted, “That… that was awesome!”

“Yeah.” Kat gave a shaky smile. She and Lauren struggled to hold each other up. While they attempted to catch their breaths, inattentive to their own surroundings, the pseudo-David’s head grew back from the stump of its neck. It grabbed Katherine’s daggers from the ground, and plunged them into their shoulders before either could react. Lauren and Katherine collapsed to the ground, in too much pain to so much as make any vocalizations. “Good!” Taylor commanded her creation, “Now kill them!”

The pseudo-David rose Katherine’s daggers over her and Lauren’s heads. The air nearby warped as though there was a nearby heat source, while no one thought to pay it any mind. The second it brought the weapons down, something struck it in the back. It turned around to look down at the yellow and blue weapon on the floor. The mystic rope disappeared from around Marcus’s neck from Taylor’s surprise.

“What?! Who are you?!” A young inkling woman had jumped into existence, her vibrant blue-green tentacle-hairs hanging at her sides as she examined the cavern. “I could ask you the same thing. I have so many questions. But first…” She ran forward and pivoted on one leg to kick the pseudo-David in the chest, causing it to stumble backward one step.

Lauren and Katherine forced their heads up, blinking to watch as the newcomer brought her foot down on one end of the hero shot, launching it upwards. The weapon rotated vertically until the inkling effortlessly caught it in midair, shooting ink into her opponent’s eyes in a single motion.

“Stop!” Taylor yelled. She grasped the sides of Marcus’s head, with both hands glowing orange. He screamed in agonizing pain as he writhed on his hands and knees. “I’ll kill him! I swear I’m not bluffing!”

“She’s not!” Katherine yelled from the ground, “Please, just do what she says!”

“The octoling knows what she’s talking about.” Taylor slightly tightened her grip on Marcus’s head, eliciting another cry of pain. “Now, drop your weapon.” The woman hesitated, grip briefly tightening on her hero shot before throwing it to the ground. The sound of metal clattering on stone echoed throughout the cavern. “Good girl. Now tell me: who are you?”

“Why should I tell you anything?! What even is this place?”

Taylor’s eyes glowed. She spoke with three simultaneous voices, each with a slightly different pitch, “Do what I say or I’ll put him out of my misery!”

Katherine stood up, stumbling forward. “Taylor, please, stop!”

“Tell me!” Taylor screamed.

Marcus yelled out as green ink-blood dripped from around Taylor’s fingers, “Help… me…!”

“May!”

“What’s that?” Taylor slightly loosened her grip, leaving Marcus gasping and convulsing.

“My name. May Pike.”

“Wh… what?” Marcus blinked.

“So this is what power feels like, huh?” Taylor grinned, “I can see the appeal. Now, I want you to tell me some secrets about yourself.”

“What? Why would I do that?”

“I’m just a bit curious. And if you don’t…” She placed one hand on top of Marcus’s head, and slowly tightened her grip. “...I’ll crush his head.”

“You’re insane!”

“May, please…” Lauren stood up, her weapon shaking in her hand. “...just… for now, just go along with her.” May looked back to Taylor. Lines of green ink-blood were starting to appear around her fingers, and Marcus was in too much pain to make any sound.

“Okay, fine! I’ll tell you!” She hesitated for a moment.

“Well? Tell me what?”

“That I’m agent 3.”

Taylor released Marcus in surprise. “What now?” The air around her started to warp.

“No, no, that’s not… she can’t…” Lauren stammered to herself. The empty air directly behind Taylor burst open. A young man emerged from nothingness and kicked Taylor in the back of her head. She screamed in pain, launched forward, as the inkling scrambled to his feet.

“What? What’s going on? Oh no, I am so sorry!”

“Don’t apologize; she’s evil!” Lauren blurted out.

“Aaron! What the hell is going on?!” May screamed at no one in particular. “May? What’s happening?!”

“Die!” Taylor shot an orb of orange energy at him from the tip of her inkbrush. The stranger barely managed to duck under it, leaving it to explode on the cave wall behind him. “Ah, nuts.” A massive boulder fell from the ceiling directly over Marcus’s head. “Kid, watch out!” The man grabbed Marcus and dragged him away from the collapsing ceiling.

“Thanks. Y-you’re really strong.” Marcus stammered, face pale and bleeding.

“I, uh, I think he might be delirious.” The older man pointed out. He stood head and shoulders over the rest of the group, and his green tentacle-hair was slicked back similar to Mark’s.

“Ya think?” Lauren dialed her communicator. “Sheldon, we need two more communicators, now!”

“Understood, agent- I mean, captain 3- I mean, captain Laker.” Two communicators appeared in Lauren’s hand. The cave continued to implode around them, filling the chamber with dust and rubble.

Taylor fired bursts of energy from her inkbrush at the boulders that got close to her. “You know what? You guys have fun here. I’m out!” She disappeared in a burst of orange light.

“Okay, here’s-” Lauren started coughing from the dust while attaching the transporters to the other two inklings’ wrists. “Here’s the code. Just type it in. Trust me?” 

“Who are you?” May yelled, “Was that Sheldon? Did he call you captain?”

“Just trust me! We don’t have time!” A large boulder emphasized her point by falling onto the floor less than a foot away.

“Good point.” The man entered the code, and instantaneously disappeared.

“What the-?! Aaron! What did you do to him?!”

“Don’t worry; he just teleported.” Katherine explained, “I’d recommend you do the same, unless you want to stay here.” Her eyes had started to redden from the smoke that now filled half the cavern.

"Okay, good. Fair enough." May input the code, disappearing with the other three.

Sheldon stood in the middle of the living room, while Pearl and Marina walked through the front door. “Yo, Sheldon, what’re ya doing here? I thought you were working.” Pearl asked, tapping his head.

“Well, funny story-”

A man appeared in the living room from out of nowhere. “Intruder!” Pearl screamed, jumping up and punching him in the stomach.

“Ow! What was that for?!”

“I’ll go call Callie and Marie.” Sheldon ran into the laboratory nearby. Marcus, Lauren, Katherine, and another girl teleported into the living room.

“Kids, who are these two?” Marina asked, “Wait, Marcus, what happened to you?”

Katherine helped her brother sit on the couch, green ink-blood dripping from his face onto the cushions. “Taylor happened.” She explained succinctly, while he breathed out a thanks.

“Wait, Taylor?” Marina startled, “Didn’t we get her locked up last year?”

“She broke out.” Marcus held his head and trembled, “She broke out, and she got powers from Majora, and she almost killed us.” He looked up at one of the newcomers. “You saved my life. Thank you so much. Aaron, right?”

“Yeah, Aaron. And you’re welcome.”

Katherine retrieved a first aid kit from a nearby wall, and started applying bandages to Marcus’s cuts.

“Thanks, sis.” He gasped, holding still.

Katherine nodded. “Don’t mention it.”

“Hey, kid, mind if I help?” May offered, “Trust me, I know a thing or two about first aid kits, and that girl really did a number on your friend.”

Kat shook her head. “Thanks, but I think I can handle this. I’ll let you know if I need any help. Also, he’s my brother.”

May’s eyes widened in surprise. “But you’re an octoling, and he’s an inkling.”

“She’s adopted.” Marcus clarified.

“Ah.” May nodded in understanding, “Gotcha.” She turned around as Lauren tapped her on the shoulder.

“So, you’re agent 3, right?”

“Uh, yeah, but you’re not supposed to know about that.” May held her arm nervously.

“Well, that’s funny, because I’m agent 3.”

“I-I’m sorry. What?”

“Just for the record, I’m agent 4.” Aaron interjected.

“I’m agent 4! Wait…” Marcus realized, “Oh no, not again. You two are from another dimension!”

“What?!” Aaron yelled, “What are you talking about?”

“No, wait, I think he’s right.” May grabbed onto his arm. “That would explain how we were just in that cave without actually going anywhere.”

“Yeah, you’re right.” Aaron remembered, “One minute, I was practicing my jump kicks, and the next, I was in a cave fighting a crazy little girl.”

“What I don’t get is, how’d we cross dimensions in the first place?” May looked around the room. “We should get to your headquarters and talk to captain Cuttlefish. Maybe he’ll know something.”

Lauren, Marcus, and Katherine all looked at each other, before Lauren pointed at herself. “Mr. Cuttlefish retired. I’m the captain now.”

“Wait, you’re the captain?” Aaron cocked his head to the side. “But you’re just a kid!”

“Hey, for your information, my 18th birthday is tomorrow.”

“Well, happy birthday, captain, but that’s just it. You’re a teenager.”

“Oh, please.” Lauren crossed her arms indignantly, “I’m willing to bet I’ve been through way more than you could imagine. Same goes for your world’s agent 3 too.”

“How dare you?!”

“You two, shut up!” May held her arms out between Lauren and Aaron, while Katherine held Lauren back by the arms.

“Listen, all of you.” Marina ordered, waiting until they were all looking at her. “I’m not entirely sure what’s going on here, or how you two got to this universe, but I do know one thing.”

“Which is…?” Pearl motioned for her to continue.

“What? Oh, sorry, I was, just, y’know, trying to pause for dramatic effect. Anyway, what I know is that if we’re constantly fighting each other, it’ll be that much harder for us to figure out what’s going on here.”

Aaron took a second to put his arms down. “You’re right. Sorry, it’s just, she’s a kid. Are you sure she’s captain material?”

All eyes in the room turned to Lauren. She put her arms around her torso, despite forcing herself to hold up her head. “To be perfectly honest, I’m not really sure myself. I’ve been having doubts ever since I first got promoted. But be that as it may…” 

She lowered her arms to her sides, clenched her fists, and straightened her posture. “...I accepted the responsibilities of being the New Squibeak Splatoon’s captain. Craig Cuttlefish himself told me that he and his granddaughters all agreed that I was the best choice to be the second captain.” She turned her hardened, unblinking gaze to Aaron. “And I don’t intend to disappoint them.”

The older inkling looked into her eyes for a moment. “Okay. I can’t say I’m convinced, but if Callie, Marie, and Cuttlefish trust you, then you can’t be all bad.”

“Thanks. Right now, that’s good enough for me.”

“So, does anyone have any ideas on how we got here in the first place?” May asked, sitting on a nearby chair, “And why the base is so much…” She looked around, tapping the armrest with her knuckle, “...roomier and less underground than where I’m from?”

“Our old bases were all destroyed a couple years back, so Marina’s been letting us crash at her place ever since.” Marcus piped up from the couch, “As for how you two got here, you know how Taylor was using those powers with the freaky orange glow?” 

“That little creep who tried to use your head as a stress ball? You think she had something to do with it?” Aaron asked.

“Uh… yeah. Yeah, I do.” Marcus averted his gaze from the older inkling. He cleared his throat, “So, anyway, she got those powers from a demon from another dimension. Maybe her using them like she did caused some sort of dimensional warp thingy.”

“If that’s the case, then we need to stop her yesterday. You guys all remember what happened last time.” Marina insisted.

“Well, we don’t!” May yelled in exasperation, “How are you guys so… calm about this? I mean, alternate dimensions, demons, magic…”

Marcus shrugged, “You get used to it after a while. We’ve been dealing with this stuff for over a year now. I actually have a card that lets me into the infinite Library at the center of the multiverse.”

“I’m not even going to try to figure out that last part.” Aaron stated bluntly. “So, anyway, what happened last time?”

Marina answered, “It’s a bit hard to explain without getting into some really complicated metaphysical jargon, but let’s just say that multiple universes colliding with each other can have devastating ripple effects for the entire multiverse.”

“Well, we can’t let that happen, now can we?” May punched her open palm, “Let’s find this Taylor girl and put our dimensions back in order.”

Sheldon slammed the laboratory door open. “Guys! Callie and Marie just called; something happened in New Sardine! I don’t know what, but it sounded like they need backup.”

Lauren winced, “Just our luck. We don’t have any teleport beacons there.”

“Then it’s a good thing you’ve got your license.” Katherine pointed out.

“Actually, I think I have my license on me.” May interjected, briefly feeling at her pockets, “But I’m not sure it’d actually work in this dimension.”

“Alright.” Lauren decided, “Sheldon, you stay here on lookout. I’ll drive the rest of us to New Sardine. Agent 4, you up for another fight?”

“ Of course! ” Aaron and Marcus affirmed in unison. They both glanced at each other. “Oh, wait. Sorry, force of habit.”

“It’s fine.” Marcus blushed. “ But are you kidding?” He stood up from the couch, fists clenched, “I’m agent 4. Or, well, an agent 4. A little bleeding isn’t going to stop me.”

“That’s what I like to hear. Now, you two, what’re your weapons?”

“Hero shot, but if you’ve got a roller, I could use that too.” May answered.

“Blaster.” Ame replied.

“Huh.” Marcus thought aloud, “My ex-girlfriend used a blaster.”

“Right. Sheldon, get these two their new weapons. Then, we’re going down to New Sardine. No prizes for guessing who we’re gonna find there.”

