Chapter Text
Goggles struggled against his sanitized captors, one octoling holding each arm, keeping him from moving. A group of octarians had taken team blue and Hachi by surprise, and in the confusion Goggles had gotten captured.
As they walked to who knew where, he tried to pull his arms free, in vain. The octolings had grips like steel—he couldn’t even slip out of his clothes to escape, as he would usually do in a situation like this. “What do you want?”
“You should’ve stayed in the blender,” one of the octolings said in a monotone voice. “Your tests proved you and your accomplices possessed the superior DNA Tartar seeks.”
“Superior DNA? What does he want with that?”
“Until you proved that you are too rebellious,” continued the girl, not answering him. “If Tartar is to eliminate the idea of the individual and create the perfect life form, we must not use DNA that is as uncooperative as yours.”
“Eliminate the idea of what?! Create what?!”
The octoling holding his other arm spoke up. “Since your DNA is unusable, you cannot be part of the perfect species. Instead, you will take another role in helping create it.”
“I don’t want to help create it!” Goggles pulled his arms again, with no more success than previously. “Nobody is perfect! But we like each other anyway. And I’m not helping to make everyone the same! If everybody is the same, you might as well not even be people. At that point, there’s really no difference between you and… and a bunch of robots!”
The octoling holding his left arm announced, “We aren’t planning on making every member of your pathetic species the same.”
The one on his right said, “Kamabo Co will cover the earth in a sludge of superior DNA to wipe out all life and let a new, perfect life form emerge from its ashes.”
“WHAT?!” Goggles dug his heels into the ground, halting the three. “That’s even worse!”
“Your kind is unworthy of receiving humanity’s vast knowledge and fulfilling Tartar’s prime directive.” The two octolings pulled on him simultaneously, restarting their movement. “You and your accomplices will be sanitized, and begin work in the metro. ”
Goggles’ eyes widened in horror. He could barely comprehend the possibility of his friends colored that sickening green-blue, stripped of all free will and original thought.
“I—no way! You can’t! I won’t let you! I’ll save my friends!” He glanced at his arms. “Or… they’ll save me! One of the two.”
The octolings finally stopped, on a walkway sticking out like a diving board over a vat of teal ink. “I’d like to see you try to save them when you won’t even know who they are.”
Before Goggles had any time to react to the octoling’s strange statement, the two threw him off the walkway into the strange green liquid.
Chapter Text
An inkling found themselves floating.
Floating where? They couldn’t remember where they were, how they got there. All they could see was green.
At first, it was strangely pleasant, floating completely detached. Until he—he? Yes, that felt right—realized that was terrifying and also he was running out of oxygen. He flailed his arms and legs in what appeared to be an attempt to swim, which humans would cringe at but was actually pretty decent for a species that dissolves in water.
He managed to pull himself out from underneath to the surface. A green hand grabbed his arm and pulled him all the way out.
“Welcome, 10,009.” Said a green octoling. He blinked, dumbfounded. “Is that my name?”
“It is your identification number. After the second step of the sanitization process, you will have no need for a name.”
“Second step? I don’t remember going through the first…”
“That’s the point. The first step removes memories that will bind you and hinder you from serving Kamabo Co.”
The other octoling said, “Although, I don’t believe it’s supposed to remove clothes.”
He looked down at himself, and yup, he was completely nude. “Huh.”
One of the octolings stuck her weapon into the liquid and managed to fish out the clothes floating on top of the mixture. She flung them at him and commanded him to put them on. When he had the suit on, she announced, “Come with us.”
He couldn’t say why, but he was getting sort of a bad vibe from these two. But since they were the only thing he had to grab onto in the memory-less void he was drifting in, he followed deeper into whatever facility they were in.
Eventually, they reached a place that looked like a medical area of sorts. A third octoling was standing nearby, dressed in a lab coat and surgical mask and holding something that looked like a cross between a syringe and a weapon. Somehow, the inkling suspected that was the second step. He was rapidly feeling less and less sure about doing this—not that he was all that sure to begin with.
The doctor-looking octoling approached him. Nervous, he took a step back. “You know what? I’m not so sure I want to do this…”
None of the octolings said anything, but the one in medical gear continued walking towards him, communicating he didn’t have a choice.
His back hit the wall. He hadn’t even realized he’d still been moving backwards. The octoling finally stopped as well, only a few paces from him. She raised the weapon, prepared to inject him with something teal. The inkling closed his eyes and turned his head away, bracing for pain of some kind.
It never came, but he heard a loud crash and a battle cry. He quickly opened his eyes.
The three octolings were suddenly fighting a fourth octoling, but she wasn’t green and lifeless like the rest. Her tentacles were magenta, and she sprayed ink at them with a fiery passion, as though she’d been waiting to fight them for a while.
“Are you okay?”
He turned to the left. Two more magenta octolings, these ones unarmed, were looking at him. One wore her tentacles in a ponytail, the other had an afro.
“My name’s Afro. That’s Pony.” The inkling nodded, still bewildered, but pretty straightforward names.
“That one over there is Nana. We couldn’t come up with a name that matched her hair.” He looked back at Nana. Two of the octolings she’d been fighting were now gone, and the last one was rapidly being pushed back. The green octoling threw a bomb at Nana to get a bit of room from her, then super-jumped to who-knew-where.
Nana exhaled, trying to un-tense herself after the brief battle. She turned to look at the inkling boy staring at her. He didn't look hurt, but very confused and a little scared, even. He was wearing strange gear, the only piece of which she could recognize was a pair of pilot goggles on his head. "What's your name?"
The boy thought for a moment, then the worry in his face increased. "I...don't remember."
Pony’s eyebrows raised in surprise. “You too?”
The boy turned to her. “Me too what? Did this happen to someone else?”
Afro said, “It happened to all of us. We woke up in this place with no memories. Not where we came from, how we got here, even our names. We had to figure out new ones.”
“Me and Afro were named after our hairdos,” explained Pony. “Nana’s hair was harder, so we named her after this bracelet she had on.”
Nana held up her wrist. On it was a bracelet that had the number 10,007.1 on it.
“Although we realized we also had those,” said Afro. He held up his own wrist, showing off a 10,007.2. Pony displayed a 10,007.3.
“Pretty soon, we came across a train station with a telephone. We couldn’t call anyone, but someone called us and told us that it’d take us home if we collected four things for it,” Nana said. “And, well, I’m guessing you know what happened next.”
“Um...no, actually.”
Nana looked surprised. “Really? We failed to get all four and then they brought us here to be ‘sanitized.’” (complete with finger quotes.) “Didn’t the same thing happen to you? I assumed everyone who failed was sanitized.”
The inkling shook his head. “I just woke up with no memories and they brought me here.”
Pony rubbed her chin. “That’s different than what happened to us.” Afro thought for a moment, then said, “Hey, have you noticed that if we hadn’t come around here, this guy probably would’ve been the only non-octarian to be sanitized?”
“Oh, yeah! That’s weird,” Nana agreed. “Why do you think that is?”
“Maybe no other inklings have found this place?” suggested Pony. “Because….octolings live closer to it or something? And this guy was just somehow the first to get in here?”
“Okay, hang on a sec,” Afro interrupted. “I’d love to continue talking about why this guy is the only inkling in here, but can we figure out a name for him, so we’re not always referring to him as ‘this guy?’”
Murmurs of agreement went up among the party. Nana turned to the boy. “Do you remember anything about your name?”
The inkling racked his brain. “I sort of remember something, but it’s not name-related.”
“Better than nothing,” said Nana with a smile. “What is it?”
“I remember pantsing a guy.”
The octolings went silent.
Pony hesitantly said, “As in...pulling their pants down.”
“Yes,” said the inkling with no shame. “And I think I did this on multiple occasions.”
The group stared in awkward silence. Nana was the first to break it. “Alrighty then! If you can’t remember…” she looked over him again, her eyes focusing on the one piece of recognizable gear. “Does anyone have a coin?” The octolings shook their heads. The inkling boy searched himself.
“I have this!” He held up the top of a jar.
Nana clapped her hands together. “That’ll work!” She took it from him and grabbed a marker off a counter. Ignoring the strange sour smell that wafted off the lid, she wrote one word on each side.
Holding out her makeshift coin to her companions, she said, “I’ll flip this into the air. If it lands on this side, we’ll call you Goggles.” She turned it over. “But if it lands on this side, your name will be Pilot. That good with you?”
The inkling looked at the lid, then gave her a big smile and a thumbs-up. “Ready? Here goes!” Nana flipped the lid. It spun in the air and landed a few feet away. Everyone rushed to see which side it landed on, but the inkling was too slow and with the other three crowded around it, he couldn’t see.
“What’s it say? What’s my new name?” he asked excitedly.
Nana turned around. “Welcome to the team, Pilot.”
Pilot smiled warmly at receiving his new name. The sound of approaching footsteps make everyone turn in surprise, though.
Nana chuckled. “I probably should’ve told you this sooner, but since we escaped being sanitized these green guys have been hunting us down nonstop. They’ll probably be after you too now, so we should go.”
Pilot nodded. Afro was already on the ground, trying to remove the lid off a vent. “C’mon,” he grumbled at it.
Pony looked over his shoulder. “I think we can slip through that in octopus form.” Afro blushed, embarrassed. “I knew that.”
“Hurry!” urged Nana. Quickly, the four of them changed to octopus/squid form and slipped to safety.
Notes:
Nana my beloved :D
And if you watched the video from the first chapter, you'll notice I change the injection of dummy information from being and i.v. drip to being the medical-looking octoling in the thumbnail injecting you.
Feel free to point out any spelling or grammar issues in my writing!
Chapter Text
Hachi and team blue walked through the Intestinal Phase of the facility, carefully avoiding the inky lasers blocking their path. Hachi called out, “Goggles? Goggles, are you here?”