Callie sat on a chair, wiping her brow with a nearby washcloth. “Man, I forgot how intense these things could be.”

“No kidding.” Marie sat down and took a cloth of her own. “I mean, don’t get me wrong, it’s fun, but it’s exhausting.”

“Yeah. I can’t believe we used to do this every month.” Callie laughed to herself, “Good thing we got off the hook to take over for us, huh?”

“No kidding. I think we’ve got maybe an hour before we have to go back on.” Marie looked at a piece of paper on the nearby desk. “Looks like our next song’s a remix of City of Color.” She smiled. “Our debut song.”

“Think we still got it?” Callie asked, grinning and leaning sideways in her chair. 

“We haven’t missed a beat yet, and we’ve been doing this all day. Speaking of which, I think our lunch break is after the next song.”

“Oh, good. I was starting to get kinda hungry.”

Before Marie could reply, her phone started ringing. “Hey, sheldon. What’s up?” 

“Hey, Marie, has, uh, has anything strange happened over there?” “Not really, no. All things considered, it’s been going pretty well. Why do you ask?” “Well…” Sheldon hesitated, as though he was nervous, “...Someone’s appeared in the base.”

Marie sat bolt upright. “Who?”

“I’m not sure, but I don’t think they’re from this universe.”

“Hold up, I thought we were done with multiverse stuff.”

“So did I, but here we are.” Sheldon paused to listen through the door. “Also, it seems Taylor’s back.”

“Oh, for the love of… how’s Marcus doing?”

“I think he’s doing fine enough.”

“That’s good. Do you need our help?”

“I don’t think so. You two stay there for your concert.”

“Thanks. Mind sending us our weapons, though? Just in case.”

“Understood. Anything else?”

“I don’t think so. If something happens, I’ll call you back.”

“Understood.”

Marie hung up the phone. She rubbed her temple. “What happened? Did someone come in from another dimension?” Callie asked. Nearby, the hero roller DX and hero charger DX teleported into the corner of the room.

“Yeah, apparently. Also, Taylor’s back.”

“Really? I’m guessing she wasn’t let out early for good behavior.”

“Doubtful. Sheldon said he’s going to keep me posted, but they should have it handled for now.”

“That’s good.” With no warning, the entire building shook with the sound of an explosion. “What was that?!” Callie screamed, shooting up.

“Come on.” Marie stood up. They grabbed their weapons before sprinting into the hallway. A taller man, wearing a business suit, ran up to them. “Something’s happened.” He tried and almost succeeded at keeping his voice even, “I need to escort you two- why do you have weapons?”

“Long story.” Marie told him, “Get the other security guards; tell them to evacuate the civilians. We’ll neutralize the threat.”

“Understood.” Callie and Marie ran past the guard. “I’ll call Sheldon and tell him to send in backup.” Callie decided, taking her cell phone out of her pocket while running. While he was running to the other end of the hall, the guard sighed under his breath, “Why do they even hire security guards for secret agents, anyway?”

New Sardine was a moderately sized town, named after the far larger and older Sardine city out to the west. Its primary industry was television and filmmaking, and it had a sizable concert venue that could hold several hundreds of concert-goers at a time. By the time the squid sisters sprinted onto the 20-foot tall stage, the entire pavilion was on fire.

Floating 50 feet over the blaze, back turned to them, was a small humanoid figure. Callie and Marie wordlessly nodded to each other, and attached their weapons side-by-side. They fired a single burst of plasma at the humanoid. When it was less than a foot away, the humanoid held up a hand. The orb of plasma froze in midair, surrounded by a bright orange glow.

“Did you really think you could catch me off-guard?” Taylor turned around, swinging her arm out to the side and launching the plasma at the stage. Callie and Marie barely managed to jump out of the way. The blast launched them into the air and onto the hardwood stage.

Callie stood up, her entire body shaking and eyes burning with rage. “Taylor, you monster! Do you have any idea what you’ve done?! Causing an explosion in public?!” 

“Oh, please.” Taylor slowly descended onto the stage. “It was an intermission, wasn’t it? Besides, it’s not like I chose to teleport here. It was just a roll of the cosmic dice.” Her hands glowed orange, and she assumed an offensive stance. “So, what’re you gonna do next?”

“That is an excellent question.” Callie grabbed Marie’s arm, dragging her away while screaming, “Run!”

Taylor lowered her arms in surprise. “Huh. Wasn’t expecting that.” She grinned, flying after them with glowing hands. “This might actually be fun!” She started throwing orange light from her hands, causing fires wherever they landed.

“Why are you even going after us?!” Callie yelled, “I thought your thing was with Marcus!”

Taylor descended to the ground in front of them. “Look, there was a cave-in, and I didn’t really think about where I was teleporting. And besides…” She grinned, as the orange radiance traveled from her fists to her legs. “...you two are friends of Marky’s, aren’t you? So if I kill you, that’ll just help my revenge!” She jumped into the air, leaving a crater in the pavement, before somersaulting in midair and diving at Callie with her legs outstretched.

Callie held up her roller to block the girl’s kick. The roller disintegrated, knocking Callie onto the ground. “That… that’s impossible! How are you even doing that?!”

“What can I say? Looks like Majora rubbed off on me, but it needed a year or so to really settle in.” She clenched and unclenched her fist. “But now, I can feel myself getting stronger by the second.”

An unfamiliar voice yelled, “Don’t you dare!” Taylor was tackled to the ground from behind. “What the hell?! Who are you?!”

An octoling girl with short tentacle-hair tied into a ponytail, the same color as Taylor’s, punched her in the face twice before running up to Callie and Marie. “Marie! I’m so glad you’re safe! I turned around and there was this weird light and everything was different and it feels like something’s off and who is that girl and why was she glowing and Marie why do you have your charger you didn’t have your charger when we came here and what’s going on?!”

“I’m sorry, but who are you and why are you talking like you know us?” Callie asked, staring blankly at the girl. She blinked, as though simultaneously surprised and insulted.

“This isn’t the time, you two! It’s me, Lacey!” She gestured to Marie, “I’m May’s girlfriend!”

Callie and Marie glanced at each other. Callie admitted, “We have no idea who that is.”

Taylor stood up, her eyes glowing. “I don’t care who you are! Get in my way, and I’ll annihilate you!”

“How do you not recognize me?!” Lacey screamed, “How- May’s agent 3!”

“What?!” Callie yelled, stepping backwards, “We already have an agent 3!” 

“Okay, bored now. Die please.” Taylor lobbed a bolt of orange energy at the three.

“Get down!” Lacey pushed the other two under the strike, allowing it to set fire to a parked car across the street.

“Uh…” Marie blinked, “Thanks. I guess.” The sound of an engine slowly grew louder, until a bright multicolored truck rammed into Taylor from the side, launching her screaming into a nearby wall.

“Hey, who’s that?” Lacey asked no one in particular.

A yellow-haired inkling poked her head out of a window in the van. “Hey guys! Hope we didn’t keep you waiting- hey who’s that?”

“Lauren! How’d you guys get here so fast?” Marie questioned her.

Lauren opened the driver’s side door and ran to the other side. “We definitely didn’t run any red lights or drive over any speed limits, that’s for sure.”

“Are you kidding?!” Marina yelled, opening the passenger’s side door, “You’re lucky we didn’t crash or kill anyone!”

Pearl’s voice countered from inside, “Well the point is, we’re all still alive for now.” The other agents left the van.

“Okay, but seriously, who is this?” Lauren gestured at the girl in front of Callie and Marie.

“Lace!” May ran over to hug the octoling, barreling into her and twirling her around. “I was so worried about you!” She repeatedly kissed her forehead and cheeks.

Lacey tightened her grip on May, giggling, “I’m fine, May. I have no idea what’s going on, but I’m okay.”

“Right, sorry, sorry.” May set her down. “Guys, this is my wife Lacey!”

“Your wife?” Lauren glanced down, noticing the rings on their fingers. She smiled glowingly. “Congrats! Are you an agent 8?”

“Wha- um, no. Agent 8 is someone else. And what do you mean, an agent 8? Seriously, I’m completely lost to the context here.”

“It’s okay, Lacey.” Aaron assured her, “We’re just in another dimension.”

“Oh.” After a second, her eyes widened. “Wait, another dimension?!”

Taylor flew into the air, her entire body glowing a deep, blinding orange. “So that’s what this is. I’m going to kill every single one of you! I’ll make the entire world pay for what I’ve gone through!” She started throwing dozens of mystical explosives, with no rhyme or reason to where they struck.

“Guys! Scatter!” Lauren yelled. The entire group ran in multiple different directions, splitting up at random.

Marcus looked to the side at Lacey. “So, you’re agent 3’s wife, huh?”

“Well, an agent 3’s wife, apparently.” They ran past a 10-story building. A burst of energy struck the fifth story, causing rubble to fall on top of them.

Callie and Aaron sprinted down the street, until the sound of explosions started to quiet down. Callie doubled over, panting. “Okay, okay…” She looked over at Aaron, as he held his side. “Who are you?”

“Name’s Aaron. I’m a friend of May and Lacey’s. Also agent 4, at least where I’m from.”

Callie rolled her eyes. “Oh, great. And here I thought we were done dealing with the multiverse. So, did I get kidnapped and mind-controlled by the octarians in your timeline too?”

“What?” Aaron cocked his head to the side. “No. Why do you ask?”

“Oh, well, um…” Callie tugged at the collar of her shirt, “That happened to me a couple years back, so Marie had to recruit Marcus to help her rescue me.”

“Oh.” Aaron’s tone was mild and reassuring, “Are you okay?”

Callie nodded, smiling. “Yeah, I’m fine. No lasting trauma. Well, sometimes, but Marie’s always there for me. Thanks for asking, though.”

“No problem.”

Callie turned her head to the side. “Watch out! Taylor!”

“What?” He turned to see Taylor floating in midair.

“About time you two noticed me.” Taylor descended onto the ground. "So, are you ready to fight?"

Aaron and Callie both stood up, brandishing their weapons at Taylor. "Always!" Callie yelled.

Aaron fired a burst of plasma from his blaster. Taylor effortlessly sidestepped it. "Come on, is that the best you can do?"

"Hardly! Aaron, let’s put our weapons together!" "What?! How?!"

"I’ll make sure you don’t live long enough to find out." Taylor remarked, forming an orb of pure energy in the palm of her hand and throwing it at the inklings, a hundred feet away from her.

At the halfway mark, the magic strike was intercepted by a burst of plasma from the side, causing an explosion that knocked all three inklings to the ground. "Ow. The hell-" Another burst of plasma struck Taylor as she stood up, launching her onto the sidewalk.

Pearl detached her dualies from Marie’s charger, while Marina disassembled her brella from Katherine’s dualies. “Guys!” Kat ran over to them. “What’re you doing? You’re supposed to fight Taylor, not just stand there!”

“Sorry.” Aaron stood up, groaning, “She caught us off guard.”

“And here I thought you were an agent.” Marie shook her head disappointedly.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You two, focus!” Katherine yelled, “Taylor’s the enemy here!”

“No, no, keep going. I already dropped half a building on Marcus and that other girl a few streets back, so at this point, I’m just tying up some loose ends.”

Katherine fired plasma wildly at Taylor, screaming, “You bit-!” Taylor threw out an orange line of magic that wrapped around Katherine’s neck. She dropped her weapons as Taylor dragged her into the air, the rope tightening around her throat while she desperately kicked and struggled.

“And to think, I used to be scared of you idiots. Always laying low and relying on others to actually fight you for me. But now that I’ve got Majora’s powers, I don’t need David, or anyone else! I’ve surpassed him! And once I kill the New Squidbeak Splatoon, I can show the entire world what I’m capable of!” Taylor laughed, yanking on the rope while Katherine choked and clawed at her throat.

“Kid!” Aaron fired a blast of plasma at the rope, severing it in the middle. He managed to catch Katherine before she hit the pavement.

“Th… thanks.” The mystic rope dissolved from around her throat. “That other girl with Marcus… D’ya think…?”

“Yeah, probably Lacey.” He looked behind him.

Taylor was fighting off the rest of their group, trading magic and plasma in a blitz of sound and light. Aaron and Katherine looked at each other, and nodded.

“Hey guys!” Katherine hollered over to them, “We need you to keep Taylor busy while we take care of something!”

“You got it, Kat!” Pearl jumped off of Marina’s open brella to slice at Taylor, as she dodged backwards in midair. “Oh dang, I missed.”

“Come on, while there’s still time!” Katherine grabbed Aaron’s hand, dragging him away.

Marcus coughed up a cloud of dust and pebbles, his eyes darting around. He was in a small air pocket, surrounded by concrete slabs, able to see only by his green bioluminescence. He noticed a purple glow mixed with his own, and briefly startled at the color until he noticed the girl lying on her back behind him. “Hey…” He attempted to stand up, forced to hunch over, and walked over to the girl.