Headphones said, with a look of worry on her face, “I can’t believe we lost him!” Specs added on, “Those octarians came out of nowhere…”
Hachi didn’t say anything, but he was also nervous. He couldn’t believe one of their friends had gotten snatched out from under their noses like that. The octoling glanced down at Goggles’ jar of plums, which we was holding onto for him since Goggles dropped it. It was admittedly making things more difficult, as the jar no longer had a lid and Hachi was doing his best to keep them from spilling.
“I’m sure Goggles will be fine!” The team turned to look at Bobble Hat, who was wearing her signature grin despite the situation. “He’s handled worse, I know he won’t get hurt. He’s pretty much indestructible.”
“I suppose that’s true…” Specs said to himself. “I mean, how many times has Rider just hit him with his roller? Not even splatting him, just getting him back for pulling down his pants.”
Hachi almost laughed. He was feeling a lot better about this now, remembering that despite how Goggles could be rather idiotic at times, he was strong. He smiled to himself. “She’s right! Goggles can handle himself, and we’ll look for him as well as my friend!”
***
Pilot pushed the cover off a vent, glancing around the room it led to. “I think the coast is clear, guys!” He stepped carefully out of the vent, the octolings following behind him.
“Finally!” said Nana. “I was freezing my butt off in there.”
“It is an air vent,” argued Afro. “The things they use to move cool air when you turn up the AC.”
“Guys, enough.” Pony said, hoping to interrupt them before a fight broke out. Fights between the three weren’t common, but it would be an unwelcome distraction right now. “We have to focus on finding a way outta here!”
Pilot took a moment to examine the room they were in. It was fairly plain, with a black floor and white walls. One wall had a desk pressed against it that had four screens, three in a row and the fourth on top of the middle, each one showing security footage from four different parts of the facility.
Pony approached the computer. “Let me see if I can figure out where we are.”
As she sat down at the desk, she smiled. “Hey, it’s unlocked! They must have been really confident that nobody would get here.”
She tapped on the computer. “Okay, it looks like this Kamabo Co operates inside a giant statue? And we’re in the shoulder right now.”
“Is there a way to get out?” asked Nana. Pony messed with the computer a bit longer, then said, “Well, I think there’s an exit on the head, but we’d have to get past a ton of security, and I think avoid the mouth area. They have something in there that I can’t even see on here without a password.”
Nana sighed. “Okay, secret unknown thing, and a bunch of sanitized soldiers to get past, no doubt. And I’m the only one who has a weapon, which makes thing harder...”
Pony interrupted her, “Actually, that’s not the only way out.” She clicked something, and several red dots appeared on a 3D map of the statue on the screen. “There are a lot of exits scattered around here. The problem is, they only open in an emergency.”
Pilot thought for a second. “Does that mean we have to cause an emergency?”
“Actually...that’s not a bad idea!” Afro said. “We get out of here, and cause a bit of trouble for these Kamabo jerks.”
Nana grinned mischievously. “Yeah! They deserve it for turning who-knows-how-many octarians into mindless zombies.” She whipped around to face the computer. “Pony, how do we go about this?”
“Sanitization…” muttered Pony. “That gives me an idea! Hang on,” she clicked around a bit then announced, “Got it! First we have to go to the diaphragm. There’s an energy core there that we’ll bring down to the stomach, where all the sanitization stuff happens.” Pilot asked, “Is that the pl-” “Yes, it’s the place we just left. The electricity from the energy core has to go through a really strong resistor to tone it down. My idea is to plug it directly into the belly, which should cause the whole thing to overload and blow up! Emergency doors open, and we’re home free!”
Pilot thought for a second. “...Will anyone get hurt in the explosion?”
“It won’t blow up immediately,” clarified Pony. “There’s gonna be a bit of time before it blows up which should give everybody a bit of time to get away.”
Afro asked, “Is being worried for the safety of our enemies going to be a regular thing with you?” Pilot shrugged. The octoling boy turned to say something to Pony, but noticed something on the desk. “What’s that?”
Pony picked it up. “It’s an employee model of the CQ-80! I can use this to get get a map of the entire facility from anywhere! Way to go, Afro. You really hit the jackpot.” She put it in her pocket, then after a moment of consideration grabbed a cord that was sitting on the desk as well. I might need to tap into the system again later, she thought.
“Everybody ready?” Asked Nana. The team nodded in agreement. “Which way, Pony?”
“Follow me,’ she said, leading them out the one door the room had.
Notes:
Although Nana is acting like the leader in this story, I decided to have Pony and Afro be the Serious ones on team Eight, like how Specs and Headphones are the Serious ones on team Blue.
Galax_Dragon on Chapter 1 Wed 23 Jul 2025 07:58PM UTC
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PhasesGurl on Chapter 1 Thu 24 Jul 2025 12:02AM UTC
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sodabiscuit on Chapter 2 Thu 24 Jul 2025 10:02AM UTC
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Galax_Dragon on Chapter 2 Thu 24 Jul 2025 06:15PM UTC
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Galax_Dragon on Chapter 3 Fri 15 Aug 2025 01:56PM UTC
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