She was nearly a decade older than him, her leg was pinned under a support beam, and a line of purple ink-blood marred her forehead. Marcus held up the back of her head. “Are you alright?”

“What do you think?” She groaned in pain.

“Okay, yeah, stupid question. Okay, okay, uh… Yeah, sorry, Kat’s usually the one who does the, um, y’know, the first-aid stuff.”

“Okay.” Lacey hissed in pain before looking down at her leg. “Try to look under the beam. See if I’m bleeding.”

“I hate to break it to you, but, well...” He gestured to her forehead.

“Oh, right. So that’s what delirium feels like. It’s actually not so bad.” She weakly lifted her hand to take some of her own ink-blood, and licked it off her fingertips. “Huh. So that’s what I taste like.”

“Gross, but the cut doesn’t look too bad. I just need something to bandage it.” Marcus looked around for something to use. “Come on, come on, what do I have?” After a few seconds, he found himself tugging at his own sleeve. “Well, if it’s all I’ve got…” He yanked the short sleeve from his shirt, and placed it over the cut. “Dammit, it’s not long enough.”

“Okay, you’re going to have to stick it on there. Either that, or just keep pressing it yourself, but I don’t think that’ll work.”

“You’re right.” Marcus briefly scanned the area. “Sorry, but I usually don’t bring tape to fights like this.”

“Oh, great. How could you be so unprepared?” She laughed weakly.

“Uh… how still can you hold your head?”

Lacey narrowed her eyes at Marcus, clearly unamused.

“Well, do you have any ideas?”

“Fair enough.” The octoling leaned back so her head was on the ground, with Marcus’s sleeve still covering her wound.

“Okay.” Marcus sat on the ground, sighing, “I’m not sure I can look under the beam without knocking that bandage off.”

“You should probably try. I need to know if it’s broken or anything. I have lost all feeling down there, you know.”

“Good point.” Marcus knelt down to look under the beam, careful to avoid moving Lacey too much. Her skin around the beam had turned a dark purple, with black edges. “Oh. Okay, I don’t think it’s broken, but it really shouldn’t be that color.” He attempted to move the support beam off of her legs.

Lacey writhed and screamed in agony, the guttural sound filling the small space, her purple ink-blood slowly dripping into her eyes. “Stop! Stop! Please, stop!”

“Okay, okay, it’s okay, I’ll stop!” Marcus released the support beam. “So, that didn’t work.”

“Ob… obviously… not.” Lacey gasped, blinking rapidly, her chest heaving from how hard she was breathing. “Any ideas?”

Marcus looked around. “Not really. There’s some holes in here, so we won’t suffocate. We probably shouldn’t move anything so this whole thing doesn’t collapse on top of us. But even if we shapeshift, we’d still risk destabilizing- hey, that’s it! What’d you say your name was?”

“Lacey.”

“Right. Lace, can you shapeshift?”

“Why- oh, yeah, good idea! Only May’s allowed to call me Lace, but good idea!” She closed her eyes, attempted to steady her breathing, and concentrated on shifting forms. Her skin had barely started to turn purple before her leg flared, causing her to gasp in pain. “Nope. It was a good idea, though. Really. Well, I mean, a good concept, at least.”

“Yeah, but good concept or not, it didn’t work.” Marcus glanced down at his wrist. His communicator had a jagged piece of cement jammed into it. He pulled it out and tossed it aside, wincing at how close it’d been to his skin. “Well, my communicator’s busted, so I can’t call anyone. I could teleport, but we don’t have any beacons near here, so it’d take forever to get back-”

“Wait, teleport? You guys can teleport?”

“Yeah. Here.” Marcus laid down on his side, his arm at an angle so Lacey could see the transporter around his wrist. “We have teleport beacons all over Inkopolis and some other places, like Melani and Innsmouth counties. I’m not really sure how they work; I think it has something to do with frequencies. But they operate differently from the squid beakons we use in turf war-you guys have that stuff in your universe, right? Squid beakons and turf wars?”

“Yeah.” Lacey stopped herself from nodding.

“Okay, so each of our teleport beacons has a different code, so when we activate the transporters, we have to input the code for whichever beacon we want to go to. They’re also much faster and have a longer range than turf war beakons.”

“Cool.” Lacey gave a shaky grin. “Sounds like you guys have way more advanced technology than my place.” She winced, glancing down at her knees. “Can you please keep talking? It’s a distraction.”

“Okay. So, you know that girl out there, trying to blow up the city? She’s actually my ex.”

“Really? How did that happen?”

“We started dating back in high school, but after we graduated, I finally realized she was being controlling, so I broke up with her.”

“Man. You look pretty young to be out of high school. Either you’re some kind of prodigy, or this place has a way different school system from my world. And no offense, kid, but you don’t look like much of a prodigy.”

Marcus chuckled, “None taken, and yeah, I guess some things are different. So, uh, how’s your wife? What was the wedding like?”

Lacey grinned. “It was amazing. Don’t tell May I told you this, but she actually started crying at Aaron’s speech. She was so cute.”

“Congratulations. I hope I can find someone like that. And I hope Lauren and Katherine’s wedding is as nice as yours and May’s.”

“I’m sure you’ll find someone.” Lacey assured him, “You’re a pretty nice kid. And I also hope for the best for your friends.”

“Thank you. Hey, by the way, are the squid sisters also agents where you’re from.”

“Yeah, but they think we don’t know. Y’know, your squid sisters look exactly like my squid sisters.”

“Huh. Weird coincidence.”

“Really is. So, um, what’s your name?”

“Marcus. The local agent 4.” He shook Lacey’s hand.

“Nice to meet you, other Aaron. So, agent 8 is agent 3’s girlfriend here?”

Marcus nodded his head, “Yeah. Also, agent 8, Katherine, is my adopted sister.”

“Oh, gotcha. Good for you.” She fell silent, before abruptly gasping in a dull agony.

“Hey, hey, it’s alright, okay?” Marcus grabbed Lacey by the shoulders, looking into her eyes. “You’re go-we’re going to be fine.”

Marina fired a burst of electricity into the air, groaning when Taylor effortlessly floated away from it. “Face it, Ida! I’m all-powerful now!” She threw up a glowing hand, causing a section of the road to burst open with an orange glow. The entire group was thrown aside by the disruption.

“Get up!” Marie commanded, using her charger to support herself, “We keep fighting, no matter what!”

“That’s it, just keep fighting. It won’t save you from my wrath!” Taylor dove at the ground, fist outstretched and radiating pure magic. Before she could make impact, something struck her from behind, pushing her onto her back. “Who dares?!” Taylor stood up on the ground.

Lauren and May stood in front of the group. “We dare, Taylor.” Lauren pointed at her, “We dare to kick your face in!” May charged at her, swinging the roller in her hands. 

Taylor effortlessly caught the roller in her hand. “You’re pathetic.” She tossed May into the wall of a nearby apartment complex.

“Is it just me, or does she seem stronger?” Lauren wondered aloud.

“Yeah, maybe. Ow.” May groaned, “Gah. My ba- oh, my back.”

“Of course I’ve gotten stronger! I’ve been getting stronger ever since I lost the mask!” She tossed a sphere of orange magic, forcing May to jump out of the way.

“Guys, any ideas?”

“What if we combine our weapons?” Marie suggested.

“No good; she won’t give us enough time.” Lauren vetoed.

“She’s right. I won’t.”

“You stay out of this, Taylor!”

Taylor launched herself into the air, before rocketing back down and punching the road. A wave of orange light radiated from her fist, upturning the road around her.

“We… we need to retreat, now!” Lauren struggled to her feet, stumbling on the uneven ground. The group sprinted away from Taylor.

She grinned, watching them run below her. “Like a bunch of ants.” She remarked, telekinetically upturning small sections of pavement, “Keep running, little ants. Let’s see how you handle the magnifying glass.”

Aaron and Katherine cleared piles of rubble, until they could clearly see Marcus and Lacey below them, with a support beam pinning the older octoling’s leg to the sidewalk. “Guys!” Marcus blushed, trying to avoid looking directly at Aaron.

“Lacey!” Aaron jumped down to his friend. “Hold on, I’ll get you out.” He attempted to lift one end of the support beam, and found himself unable to move it. “Can… someone… help me out here?”

“What? Oh, uh, right!” Marcus shot up to help his counterpart. With no small amount of effort, they eventually managed to move the support beam off of Lacey’s leg. She gasped in pain and relief, while Katherine helped her stand up.

Lacey’s knees were covered in a disgusting mix of purple ink-blood and black and blue bruises. “Tha-” She yelped, “Thanks, guys.”

“We need to get her to the infirmary.” Katherine decided, “I don’t have any medical supplies on me. Marcus, can I borrow your transporter?”

“Yeah, here.” Marcus tossed the device to Katherine.

She placed it on Lacey’s wrist, entering the code for her while explaining, “I’ll call Sheldon and tell him to treat your legs. The rest of us will stay here and deal with Taylor.”

“Got it.” Lacey disappeared.

“So, that’ll take her to your base?” Aaron asked.

“Yeah. It just disassembled her molecules to reassemble them at our headquarters.” Katherine explained.

Aaron’s hands flew onto his face. “Disassembled her what?!”

“Oh, relax. It’s just a bit tingly the first few times.” Katherine dialed her communicator, “Sheldon, did you get a visitor? Yeah, she’s May’s wife. No, she’s not an agent 8. We were fighting Taylor, and I had to send her to you. Oh, no, just give her some painkillers and- yes, put her in the infirmary! Alright, thanks.” She turned off her device. “Okay, agent 4s. You two ready to get back in the game?”

“I have no idea what’s going on, but yeah. That psycho hurt my friend. The one who got me to change my perspective on octolings in the first place.”

“Yes!” Marcus practically yelped.

“Uh, right.” Kat rolled her eyes, before her communicator started beeping. “Captain? What is it? Right, I’ll tell them.” She turned off her communicator. “Taylor disappeared. We’re retreating back to base. And then Aaron can elaborate on that last part.”

“Got it.” Marcus nodded.

Aaron shrugged agreeably, “Yeah, sure.”

The three turned on their transporters.

The group appeared in the headquarters of the New Squidbeak Splatoon. Aaron looked around, before tapping Callie on the shoulder. “Where’s your infirmary?”

“Down the hall. You can’t miss it.” She pointed in the appropriate direction.

“Thanks.” Aaron ran over to the infirmary. Lacey was lying on a hospital bed, letting Sheldon wrap gauze around her legs. May was standing over her, rubbing comforting strokes into her tentacle-hair.

“Hey, Lacey, you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine.” Her voice was quiet, simultaneously pained and contented.

Sheldon looked up at Ame from the stool he was standing on. “It shouldn’t take too long to fix her legs. Once I finish applying the bandages, she’ll just have to wait.”

“Okay, thanks.” Lacey scanned the infirmary, “This place looks way different.” 

“Yeah, apparently the old base got destroyed in this timeline.” Aaron explained. “Oh.”

After a few more seconds, Sheldon jumped off the stool. “Okay. Now just stay there for a while.”

“Understood.” Sheldon walked out, leaving the cephalings on their own.

“How are you guys holding up?” Lauren asked as she walked into the infirmary.

“Alright.” Lacey shrugged, “I should be back up in a couple of minutes.”

“Good.” Lauren smiled, sitting down while May bent over to kiss Lacey on the forehead. “You guys mind if we talk for a while? Being fellow agent 3s?”

“Sure.” Aaron noted, “Although I’m actually an agent 4.” He leaned forward to ask Lauren, “But what about that Marcus kid? Isn’t he this world’s agent 4?”

“Yeah, he’s out in the base.” Lauren explained. She gestured to her older counterpart, “So, May, tell us about yourself. What’s it like being agent 3 where you’re from?”

“Lonely, at first. I used to live in Melani county, until I made one single mistake that turned my own best friend against me, so I moved to Inkopolis. After a while, I joined the New Squidbeak Splatoon and helped capture Octavio. You guys all know who that is, right?”

The entire room nodded.

“Right. So, for months, I was living on my own and going out of my way to not make any connections. I figured if I ever got close to anyone, they’d find out what I did in Melani and I’d just be on my own again.” She looked down as Lacey gripped her forearm. She returned the grip.

“What about Callie and Marie? Weren’t you close to them?” Lauren asked, “Or are Callie and Marie not agents 1 and 2 in your dimension?”

“No, they are. We’re just, y’know, not actually friends. Strictly professional.”

Lauren nodded,“Oh. Yeah, I, um, I guess that kind of makes sense. It’s just that I’ve always thought of the group as sort of like a second family. Especially since my girlfriend is also a member.”

“Ah. That sounds nice.”

“Thanks. So, anyway, how’d you meet? Must be a pretty juicy story; a civilian octoling hooking up with agent 3?” Lauren grinned, leaning forward.

“Well, even after I took down Octavio, the octarians still kept stealing the zapfish every once in a while. On one of my missions, I accidentally injured an octoling soldier.” She inhaled, slowly and sharply through her nose, gently rubbing Lacey’s side, before continuing, “I couldn’t just let her die. The octolings were under hypnotism from the octarian higher-ups, not acting of their own free will. I don’t really know what I was thinking at the time, but I brought her home with me.”

“And it turned out to be the best thing that ever happened to me.” Lacey gazed lovingly into her wife’s eyes. “Well, aside from getting gored by spikes and the multiple days’ worth of mind-numbing agony. I could’ve done without that, but still.”

“Yeah. The whole thing was, um, complicated, I think would be the right word for it. I nursed Lacey back to health over time, but I still thought of her as lesser. It wasn’t until I learned her name that I started thinking of her as a friend. She helped me evaluate my choices, and at some point, I helped her get outside the apartment. I let an octoling into Inkopolis, kept her disguised and hidden, showed her around, and I trusted her, when everyone else thought that octolings were either the enemy or went extinct after the great turf war. I thought that if anyone found out, then Lacey and I were both dead. So of course, Aaron here… wait, is it okay if I tell her?”

Aaron glanced away from the group. “Sorry. You can tell her.”

“Thanks. Okay, so, Aaron found out. He despised everything about the octarians, and I still don’t know why. When he found out that Lacey was an octoling, I thought he was going to shoot her right then and there.” She took a breath.

“I just thought they were monsters. All four of my grandparents had siblings who were killed in the great turf war, so that’s how I was raised. Same story with pretty much everyone in my hometown. I’m sorry.”

Lacey turned to look at him. “It’s okay. That’s all in the past, right?”

“Yeah. Thanks for being so forgiving.”

“You’re welcome. May, you wanna keep going, hon?”

“Oh, right. Sure. Okay, so, I told Aaron that Lacey and I were dating, and he disappeared. I thought it was all over for both of us, but over time, he got to know Lacey for my sake.” She smiled, “I can’t even tell you how much that meant to me.”

“Congrats on making it work out.” Lauren shook the older agent 3’s hand. “And now onto something else…” Lauren grinned, rocking side to side mischievously. “Aaron, do you have someone at home?”

Aaron blushed, nodding. “Yeah. There’s this guy named Anthias. I’ve asked him on a date, but he hasn’t answered yet. I’ll let him make the decision on his own time, and hope for the best. He used to hate octolings, but Lacey helped him change, just like me.” The young adult smiled. “I hope he’s alright.”

There was a frantic knock on the door. “Come in!” Lacey yelled.

Marcus walked inside the infirmary, holding his cell phone. “Guys, Whinter just called me from Melani! Taylor’s there, and she’s Tayloring all over the place!”

“Taylor’s a verb now?” Lauren asked, “And more importantly, what’s she doing in Melani?”

Marcus slapped his hands to his thighs. “Probably because it’s where I broke up with her.”

“Good point. Now, what’re we waiting for?” Lauren stood up, “Let’s go already!”

“Yeah, and then we can get back to our world.” Lacey stood up. “Oh, that was quick.”

“Are you sure you’re okay?” May asked, gently holding Lacey’s sides..

“I’m fine. Thanks for worrying.” She kissed her wife on the lips.

“Hey, I can’t help it, Lace. You just bring out that side of me.” She playfully lifted the octoling into her arms.

“May, stop! You’re embarrassing me!” She protested between laughs.

“Uh…” Marcus looked over at the wall, “So, are we gonna…”

“Yeah.” May set Lacey down. “We’re ready.”

“Come on, team.” Aaron threw his fist into the air, “We’ve got a teenager to beat senseless!”

“Come on, let’s get the others.” Lauren decided.

Before Marcus could follow the agent 3s out of the infirmary, Aaron stopped him. “Hey, kid, can I talk to you for a minute?”

“Oh!” Marcus squeaked, “Y-yeah! Sure! Of course!”

Aaron chuckled. “Man, I knew it.”

“Knew? Knew what? There’s nothing to know.” Marcus stammered, nervously playing with his tentacle-hair.

“Come on, Marcus. I’ve seen you blushing and constantly looking away from me. You have a crush on me, don’t you?”

“Uh…” Marcus’s eyes darted left and right, before his shoulders slumped forward. “Yeah. I guess so. Sorry.”

“Hey, it’s alright, kid. I can’t exactly blame you for falling for me.” He spread his arms out, grinning, before resuming his more serious demeanor. “But seriously, there’s nothing wrong with you. It’s just that I‘m in my 20’s and you’re, what, 14?”

“Hey, I’m 15!” Marcus yelled defensively, his face flushed green.

“Exactly. Besides, we’re from two different universes. You know what they say about long-distance relationships.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know.”

“Relax.” Aaron patted the top of Marcus’s head. “You’re nice, and you’re a cute kid. I’m sure you’ll find someone better than Taylor.”

Marcus smiled. “Yeah I will, with standards that low. Thanks, though, Aaron.”

Aaron gently punched Marcus on the shoulder. “Hey, us agent 4s have to stick together, right?”

Katherine showed up in the doorway. “You ready, bro? We’ve gotta go fight your abusive ex!”

“Count me in. Try to keep up, will ya Aaron?”

Aaron grinned, “Oh, you’re on, mini-me.”

Whinter vaulted off a bench, barely avoiding the lightning that reduced it to flames. A section of the street lifted out of the ground directly under Clementine, forcing her to jump off and onto the grass next to him. Lauren, May, Marcus, Aaron, Katherine, and Lacey all teleported nearby.

“Hey man!” Clementine ran up to the younger agent 4. “Brought some new friends?”

“Yeah, long story.” He pointed at the newcomers, “To keep it short, Taylor destabilized the dimensional barrier, and they’re a different agent 4, agent 3, and agent 3’s wife. Not an agent 8 though.” 

“Oh.” Whinter shrugged. “Of course.”

“Stop ignoring me!” Taylor screeched, throwing spears of black ice at the group. “Scatter!” Lauren ordered. The group sprinted in a loose semicircle, leaving the foot-long ice spears to embed themselves in the ground, spreading black ice within a radius of a few inches.

Marie tossed a hero charger DX to Clementine, while Callie passed a hero roller DX over to Whinter. Clementine and Marie both fired at Taylor, only for their plasma to dissipate within a few feet of her.

May tossed a weapon over to Aaron. “What kind of hero shot is this?”

“It’s a DX model.” Lauren explained, "May was using a crazy-outdated version. These can shoot plasma."

"They what now?" Aaron startled at the burst of light and energy that shot out of his weapon. “Wow. This just keeps getting weirder and weirder.”

“You’re telling me.” May agreed, shooting plasma.

Taylor used discs of orange light to block every strike as she descended upon the agents. “It’s nice to be back in Melani after all these years. Whinter, Clementine, long time no see.”

“Not long enough, if you ask me.” Whinter snarled. Taylor threw her magic discuses so they cut through the pavement like mystic buzzsaws. They weaved through the ground in random paths, forcing the agents to dodge and weave away from them.

“Guys! Let’s try combining our weapons!” Marcus recommended.

“We can do that?” Aaron questioned.

“Yeah, just put your weapon on mine.” Marcus held out his splatling. Aaron briefly hesitated before attaching his hero shot to the side, his eyes widening at the distinct clicking noise. “Don’t you just love that sound? Ready now? We just need to wait-”

“Why are you calling the shots?” Aaron demanded.

“Because I’m the agent 4 of this world! Hey, watch out!” The mystic buzzsaw barreled into them, knocking them onto the ground with their weapons disassembled.

“Ow.” Marcus groaned, “You okay?”

“No.” Aaron groaned. His lower leg was covered in a viscous blue liquid, seeping out of a sizable cut in his knee.

“Damn it!” Marcus ran over to his counterpart, supporting his head and legs in both hands.

“Man, you’re surprisingly strong for someone so scrawny.”

“Wow, thanks. I’m a splatling user.” Marcus raised his voice, “Kat! You’re on med duty!”

“Got it!”

“Watch out!” Aaron pointed behind Marcus, where the mystic saw had turned course towards them less than 2 feet away. “Ah, nuts.” Marcus sprinted towards the saw. He held his splatling sideways with both hands to block its path, digging his heels into the ground. The blade slowed down slightly, gradually digging into the weapon. “Someone! I could use some help here!”

Katherine ran up to them, while Lacey slammed her hero shot DX into the saw alongside Marcus. “Thanks!”

“Don’t talk.” Lacey pushed forward, widening her stance, “Save energy.” Marcus did the same.

Nearby, Katherine started applying disinfectant to Aaron’s leg. “How’re you so good at this?”

“I dunno. I guess it just comes naturally to me. But trust me, I’ve done this before.”

“But you’re a teenager.”

Katherine smiled at Aaron. “A teenager who’s done this plenty of times. Now hold still. This is where the gauze comes in.”

A few dozen feet away, Pearl attached her dualies to either side of Marie’s charger, with Callie’s folded roller and Marina’s opened brella attached to the front. The brella shield spun at blinding speeds, warping the air around it as lightning sparked at the edges. A massive sphere of plasma shot out of the weapons, annihilating the buzzsaw in a single blast.

Marcus and Lacey were launched backwards in the process. "Thanks, girls. Little warning next time?" Marcus called over.

Marie yelled, "Sorry!"

"On the bright side, Aaron should be fine now." Katherine helped them stand up. 

"Thanks." Lacey noted.

"Don't thank me yet; there's still one left!" Katherine pointed at the other saw, slicing through the ground as it barreled towards them. "Okay. You three ready to try this again?" Marcus asked.

“You know it, bro!” Katherine excitedly agreed.

"Sure, why not?" Aaron shrugged.

"Yeah, let's go for it." Lacey decided. They combined their weapons, with Katherine’s dualies attached to the sides of Lacey’s hero shot DX, and Ame’s weapon of the same type attached to the top of Marcus’s splatling. “Wait, shouldn’t we combine them all?”

“We can’t do that with weapons of the same type.” Kat vetoed.

“That’s dumb.”

“Agreed. Now fire!”

The pair of octolings, and the pair of inklings, fired two bursts of plasma at the mystical construct, causing it to shatter out of existence. "That's better." Aaron grinned.

A glowing orange rope appeared around Marcus's neck, yanking him backwards until he was facing Taylor dozens of feet in midair. "I'll cut a deal with you, Marky. You agree to go out with me, and I'll let everyone else go. Let’s just put this whole thing behind us and start over."

Marcus grasped at the construct as it tightened around his throat. “Taylor! How many times do I have to tell you…” His face started to turn blue, and he gasped, “I’m not into this stuff?!”

Taylor grinned. “I know. Just figured I’d make sure.” Bolts of electricity traveled down the orange line into Marcus’s skin, causing him to writhe and scream in agony. He blacked out repeatedly as he grabbed the mystical line connecting him to Taylor. He struggled to maintain his grip, his hands electrocuted and burning, until he was able to yank the glowing rope.

Taylor lost her concentration, allowing the construct to fall off of Marcus's neck. He struggled to stay awake even as he fell through the air, his back facing the pavement far below him. He managed to fire a small amount of ink from his splatling at the ground, and shapeshifted at the last possible second.

Marcus emerged in his humanoid form, staggering and gasping for air, rubbing at his sore and reddened throat.

“Mark!” Lauren ran up to him, before catching herself and standing ramrod-straight. She cleared her throat, “Agent 4. Can you keep going?”

“What, back down from Taylor of all things?” He grinned, despite being nearly hunched over and breathing heavily, “You don’t even have to ask.” He turned around to watch as Taylor slowly descended, until her feet touched the ground.

“Well well well, looks like team bleeding ink is together again at long last.” She clapped, slowly and mockingly. “Gotta say, I never expected our reunion to go like this.”

“Team bleeding ink?” Aaron rolled his eyes, “Seriously?”

“We were 14; it sounded cool at the time.” Whinter argued.

“Dude, that is the most over-the-top edgelord-”

“Save it, Taylor.” Lauren interrupted Aaron. She stepped towards the younger girl. Despite Taylor offhandedly blocking every shot, she continued firing. “As the captain of the New Squidbeak Splatoon, I can’t let you keep going. Turn yourself in, or I won’t hesitate to use force.”

Taylor laughed, “What? You’re going to kill me? A child?”

“Don’t start with me, monster!” Lauren screamed, “You’re an abusive sociopath, going out of your way to hurt everyone around you! I don't care how old you are! You're unforgivable!” She fired a burst of plasma that Taylor caught in the palm of her hand.

Taylor turned the energy in her hands, causing it to grow and spark with red electricity. “So what if I’m unforgivable? With this power, who needs forgiveness?! I’ll kill everyone who ever wronged me!” She tossed the plasma at Lauren. She barely managed to dodge to the side of the shot.

It exploded inches away from her, red sparks striking her in the chest and legs, knocking her hard onto the road. She groaned as she got up to all fours, one eye practically forced shut, her limbs occasionally jerking from the electricity. "C'mon, Yonshi." Lauren stood up, arm wrapped around her torso, "Didn't your parents ever teach you to respect your elders?"

Taylor's eyes glazed over. Dark magic manifested around her fists, trails of electricity sparking up and down her forearms. "Don't you dare mention them! Those monsters abandoned me! I spent years living on my own, my aunt and uncle only showing up for a week once, maybe twice a year if I was lucky! I raised myself! I made myself who I am! Everything I have, I earned myself!” She launched forward, punching Lauren in the stomach hard enough to launch her backwards.

Lauren flew an inch above the ground for a dozen feet, until she slammed into a brick wall hard enough to dent it. She gasped in pain before losing her breath entirely. She fell limply to the ground, with yellow ink-blood pooling around her.

“Lauren!” Katherine ran over to her. She cradled her girlfriend’s unconscious body.  "No, no, please no, this can’t be happening. I can’t lose you again.”

Marcus yelled at Taylor, “So that’s what this is all about?! Your parents weren’t there, so that’s your excuse to be a monster?!”

“Yes!” She levitated dozens of feet above the ground. "Myers! What do you think I’ve been doing here? Just mindless destruction?"

Marcus shrugged, “Yes.”

“Yeah, well, I found something in your bedroom after we met up in New Sardine.” She pulled a slip of paper out of her pocket, allowing it to drop to the ground.

“You were in my room? Do you have any idea how creepy that is, you little pervert?” Marcus picked up the card. “Oh no.”

“Don’t tell me.” Aaron deadpanned, “That’s the card that takes you to alternate dimensions, isn’t it?”

“Yeah.” Marcus breathed out, “We need to retreat. Now.”

“Taylor! Why are you doing this?!” Clementine yelled, “Why are you trying to destroy the town?”

“How stupid are you? This is the town where my parents abandoned me, where I practically lived on my own for years on end, where I thought I found someone I could trust, only for him to toss me aside like wet trash!”

“Yeah, because you are wet trash!” Marcus confirmed, “You were the one who cheated on me, Taylor! That was your mistake!”

Taylor ignored her ex-boyfriend, instead speaking the incantation, “ Magna bibliotheca ad centrum omnium, aperta tibi ad me! ”

The cracks in the ground glowed a warm blue. A deep, low humming emanated from underground. Mystical energy poured upwards, coalescing in the sky. The entirety of Melani county was pushed upwards by the cracks widening and the thaumaturgic energy pouring out of it, reducing buildings to dust and splitting the county into multiple sections.

Katherine frantically continued wrapping bandages around Lauren’s entire body. She yelled over, “We need to get out of here!”

“No.” Lauren put a hand on her shoulder. She stood up shakily. “It’s too late to retreat.” She watched as Taylor floated through the massive Way overhead. “We need to follow her.”

“Not in your condition.” Marie insisted.

“I’m fine, agent 1!”

“No, she’s agent 2.” Callie corrected her, “I’m agent 1.”

“Whatever!” Lauren took a few steps forward, until her legs stopped shaking. “May, Lacey, Aaron, you three ready to show Taylor what six agents can do?”

“I’m technically not an agent, but I’m in!” Lacey raised her fist.

“Yeah. The sooner we get this over with, the better.” May confirmed.

“Besides, we can’t just let that weirdo run rampant wherever that is.” Aaron gestured to the Way.

Lauren pointed at the other agents. “We’ll go through that Way to stop Taylor from being Taylor. The rest of you, stay behind and help the civilians.”

“Yes, sir.” Callie nodded.

Aaron, Marcus, Lacey, Katherine, Lauren, and May turned to look at the blue Way. “So, how do we get up there?” Lacey wondered aloud.

“We’ll shoot you.” Marie replied casually.

“What the hell, Marie?!”

“No, no, we’re going to launch you in your squid forms. Octo form’s in your and Kat’s cases.” Clementine explained, “Just get on the tips of our chargers, and we’ll launch you into the portal.”

“Yeah, even you can’t miss a target that big.” Marcus grinned.

“Very funny, Myers.”

“I’m kidding, guys.” Marcus assured, “Clementine’s one of the best charger shots I know.”

“But not as good as me though, right?” Marie clarified. After a few seconds of Marcus hesitating, she scoffed, “Biased. Now come on. Let’s do this.”

The six agents ran over to the rest of the group. “Sorry. Our weapons…” Marina gestured to her brella and Pearl’s dualies, “...aren’t really made for long-range shots.”

Pearl shrugged, “Well, at least we blew up that saw-thing.”

Roughly half of the group shifted into their cephalopod forms. Marcus attached himself to Clementine’s charger, Katherine and Aaron placed themselves on either end of Callie’s roller, Lacey and May wrapped her tentacles around Marie’s charger, and Lauren readied herself on the end of Whinter’s roller. “Ready, team?” Marie ordered, “Aim…” The four angled their weapons at the Way. “...Fire!”

The agents found themselves in an aisle between two bookshelves of incalculable heights that stretched into the distance, while the Way filled the aisle behind them. “What is this place?” Aaron craned his neck in a failed attempt to see the top of the bookshelves.

“The Wanderer’s Library.” Marcus explained, “This place has all the information in existence, and since it’s at the center of the multiverse, that also means it’s a hub world that can access any dimension. Whatever Taylor’s trying to do here, we can’t let her damage this place.”

“Uh… yeah… understood.” Lacey scanned around, “So, you guys have been here before?”

“Oh, yeah.” Marcus confirmed, “A couple years ago, we got roped in with this group called the Serpent’s Hand, and one of them gave me the Wanderer’s Library card. And then we got involved in a massive interdimensional battle against an elder god called the Scarlet King, who tried to destroy the multiverse. It was a whole thing.”

“Sounds like a hell of a story. Like, a novel with a chapter count in the 60’s.” Lacey turned to look back at the Way, before facing forward. “Okay. Let’s do this.”

“That’s the spirit.” Lauren gestured away from the gap in reality. “Now come on. Only one way to go, team.” They walked through the aisle.

“So, how exactly do we find Taylor?” Katherine wondered aloud, “It’s not like there’s the usual trail of death and destruction for us to follow. Plus, this is a big place.”

“I’m sure we’ll find-” Marcus was interrupted by an enraged scream in the distance. “See? What’d I tell ya?”

Taylor floated above the floor of the Wanderer’s Library, dozens of books flying around her with their pages turning at blinding speeds, creating a cacophony of paper. “No, no, no! Where is it?!” She screamed in blind rage, manifesting an orange glow around the books that caused them to crumble into dust.

“And what exactly are you looking for?”

She looked down at Marcus, Lauren, and Katherine, with their combined weapons aimed at her.

“Oh, of course. I should’ve figured you three would follow me. Always playing the heroes.” Three bursts of plasma exploded on her back simultaneously, causing her to fall to the ground while yelping in pain and alarm, “What?!”

Lauren grinned. “Who said there were only three of us?”

Aaron, May, and Lacey ran past Taylor to rendezvous with the other three.

“You little…” Taylor stood up, generating red lightning around her hands. “Fine! I’ll just kill you all, and then I’ll figure out how to open a Way out of here!”

“And then what?” Aaron yelled, “You’ll take over the multiverse?”

“What?” Taylor cocked her head to the side, genuinely taken aback. “No, of course not! What, are you stupid or something? I don’t want to control anything! Just imagine dealing with all that paperwork, and the rebellions… If I couldn’t handle being class president, then how exactly could I govern all of existence?!”

Katherine looked over at Marcus. “She was class president?”

“It was not a good election. The choices were either her, or the kid who thought the great turf war was a myth perpetuated by the government to sell more bread loaves.”

Taylor threw a sphere of scarlet lightning at the agents, forcing them to jump out of the way. Marcus fired a blast of plasma the second he landed on the ground, only for Taylor to slap it away with an inkbrush she generated from nonexistence.

“I’ll kill all of you!” She threw out a dozen small, glowing orange knives. They exploded on impact, throwing the agents into the air before they landed on the ground, struggling to breathe or stand up.

“I’ll finally have my revenge on you, Marcus. All of you. I’m going to slaughter every agent 4 in the multiverse!” She held out her hands. Orange ropes extended from her fingertips, one splitting into two at the halfway mark, each wrapping around one of the agents, dragging them into the air with their arms pinned to their sides. They kicked at nothing, while Katherine manipulated one of her dualies despite her arm being restrained. She aimed it straight downwards while keeping her eyes on Taylor. The inkling clenched her fists, tightening the constructs around the group.

Katherine swapped the dualie into dagger mode, yelping in pain at the way she was forced to maneuver her fingers. “Sorry, Taylor.” She threw the dagger upwards by flicking her wrist, severing the rope and allowing her to fall towards Taylor. She raised her arm, tearing the mystical constructs off of herself, and simultaneously grabbing her dagger by the hilt while it rotated upwards at the start of her descent. “...you just couldn’t…” She shifted her other dualie into a second dagger, slicing Marcus and Lauren’s ropes simultaneously. “...make the cut!” She slashed her dagger across Taylor’s face.

While Taylor screamed in pain, Marcus, Lauren, and Katherine fell past her. “Thanks, Kat!” Lauren turned around in midair, firing plasma that severed May, Lacey, and Aaron’s restraints. Taylor glared at them, her half-flayed face dripping with purple ink-blood.

“I don’t know what’s more painful: this cut, or that pun.” A double-helix of electricity, one line orange and the other red, traveled from her hand up the handle of her inkbrush like the serpents of a caduceus, before firing a radiant beam of multicolored light at the three.

“Combo! Now!” Lauren ordered. She effortlessly combined their weapon with the Myers siblings’, firing a massive bolt of plasma from midair. The burst of light and energy tore through the beam fired by Taylor’s inkbrush, until it slammed into her. The other agents fired ink from their weapons at the ground, landing in the puddles in their cephalopod forms.

Taylor’s back struck a shelf, knocking several dozen books loose. “That’s it! If I have to tear this place apart, then so be it!” She raised an open, glowing palm, causing hundreds of small sections of the Wanderer’s Library floor to levitate.

“Now that I’ve got an infinite canvas to work with, let’s see if I can’t find any inspiration!” She telekinetically dragged a book over to herself. “Oh, this looks promising.” She ripped out the pages without touching them, forming them into a wall of paper in front of herself. A grin nearly split her face in half as she scanned the pages. “Hell yeah. Now this I can work with.” She flew over to one of the floating platforms, painting it with her inkbrush.

“What’s she doing?” Aaron wondered aloud.

“Oh no. Taylor got involved with a magic artist from another dimension a couple years back.” Marcus explained, “She picked up some of his magic. Don’t let her draw anything!”

“Got it!” Aaron fired a series of plasma bolts. Taylor swiped her arm, creating a translucent red dome around her platform.

“Okay, new plan.” Lauren decided, “We need to make three weapon combos and aim them at the exact same spot- oh crudcakes!”

Orange energy rose and expanded outwards from Taylor’s platform, until the dome exploded, the shards disappearing as they flew outwards.

The orange glow coalesced into a massive hybrid, consisting of the upper half of a woman, the lower half of a dragon, and a scorpion’s tail, carrying a chain wrapped around her arm. Her skin was a mottled green, her head and feet were covered in nests of venomous serpents, her claws were sharp and curved, and the heads of dozens of predators appeared and disappeared randomly where the two halves connected.

“What is that thing?!” Lacey screamed in pure horror.

“Campe!” Taylor yelled, “Guardian of Tartarus, arise!” Campe roared, the deep and guttural sound causing the bookshelves and platforms to shake, knocking dozens of books into the void between dimensions.

“Okay, good news: Katherine and I fought and killed that thing once.” Marcus explained, “Bad news: we had to use a giant robot and a divine superweapon from another universe, and those were both destroyed a few months ago.”

“Of course.” May groaned.

“Campe.” Taylor floated beside the monster’s head, pointing at Marcus, “Bring him to me. Kill the rest all you want.” Campe lashed her chain dozens of feet in front of herself, wrapping it around Marcus and yanking him towards herself. The chain unwrapped itself, leaving him floating in midair by telekinesis.

“Perfect.” Taylor flew over to Marcus, kicking him in the stomach. She generated a red aura around her hand and a nearby platform, turning it onto its side by curling her fingers inwards, causing Marcus to slam his back into it. She closed the gap between them in less than a second, the platform returning to its position.

Taylor wrapped her hands around Marcus’s neck, striking his head against the floor with every word, “Why…are…you…still…breathing?!”

“You… just don’t get it… do you?” Marcus gasped out. His eyes were swollen shut, half his teeth were knocked out, and deep purple bruises covered his entire body.

“What?” Taylor snarled, “What is there to get?!”

Marcus swallowed, his throat sore from Taylor’s vice grip. “As long as you’re still around…as long as there’s anyone who can threaten my family…” He clenched his fist, arms outstretched past Taylor’s field of view. “...I can’t be bothered to die!” He punched her in the unmarred half of her face, and kneed her in the leg, causing her to release him.

Aaron kicked Taylor from behind, knocking her onto the platform. He helped Marcus stand up, each holding an arm. “Thanks… man.” Marcus trembled.

“I can’t believe you survived that.” Aaron remarked, “Not bad, kid. But seriously, ‘I can’t be bothered to die’?”

Marcus shrugged, causing himself to wince, “Hey, I was improvising.”

“Stop ignoring me!” Taylor swiped her arm in front of herself while on her back, launching the agent 4s into the air. She stood up, psychically hurtling a platform towards them from in front.

Okay, try not to have a heart attack, kid.”

“What?! Why?”

“Because we’ve gotta go over.” Aaron stepped onto the flat side of the platform, still moving in the opposite direction as it. His next step sent him kicking off the edge, landing on the next platform in their path, while the other continued to fly towards Taylor on sheer momentum alone.

“Pathetic.” She waved her hand out in a circle, creating a half sphere in front of herself. The piece of the floor crashed into the barrier, reducing itself to dust while leaving Taylor unharmed. She held out her arm, reshaping the barrier into a scepter that she tossed at Lauren and Katherine.

They each jumped onto a separate platform, while the one they were on exploded in an inferno. Katherine jumped off her platform just as a lash of Campe’s chain reduced it to a cluster of rocks falling in the void. “Okay Katie, I wasn’t there when you guys fought this thing because of my irrational obsession with keeping my sister from knowing I’m an agent! How dangerous is it?!”

“Seriously?!” Katherine gestured between Lauren and Campe, “Look at it! What do you think?!”

“Well, it never hurts to be sure.” Campe swung her chain at Lauren. She jumped off while her platform shattered, leaving her surrounded by shards of rock. She lashed out her arm, grabbed a particularly long and sharp piece, and plunged it into Campe’s eye.

Campe roared in pain, thrashing her head and flapping her wings, as a viscous orange substance poured out of its eye. Eventually, she managed to throw Lauren off. The piece of stone fell out of her eye, allowing it to reform.

Lauren fell towards another platform, where May caught her out of the air. “Wow! You are surprisingly strong.”

“Thanks.” May released her younger counterpart, while Katherine jumped over to them.

“Lauren! What were you thinking? That was insane! And reckless! And also awesome and really brave and resourceful and kinda hot.”

May giggled while Lauren blushed. “Agent 8, now’s really not the time.”

They heard Marcus yelling from elsewhere, “Guys, Campe and Taylor are more than enough on their own! Whatever you do, don’t let her paint another monster!”

“Taylor’s painting another monster.” Lacey pointed at a floating platform surrounded by a red dome.

“Are you kidding me?!” Marcus yelled, “Stop her!”

The agent 4s combined their weapons as they’d done before. Lauren merged her weapon with her girlfriend’s dualies. Lacey stood on a third platform, rapidly looking between the two groups. “They’ve both got hero shots! Why can’t we combine the same weapons?! Why didn’t I bring a slosher?!”

“There! Fire!” Lauren ordered, pointing at a specific area of the dome. Two bursts of plasma converged, destroying the barrier with a massive explosion.

“That doesn’t matter!” Taylor screeched, “Lord of volcanoes, awaken!” An 8-foot tall humanoid rose from the painting, its entire body made of crimson rock with rivers of lava visibly flowing through it like veins.

“And that thing is…?” Lacey wondered aloud.

“Dammit, that’s Cherufe.” Katherine explained, “Don’t even bother; we can’t hurt it without ice. Just avoid it as best you can.”

“Great, something we can’t even hit. Just what we need right now.” Aaron lamented. Cherufe jumped over to Lacey, the closest one to it. Before she could jump over to another platform, Cherufe created a wall of fire around the perimeter.

May screamed in fear and rage, jumping between platforms. Kampe struck each platform, annihilating it just as May jumped off. Aaron watched her as she jumped down to the middle of the flaming circle. “That idiot. I’m gonna go help them.”

“What’re you gonna do?” Katherine asked her.

“I think I’ve got something. Hopefully.” He jumped off the platform.

Lauren turned to her girlfriend. "We need to stop Campe. Ideas?"

"I- I have no idea! Without the KartMech, we never would've survived that thing last time!"

"Yeah, and the fake David could regenerate too, so even if we can hurt it, it won't stick." Lauren pointed at Campe's fully regenerated eye. Campe roared, flying towards them. Lauren and Katherine braced themselves against the gusts of wind created by her wings. White-hot fire traveled up the length of Campe's chain from her hand. She lashed her weapon, aiming directly at the inkling.

“Lauren!” Katherine tackled her, diving off the platform as it exploded. They fell for a few dozen feet until they hit the next platform down, knocking the breath out of them both. “Lorie…” Katherine groaned, standing up, “...you okay?”

“Yeah.” Lauren stood up, watching Campe flying overhead, “Barely.”

Nearby, May landed between Lacey and Cherufe, surrounded by fire. She fired a series of plasma blasts, knocking Cherufe back with the force of each strike. The flames continued to rise, until May started to hyperventilate. Her arms grew tired from holding her weapon. Cherufe jumped into the air, the inside of its open mouth glowing red and orange.

May dropped her weapon for its weight. She pushed her wife behind herself,  and held her arms out in front of the Cherufe. Her eyes were forced shut by the sweat dripping from her forehead. Her knees shook.

Lacey collapsed onto the ground, trying to stand up. Her hands shook as she held her weapon, firing once and missing entirely before dropping it. “May. Thanks for protecting me… even though I’m a soldier…”

“Yeah.” May inhaled sharply, “Still, you look so happy… when you’re just living. Guess I forgot.”

Something slammed into Cherufe the second it reached the zenith of its jump, knocking it onto the edge of the platform. Aaron landed directly in front of the couple, leaning forward to maintain his balance with her roller outstretched in both hands. “You girls okay?” He wiped the sweat from his forehead.

May and Lacey narrowed their eyes at him. “Seriously?” May deadpanned.

“Never mind. Dumb question.” Aaron ran forward, tearing a shard of rock out of the ground and plunging it into Cherufe’s stomach. He jumped away, hyperventilating from the heat.

The fire demon screeched, falling into the nothing between everything. The edges of the platform fell away, taking most of the fire with them. “Alright, one down, two to go.” He turned to the other two. “Okay, shift into your squid and octo forms.” He gasped, “I’ll launch you.” He pointed with a trembling hand at a platform slightly above theirs.

Lacey stood up, looking between her friend and where he was gesturing. “Aaron, are you crazy? What about you?”

“I’ll figure something out.”

“Like what?!” May demanded.

“I’ll… jump somewhere else.”

May shook her head, “There aren’t any platforms close enough for you to jump to, not in your condition. I doubt you can even throw us in your condition.” She gestured at him as he slumped over, panting.

“Okay. Fair. New plan.” Aaron looked around. “May, how are you feeling right now?”

“I’ve been better, I’ve been worse. Why?”

“Can you throw us with your roller and then jump over to us?”

May squinted at the platform, closing one eye to judge its distance. She kicked her legs out to test them. “Yeah, I think I can manage.” A deafening roar grabbed their attention. They turned to see Campe flying towards them, flaming chain in hand. “No time! Get on!”

Aaron and Lacey shifted into their cephalopod forms, attaching themselves to the ends of May’s roller. She flung them each onto the nearby platform above them, where they reverted to humanoid shape.

“May!” Lacey yelled over the edge, “Come on!”

May nodded. She could feel the gusts from Campe’s wings. She sprinted to the opposite side of the platform she was on. The heads on Campe’s waist snarled at the air. May took a running start. The chain descended upon her. Time seemed to slow down. May could feel every bead of sweat, every muscle screaming in agony, the void threatening to draw her in. She reached the edge and jumped. The chain struck the piece of the Library. The resulting explosion propelled May upwards, onto the platform where Lacey and Aaron stood with Marcus.

“May!” Aaron gasped in relief, “Never do something that reckless again!”

“I make no promises.” May grunted as Lacey hugged her, briefly constricting her. “It’s okay, Lace. I’m still here.”

“Guys…” Marcus pointed at Campe, “...we’re not getting anything done with that thing flying around.”

“Well, how do we stop it?!” Aaron yelled.

“Okay…” Marcus thought aloud, “Maybe if we can cut its wings off, it’ll fall into the void.”

“Got it!” Katherine yelled from another platform, where Lauren was also standing. She jumped off the edge, arms raised and daggers outstretched, screaming as she sliced straight through the skin between Campe’s side and left wing.

Campe roared in agony as her wing fell into the endless nothingness. Katherine landed on a platform below her, near an infinite wall of books floating in the Library. She watched Campe fly in a circle with only one wing to keep her aloft, orange liquid bleeding from her side.

Dozens of feet above her, Lauren watched as Campe’s wing slowly started to grow back. “Great. Just great. Anyone got anything sharp? And I mean really sharp?”

“Maybe this could work.” Marcus picked up a cylindrical, pointed rock from the floating ground. “There seem to be a lot of these just lying around here.”

“Yeah, good thinking.” Lauren took the rock and watched as Campe flew in a circle, trying to keep track of her angle. “Agent 4, tell me when to jump.”

“Wait, which agent 4?” Aaron pointed at himself and Marcus.

“Sorry. I was talking to Mark.”

“What? Why do I have to tell you?”

“Because I’ve seen how observant you can be.”

“Yeah, I can notice stuff, but I don’t know anything about angles! I sucked in geography class!”

“You mean geometry, right?” May clarified.

“Yeah, I sucked at that, too. Point is, Lauren, this is a terrible idea.”

“Well, we’d better do something quick.” Kat pointed downwards, where Campe’s severed wing had grown halfway back.

“Dammit.” Lauren watched Campe, leaning forward before jumping down with a loud drawn-out yell. The stone in her hands pierced through the membranous wing, slicing through it as Lauren continued to fall.

Campe fell into the emptiness, her pained scream echoing until it disappeared along with her, swallowed by nonexistence.

“You little…!” Taylor screamed, floating in midair, “I’ll make you pay for wasting my creation!” A red aura appeared on the platform Lauren was hurtling towards, in tandem with Taylor clenching a glowing red fist. She opened her palm, causing the tiny floating island to explode into a cloud of rocks and dust.

Lauren opened her mouth to scream, only for her voice to disappear in the air. She desperately used her arms to shield her face from the rubble. The second she made it through the cloud, she stretched her arms out to frantically claw at the wall of interdimensional literature. After a breathless second, she grabbed the bottom shelf with both hands.

Taylor floated down with her hands surrounded by a swirling blood red light, watching as Lauren hyperventilated while attempting to pull herself up, legs dangling over the void between dimensions. Lauren turned her head, squinting from the effort. “What… do you want from me?!”

“You idiot. You know exactly what I want!” She raised her arms overhead. The demonic energy pooled into her open palms, coalescing into a single constantly shifting and warping sphere.

Panic immediately overtook Lauren. She could barely see or breathe as she screamed, “ Help me! Somebody, please! Help me! Help me!”

Taylor laughed at the sight in front of her. “Just look at you. Agent 3 of the New Squidbeak Splatoon, reduced to a crying and whimpering child, begging and screaming for help against my new power.”

“No! Please, Taylor, don’t do this! You can just go back to prison! We can take your powers away! You can get some help!” Lauren screamed and sobbed, “Please have mercy! I don’t want to die!”

Taylor raised the magic sphere overhead. “You’ve done too much to me, Lauren. I’m going to enjoy listening to you scream, and watching you fall into the void.”

Katherine tackled her from behind, stabbing her in the shoulder and screaming in rage. “What are you doing, you idiot?! You’re gonna get us both killed!” Taylor screamed, inadvertently releasing the magic strike. It flew off course, exploding on the bookshelf a few feet above Lauren.

“I don’t care!” Katherine embedded her dagger in Taylor’s other shoulder, tightening her grip on the hilts. "You tried to kill my brother, and my girlfriend!" She bent her arms so Taylor fell, with her back turned to the hole she'd blasted into the shelf. Taylor screamed in pain, snarling and biting at the empty air between herself and Katherine. "You've murdered, and kidnapped, and made deals with demons just for your own self-gain!" Katherine screamed, "Absolutely unforgivable!"

Lauren watched from below as they crashed into the hole. “Katie!” She slowly gained a foothold on the bookshelf, breathing sharply from the effort. She climbed up the books, starting slow and building speed over time until she clambered into the alcove where the other two girls had fallen into.

Taylor elbowed Lauren in the stomach, causing her to stumble towards the opening. Katherine ripped her daggers out of Taylor’s skin. Taylor collapsed to her hands and knees, gasping loudly, with purple ink-blood pouring out of her wounds and onto the books that comprised the entire floor.

Taylor closed her eyes, the holes in her shoulders filling with skin until they healed completely. She stood up, her entire body shaking, and manifested plate-sized discs of translucent red and orange energy to shield herself. “Okay… I’ll admit… not bad.”

Lauren and Katherine both took a stance between Taylor and the opening of the makeshift cavern. Kat whispered, “You okay?”

“Yeah. Let’s take her down. Now.”

Katherine shifted her daggers back into dualies, attaching them to either side of Lauren’s weapon. They fired bursts of plasma rapid-fire, Taylor effortlessly blocking each of them with her mystical shields. Each shot sent them an inch back from the recoil, until Lauren realized her heel was hanging out of the edge over the infinite gap. “Kat, stop firing!”

Taylor grinned. “Yeah, don’t kill yourselves for me. Where’s the fun in that?” She threw the shields, aiming the serrated edges at their throats. Lauren and Katherine dodged to either side, leaving the shields to fall out of the cavern.

Lauren ran for a few steps before jumping at Taylor, pushing her to the ground made of books. Taylor punched Lauren in the face, effortlessly sending her flying backwards.

Lauren stood up. Her nose was bent at an awkward angle, swollen and bright yellow. “Okay, in hindsight, I probably should’ve just shot her.”

“Ya think?” Katherine fired plasma from her dualies, forcing Taylor to dodge each shot. Her hands glowed a dark red. She caught a bolt of plasma in each hand and tossed them back at Katherine, each covered in supernatural electricity.

Katherine shifted her dualies back into daggers, slashing the air in an attempt to deflect the magic-enhanced plasma. The first exploded on the blade, throwing Katherine into the air. The second struck her in the leg, knocking her backwards until she’d nearly fallen off the edge. She screamed in pain, clutching her knee while Lauren helped her stand up. “I’m… okay.” She grimaced, teeth clenched.

“No the hell you’re not! We’re not getting anywhere like this.”

“You two…!” Taylor lunged at them, screeching, “Just die already!”

Katherine and Lauren shapeshifted into their cephalopod forms, causing Taylor to dive overhead and float in midair outside the cavern. Lauren dropped a teleport beacon next to herself, and turned her communicator on. “Guys, I've got a beacon set up. We need backup, right now!”

A second later, the other five agents teleported next to her and Katherine. "You two okay?" Marcus asked.

“We’re fine. Mostly.” Katherine replied.

Taylor’s entire body glowed a bright red, all eyes and weapons trained on her. She created five copies of herself, two on her left and three on her right.

Lauren, Marcus, Katherine, May, Aaron, and Lacey fired dozens of plasma bolts. Taylor and each of her copies moved in perfect synchronization, creating shields of mystic energy that effortlessly blocked the agents’ strikes.

“It’s time to create some more monsters!” The original Taylor yelled, before they scattered in six directions.

“Guys, we need to stop them now!” Marcus yelled, “Who knows what they could create?”

“You’re right.” Lauren agreed, “Each of us will go after a different Taylor. Just as soon as we figure out how to get out of here.” Lauren craned her head outside, finding the closest platform slightly to the side and a dozen feet above them. “Okay, we should be able to jump up onto that platform, and then keep going from there.” She jumped out of the cavern, grabbing onto a piece of rock jutting out of the side of the platform. She climbed up on top of the platform, waiting until the others had made it next to her.

“Okay, let’s split up now.” Lauren decided, pointing at six different platforms in front of and above them. The other agents nodded, and went their separate directions.

Lauren jumped across a half dozen platforms, until she encountered Taylor. The ground below them was covered in an orange painting resembling the outline of a humanoid bird. “Oh, no, not again.”

“Exactly.” Taylor raised her inkbrush while holding it horizontally in one hand. “Refuted human, arise!” the outline glowed a bright orange, until a sickly gray monstrosity arose from it.

Its limbs were spindly, its oversized body was supported by inhumanly skinny legs, and its arms resembled oversized chicken wings that terminated into two-fingered pseudo-hands. At the end of a long, curving neck sat a bulbous head with holes for ears. Its face consisted of a misshapen nose, oversized circular black eyes with glowing white pupils, and burnt, blackened skin around unnaturally small and sharp teeth frozen into a rictus grin.

"So, you're familiar with this one?" Taylor asked mockingly.

"Yeah. Fought one back at Innsmouth county a couple years back." Lauren fired plasma at the instance of SCP-3199, only for it to effortlessly dodge the attack with deceptive speed. It vomited a puddle of acid that burned a hole straight through the ground, leaving a sizable window into the waiting void. The anomaly jumped across the hole, while Taylor flew away, laughing. She flew over where May was kicking at Taylor.

Taylor blocked the kick with an open palm, turning to throw May across the platform. “Old man, arise!” The drawing on the ground shone orange.

May rolled her eyes, “Oh, come on. What’s an old man going to do?”

“Oh, trust me. According to what I read, this is no ordinary old man.” A humanoid rose from the ground. Its face was covered in a sadistic, inhumanly wide grin, and its entire body consisted of an acidic sludge as black as shadow. The recreated SCP-106 walked towards May.

“Okay, uh, I can still take you!” She fired her weapon, only for the entity to absorb the plasma. Unharmed, unfazed, it laughed. “No!” She recoiled, falling back. Her weapon fell over the edge and into the nonexistent void.

“I think I’ll leave you to it.” Taylor floated away, erecting a dome around the platform to keep May trapped with the humanoid.

Some fifty feet above them, Lacey stood on a platform where Taylor had painted a massive reptilian monster. “You really don’t stand a chance against this one.” Taylor floated in the air, arms spread wide and inkbrush raised aloft like a scepter. “Even I almost feel sorry for you.” After a second’s pause, she continued, “Oh well, moment’s passed. Hard to destroy reptile, arise!”

The horror rose from the ground with a blinding orange light. It vaguely resembled a massive lizard, taking up half of the entire floating island. Its eyes showed nothing but murderous, omnicidal rage. It opened its mouth, exposing hundreds of razor-sharp teeth as it released a deafening roar.

“Have fun, you two!” Taylor flew off of the platform. Lacey aimed her weapon, arm shaking uncontrollably. “Nope nope nope nope so much nope!” She jumped onto the bottom part of a platform, frantically climbing on top. The replicant SCP-682 effortlessly jumped over to her, causing the entire structure to shake as Lacey screamed in horror.

A few hundred feet away, Katherine held a dagger in one hand and a dualie in the other. “Prototype! Arise!” A humanoid creature lunged out of the orange light. Its emaciated body was an unhealthy gray-brown. Its 2-foot neck was unnaturally skinny, with a single eye rolling inside a perfectly spherical head. Its hands and feet ended in razor-sharp claws half a foot long. “Katherine, meet SCP-001. Or, well, an SCP-001 anyway.” Taylor soared above the void outside the multiverse.

“Oh please.” Katherine scoffed, “I could take this guy in my sleep.” She jumped with her arm outstretched, easily decapitating the SCP-001 copy. “See? Now come on, Taylor! Stop hiding behind your monsters, and fight us for real!” She heard a wet sound behind her. “What the…?” Kat blanched at the sight of the demon’s head slowly regrowing from its twig of a neck, its body rising with uncanny, jerking motions like an old, malfunctioning animatronic. “Okay. Maybe I still need to be awake to take this guy.”

On another platform, Aaron was fighting Taylor. "Alien of the 12 stars armada, arise!" Taylor flew off of the platform, leaving Aaron to fire at her, yelling, "Get back here, you little coward!" He turned around as the orange light solidified.

It was ten feet tall, with a gray body and a bulbous, featureless head. Each side had 12 arms moving independently of one another. “Oh. Great. Yeah, that- that’s just- what the hell is that?!”

The soldier of Twelve Stars, bane of the Ortothans, lunged at Aaron, forcing him to jump backwards before jumping in the opposite direction, kicking it in the face. It grabbed his leg and threw him into the middle of the platform.

A hundred feet overhead, Marcus fired a burst of plasma that Taylor blocked by manifesting a shield of mystic energy. “Heart of darkness! Arise!”

The small painting on the floor illuminated. A blackened cow heart appeared, with a scorpion’s tail, four spidery legs, and several tentacles writhing in the air. Marcus used his splatling to block SCP-058’s tentacles, while Taylor’s copies flew into their creator, disappearing and leaving only the original behind.

One of the painted heart’s tentacles wrapped itself around Marcus’s unguarded legs. He looked down, startled for a brief moment. “Wait wha-” He yelped as the undead horror dragged him across the ground for a few seconds, burning his skin, before lifting him into the air upside down.

Taylor floated in midair directly in front of him. “When will you learn, Myers? I’ll always be in control. I’ve always been in control. You’ll never escape me. Now, I’m going to ask you one last time.Will you go out with me again, or do I have to kill you?” 

Marcus narrowed his eyes. “Yonshi… why would anyone ever go out with you?! You just want to control everyone around you! If you’re so powerful now, why don’t you fix your face? Because you’re a narcissist with a victim complex?”

Taylor snarled animalistically, before screaming incomprehensibly. Marcus reached out with one hand, pinching the dried, sunken-in eye in the broken half of Taylor’s face.

Taylor screamed in pain, punching Marcus with a glowing orange fist. The sheer force of the impact knocked him out of SCP-058’s grip, sending him falling through the air for several seconds, until he burst through a sorcerous barrier. He landed on the ground, the breath knocked out of him twice over.

“Kid! Are you okay?!”

“Y-yeah. I’m fine. Just gimme a minute.”

“No time!” May dragged Marcus away from the approaching SCP-106.

“Oh great.” Marcus groaned, “This guy again.”

May turned to Marcus. “You know him?”

“Kinda. He terrorized Inkopolis a couple Halloweens back.” Marcus shrugged. “Except it was mostly Lauren and Katherine who actually dealt with him.”

“Yeah, well, any ideas on how to kill it? I lost my weapon.”

“That depends. Do you have a really strong flashlight?”

May rolled her eyes. “Running away it is. Come on!” Marcus and May jumped across the gap onto another platform, leaving SCP-106 behind them.

“Guys, watch out!” Katherine jumped down from somewhere above them, pursued by SCP-001.

“Oh, just what we need.”

“You fought him too?”

“Not really.” Marcus clarified, “I met a shapeshifter, and then they fought each other. We never fought him ourselves.”

May nodded, “Good to know.”

Katherine fired plasma at SCP-001. “Relax, it doesn’t really seem that tough. Except these things can regenerate, apparently, so the only way we can actually kill them is by dropping them into the black hole down there.”

“So, in other words, bad time to lose my weapon fighting that creepy old acid man.”

Katherine’s eyes widened. “Seriously? You fought that guy? Not bad, Pike.”

“Girls, focus!” Marcus fired a blast of plasma at SCP-001. It jumped over the shot, forcing Marcus to hold up his splatling to block its outstretched claws before it could disembowel him. He pushed the splatling, deep scratches etched into its side, directly onto SCP-001’s stomach. “Get clear!” He warned, before firing an explosion of plasma.

The proximity of the blast sent Marcus flying back, Katherine grabbing his arms before he could fall off. He looked down at the platform half a mile below him. “Thanks. Guess I didn’t think that one through, huh?”

“Ya think?!” Katherine yanked him back onto the piece of the Library floor, where SCP-001 was flailing, its hollow painted body gushing orange liquid.

“Now to finish this!” May tackled the humanoid, using her momentum to push it off of the edge. She screamed the whole time as her arms burned from the effort. SCP-001 fell, screeching and regenerating itself, into the void. “Alright!” May rolled her shoulders, “Who’s next?”

“How about them?” Marcus pointed into the middle distance, where Aaron was fighting a Twelve Stars soldier while both jumped across multiple platforms.

“Wait.” Katherine gestured to another direction, where Lauren was fighting an SCP-3199 replica. Lauren fired her weapon directly into the thing’s neck, preventing it from giving birth. The mistake of a bird raised its leg to claw Lauren in the knee, causing her to collapse, screaming, her lower leg covered in yellow ink-blood. "Lauren!" 

Katherine turned back to the others. "You two can help Aaron if you want, but I've gotta protect my girlfriend!" She jumped off the edge, while the agent 4 of one world and the agent 3 of another went in the other direction.

“Sure you don’t want to help them?” May offered.

Marcus shook his head, keeping pace as they jumped between extradimensional gaps, “We fought a bunch of those bird-things a while back. They’re really not that tough. Besides, Katherine knows way more about first aid than I do.”

“Right.” May nodded. The two jumped over the gap, and kicked the Twelve Star soldier in the face, backflipping to land on either side of Aaron.

“Guys! Mark, any idea what this is?”

“Yeah.” The three rolled off to the side to avoid the thing’s flurry of punches, while the ground where they’d been standing was atomized. Aaron combined his hero shot DX with Marcus’s splatling, firing a single burst at the alien’s back. “It’s an alien called Twelve Stars.” Marcus explained, “They usually fight some other aliens called the Church of the Second Hytoth. We fought an entire army of them right before the first time the multiverse nearly collapsed.”

“Oh, cool, good for you.” Aaron fired a few shots of plasma at the charging Twelve Stars soldier, before pausing. “Wait, the first time?!”

The painted extraterrestrial grabbed Marcus in one of its dozens of hands, and tightened its grip, causing him to scream in pain. He desperately swung his splatling into the thing’s blank face, causing it to release him. Lying on his back, he fired a burst of plasma at the thing’s chest. “Well… first time we know of, anyway.”

“Oh. Oh, okay. That’s… utterly horrifying.”

“Yeah, no kidding.” May agreed, “Sorry, guys, I’m not really sure what I can do here.”

“Alright.” Aaron helped Marcus to his feet. “Come on, kid. Two agent 4s; let’s do it.”

“Yeah. I’ll shift, and you throw me.”

Aaron blinked, “What?”

Marcus shifted into squid form. Aaron picked him up by the tentacle, briefly confused. The Twelve Star abomination took a step towards them. Marcus waited patiently, unable to speak.

Aaron’s eyes widened in realization. “Oh, you want me to throw you!” He tossed Marcus at the alien’s face.

Marcus shifted in midair, slamming his splatling into the thing’s face hard enough to crack its head to the side.

Aaron ran over to him, pivoting on one leg to roundhouse kick the horror in the knee. The agents combined their firearms, launching a blast of plasma directly into the living painting.

It stumbled backwards, while May sprinted towards it. She jumped, dropkicking the entity in the chest. “Guys! Let’s push it off the edge!”

Marcus nodded, firing a series of bursts of plasma at the Twelve Star soldier. It swung its fists to no avail, until Aaron and May each grabbed one of its legs, dragging it onto its back.

Marcus jumped up, splatling raised overhead, and slammed it into the monstrosity’s head. “Now! While it’s stunned!” The three each grabbed an arm, yanking on it, all three screaming in agony from the sheer exertion. The Twelve Star soldier stood up, swatting them over to the edge of the platform. They all stood up, vision groggy.

“Okay, new plan.” May widened her stance, one leg in front of the other, arms outstretched to either side. The alien barreled towards them. “Now!” The agent 4s copied May’s stance. As soon as their opponent was close enough, they bent down below its storm of punches, lifting it by the stomach and moving as a single, coordinated entity, to throw the artificial horror into the abyss.

“Wow.” Aaron stated bluntly, “I really didn’t think that would work.”

“To be honest, neither did I.” May concurred, “I was just improvising and hoping for the best.”

“I saw all the Taylors go back into the real one.” Marcus shuddered, “Sorry, just… thinking about multiple Taylors… Anyway, now that there’s only one again, we should gather the others, take out the rest of her monsters, and take the fight to her.”

“Understood.” May nodded.

Marcus placed a teleport beacon on the ground before dialing his communicator, “Guys, can you get over here? We’re back to only one Taylor, so I figure we ought to regroup.”

“Got it.” Katherine replied, “I’ve got Lauren fixed up, and we took care of bird boy.”

“C’mon, Katie, don’t be so humble.” Lauren piped up, “She stabbed it in the knees, and then she pushed it off the edge while she pulled her daggers out at the same time. It was awesome. And yeah, we’ll be right over.”

Lauren and Katherine appeared on the platform. Marcus grabbed Lauren by the shoulders. “You okay?”

“Yeah, I-no time!” Lauren alerted the group, pointing her weapon at Taylor as she levitated above them.

“Look at us, all together again. Now it’ll be so much easier for me to drop you all into the abyss!” She threw out a massive sphere of red energy, forcing the entire group to jump off the platform just as it was atomized. They jumped from platform to platform, each one reduced to the molecular level as soon as they made contact with it, never giving them a second to breathe or think of anything except survival. “Just hold still already! You know you can’t escape me! You can’t win!”

Eventually, they descended into the cavern of the bookshelf Taylor had created earlier. The entire group collapsed, hyperventilating. “Man. Either Taylor really messed this place up…” Marcus groaned, “...or the Wanderer’s Library is really poorly designed. I mean, why is this shelf so deep?”

“Yeah, that is kinda weird.” Aaron agreed, examining the literary floor. “Maybe these books are all just so insanely big that they need a bookshelf this deep?”

Marcus thought for a moment. “Yeah, that tracks. If any place is going to have books that big, it’s gonna be the extradimensional library.”

“Good for you, solving that mystery.” Taylor remarked, floating into the cavern with her arms spread at her sides, hands sparking with supernatural energy. The six agents stood up.

“Agent 4, make us a Way out of here.” Lauren ordered through gritted teeth, just quiet enough that Taylor couldn’t make out what she was saying, “We’ll keep her distracted.”

“Got it.” Marcus agreed.

Lauren, May, Lacey, Katherine, and Aaron charged Taylor simultaneously. Marcus stayed behind, and turned around. He closed his eyes, trying to drown out the sounds of fighting behind him.

Lauren and Katherine combined their weapons and fired mid-sprint. Taylor blocked it with her bare hand. May used the opening to strike her in the mutilated side of her face with an open palm. Katherine plunged her daggers into her back. Taylor backhanded her away, despite the fact that she was screaming in pain.

Marcus concentrated harder. He visualized the streets of Inkopolis. He could feel the air itself parting in front of him. A radiant blue hole opened in the fabric of reality. “Guys! Get her through!”

Katherine grabbed Taylor by the arm, leaning her entire body to the side to throw her towards the Way.

“No! I’m not going back! I’ll kill you-”

Marcus wrapped one arm around her neck from behind, reaching around with the other to punch her in the stomach. With Taylor momentarily incapacitated, Marcus was able to throw her into the Way. “C’mon! Now!” The agents jumped through the Way after Taylor.

A Way opened directly behind Callie, Marie, Marina, and Pearl. "Hey, they're finally back! It's about t-" Pearl was interrupted by Taylor falling through the gateway between universes, knocking the entire group over.

Taylor frantically extricated herself from the tangle of limbs and bodies, facing towards the Way. Seconds later, the group of six jumped through. The Way closed behind them.

The ten agents stood in a single row together, weapons aimed at Taylor as much as they could.

“Everything go well in Melani?” Marcus asked conversationally.

“Good enough.” Callie assured him, “Whinter and Clementine stayed behind while we came back here. You just caught us patrolling for you guys.”

“Enough talk.” Taylor snarled with glowing fists.

Marcus narrowed his eyes. “Agreed.”

Lauren attached her hero shot DX to the side of his splatling. Katherine placed her dualies on the other side, one above the other. The squid sisters placed their roller and charger on the bottom and top of the splatling.

Taylor levitated over the shot, only for Pearl and Marina to combine their dualies and brella, firing another burst of plasma that intercepted Taylor. She yelped, falling to the ground.

“May, where’s your weapon?” Callie pointed at her empty hands.

“It fell into a bottomless void.”

“Right.” Callie dialed her communicator, “Hey, sheldon, we need another roller.” 

“Understood.” A second roller appeared in Callie’s hands. “Oh. Oh no. No no no no!” She fell under the weight of two rollers. “Ow. My everything.”

“Thanks, agent one!” May grabbed one of the rollers. “You okay?”

“I’m good. Yer…” Callie stood up, shaking her head. “You’re welcome. Now come on, let’s get back in the game!” They both sprinted at Taylor as she grew another magic sphere between her hands.

Before she was ready, Callie and May jumped, slamming their rollers into Taylor simultaneously. She yelped in pain, the concentrated sorcery exploding in her face to send her and both agents flying in three separate directions.

“Guys, come on! We need a finishing strike! Wait. I think I’ve got something. I need you guys to distract her real quick.” Lauren ordered.

Marcus fired his splatling. “Can do!” Taylor blinked out of existence, reappearing almost instantly just slightly to the left of the plasma shot. “She can teleport now?!” Taylor’s hand abruptly manifested around Marcus’s neck, her face in front of his. “Yup.” Marcus choked, “She can teleport now.”

Aaron and Lacey both shot plasma at her side from their weapons. “Guys, brace your shoulders!” Katherine called from behind them.

Aaron turned his head to Lacey. “What does that mean?”

Lacey shrugged ambivalently, “I think it means to brace our shoulders.”

Katherine jumped onto both of the other agents’ shoulders, using them as a springboard to somersault in midair. She fired plasma at Taylor’s head from above, forcing her to drop Marcus to the ground while shielding herself.

At the zenith of her jump, Katherine shifted her dualies into daggers, pointing them downwards to stab through the disc of orange light. A millisecond before she would’ve pierced Taylor’s midsection, Taylor swiped her glowing orange arm in front of herself, throwing Katherine a few feet away from herself.

“Oh.” Aaron remarked, “Yeah, that makes sense.”

Marcus bent his knees to his chest and his arms at his sides, kicking Taylor in the stomach while lying on his back. He flipped onto his stomach, standing up and facing Taylor, punching her in the nose.

“Guys, we’re ready! Get over here!” Lauren called, with multiple different weapons at her feet. The others ran over to her.

“Alright captain, what’s the plan?” Marie deferred to the younger girl’s recently-granted authority.

“Okay, we need to-” The ground in front of them exploded, launching them among a shower of concrete debris.

“Here’s some advice: talk faster!” Pearl yelled, causing everyone to cover their ears.

“Okay, first, ow! And second, all-weapon combo! I’ll keep her busy!” Lauren sprinted towards Taylor, firing a series of plasma bursts rapid-fire. Taylor flew around the shots, exchanging spheres of demonic magic and explosive bursts of pure energy.

With Taylor distracted, the group each took a different weapon.

Pearl attached her hero shot DX to the side of May’s inkbrush. Marcus slotted his splatling into Aaron’s slosher. Katherine placed her dualies on either side of the splatling. Callie and Marie attached their respective roller and charger to either side of Marina’s blaster. The inkbrush was placed on the side of the slosher. The blaster was attached to the bottom of the splatling. Lacey slid the handle of her brella into the splatling.

“ Now! ”

The entire group activated their weapons simultaneously. Massive amounts of plasma pooled into the brella, causing it to rotate at blinding speeds. Lightning surrounded the edges of the brella, the wind picking up speed in a localized gale. An explosion of plasma, as large as any of the agents, launched out of the brella, the sheer recoil sending them sprawling onto their backs.

Taylor noticed the sound behind her. “What?” The plasma exploded onto her back, covering Taylor in a blaze of pure energy. She screeched in pain, flung into the wall of an abandoned one-story house. The sheer impact caused the entire concrete building to collapse. By the time the dust cleared, Taylor could no longer be seen.

The agents spent a few seconds catching their breath, standing in a row facing the ruins. “Welp.” Marcus broke the silence, “She’s dead. And nothing of value was lost.”

“That seems kind of harsh.” May argued, “She was still a living, thinking individual. Do you really have to be that callous?”

“I’m sorry; whose archnemesis are we talking about here? Besides, she tried to kill all of us with no remorse for no reason. Screw her.”

“Yeah, he’s kinda got a point.” Aaron shrugged, “That girl was straight up psychopathic.”

“Alright, well, with that little moral quandary out of the way…” Marie interjected, “...we should get you guys back to your own universe. Unfortunately, we had to dismantle our portal a few months ago because of some interdimensional stuff. You’ll have to use the Wanderer’s Library.”

“That’s my cue.” Marcus picked up a sharp piece of rock off the ground, using it to draw runes on the ground from the card he took out of his pocket. “Magna bibliotheca ad centrum omnium, aperta tibi ad me!”

A Way appeared in the air.

Callie, Marie, Lauren, Marina, Marcus, Pearl, Katherine, May, Lacey, and Aaron stood in front of a Way in an aisle of the Wanderer’s Library. “Oh. Oh man.” Marcus panted, “I’ve never opened a Way to somewhere I’ve never been before. Not easy.”

“Thanks, kid.” May walked forward. She Aaron, and Lacey stood in front of the Way.

“Welp. See you guys next crisis!” Pearl waved at them.

“Next?” Aaron rolled his eyes, “What makes you think there’ll be a next crisis?”

Lauren shrugged, “With us, it’s a safe bet.”

“Oh. Hey, kid.” Aaron gestured to Marcus, “Good luck finding the right partner.”

“Thanks, other me.”

“No problem.” Aaron turned to Lauren, “And you. You’re actually not a bad captain. Don’t get me wrong, you’ve still got a ways to go, but you could probably be worse.”

Lauren smiled. “Glad I have your approval.”

Aaron smiled, walking through the portal.

“Yeah, you guys aren’t half bad.” Lacey clasped her wife’s hand.

“Agreed. I’m not sure what sort of monsters and demons you’ve got running around here, but I think it’s safe to say this world is in good hands.” May kissed Lacey on the lips. They walked through the Way, allowing the Way to close behind them.

“You too!” Lauren waved and called after them, “And congrats on the wedding!”

“Alright, then.” Marie shrugged, “Guess that’s it. Let’s go home, everyone.”

“Yup.” Marcus agreed, preparing another Way. The agents walked through, into their own world, to continue defending it with their lives.