Chapter 19: Scary Strikers

Roenaldo exited the kettle and went on to complete 3 more missions, all being relatively simple. At no point did Roenaldo regret his decision to do what was essentially a marathon run of Octo Valley; he was even starting to have fun! Now, there was but one more kettle to dive into before the giant kettle could be accessed. Seeing no reason to delay, Roenaldo went ahead and entered the lair.

The squid landed to find that he was not in a typical Octarian hideout. "Hmm," he said, "This might be another one of those places that the Octarians leave from to invade Inkopolis. Question is, where are they?" He searched the area, looking for any octopi that were smuggling important fish. Instead of finding any living creatures, he came across an abandoned mini golf area. He was almost tempted to take a swing at the game, but he knew that he had a Zapfish to save. Besides, he was horrible at golf. Instead, he inspected the area further, looking for anything suspicious. He took a look at a decorative windmill, stating, "Say, isn't that hole in the middle way too big?" He walked inside the gap, which was as tall as him, and poked the walls with his gun. As soon as he did that, the floor opened up beneath him like a trap door, and he fell straight into the cockpit of some kind of short mech with springy legs and a single cannon. Roenaldo looked back and forth in bewilderment as machinery turned on all around him, activating lights, a tube that stuck directly into the ink vein in his back, and an automatic seatbelt clicker. "Hallo Passagier," a feminine Octarian voice said as Roenaldo was strapped in, "Bitte bleiben Sie stehen. Ihre Reise beginnt jetzt!" Before Roenaldo could comprehend what was being said to him, the Inkling was rapidly sent down a passageway, with his vehicle spinning rapidly and giving him vertigo. This movement continued until Roenaldo was ejected to a place above ground.

"Sink me," said Cap'n Cuttlefish, "Those octoslobs invaded Bluefin Depot! This place used to be a great coal mine, you know; now these Octarians are using it for their vile acts!" Once Roenaldo got his bearings together, he noticed a giant UFO in the distance. "By my beard," said the captain, "Could it be? Agent 3, get out of the way NOW!" Startled by the senior's proclamation, Roenaldo quickly moved the joystick in front of him to the left. However, nothing happened. Roenaldo saw that there were two other buttons next to the joystick, which he tested out; the red button on the right fired a blast from the machine's cannon while the button on the left did nothing except for moving the mech's legs a little. Feeling a sense of impending doom, Ronaldo pressed the same button over and over again in a panic. After a flurry of mashing, Ronaldo decided to try holding down the button. This caused the legs of the machine to crouch down quite a bit. When Roenaldo released the button, the mech sprung up into the air and to the left, allowing Roenaldo to narrowly dodge a massive, purple ink tornado that suddenly manifested. The Inkling looked at the swirling pattern of sludge that was left behind, exclaiming, "What the heck was that?!" The captain answered, "Aye, that'll be an Octostriker, one of the strongest Octarians out there. That saucer up there is most likely where that spineless sucker is sitting; they're gonna launch Inkstrikes at you whenever they get the chance. Usually, you would be able to sneak past them by swimming in your ink, but you're sitting in a massive target…" Hearing this, Roenaldo attempted to get out of the machine, but he could not figure out how the technology worked. He was stuck. "Alright," he said, "I may not know how to get out of this thing, but I'll be fine. Besides, this whole situation reminds me of a game I found in Inkopolis: Squid Jump!" The elder responded, "Squid Jump? What in blazes are you saying, Agent 3?" Roenaldo shook his head and smiled, replying, "It's nothing, captain." With that, the agent hopped forward into dangerous territory.

Although Roenaldo had experience with Squid Jump, he was not very proficient in it. This was reflected in the way that he moved the machine, making weak, short hops forward. To make matters worse, he was not in a 2-D environment anymore; he was in the real world with a very real, Inkstrike-launching octopus hot on his tentacles. The whole scenario was very stressful for Roenaldo, to say the least, but he did not let his fear show through. He dodged multiple ink tornados being sent at him, all of them being close calls, all while exercising his arms in ways that he had never done before. He was about 1/8 through his way to the UFO when he came across some Octotroopers that were piloting the same machines as Roenaldo. "Suffering salmon," exclaimed Cuttlefish, "Those octos are using those thingamajigs too! I hope that you have a plan, Agent 3." The Octarians immediately fired blasts of purple ink at Roenaldo, prompting him to return fire. Figuring that the cannon on his vehicle followed the same logic as the robot's legs, so he held down the shoot button, causing the mech to rumble. Once he released the button to launch a massive blob of yellow ink. This caused one of the two enemy pilots to take massive damage, and they were stunned in shock. Roenaldo then heard the telltale sound of an object whistling through the air, and he quickly made his vehicle jump to the right to avoid the approaching Inkstrike.

After doing that, he mashed the attack button to finish off the remaining enemy. Roenaldo then moved towards the middle of the stage, finding a hazardous river. The Inkling looked up to see that there was a grate platform for him to land on. Wow, he thought to himself, this really is like Squid Jump, huh? I'll have to use my best precision skills! Taking a deep breath in and out, Roenaldo took a deep breath and clapped his face cheeks before approximating the amount of time that he would have to hold the jump button for. After some quick thinking, Roenaldo applied pressure to the activator for about 6 seconds before releasing and launching into the air. Miraculously, he ended up right on the small platform! "Holy moley," said Roenaldo as he clutched his head in joyous disbelief, "I can't believe this! I thought that I was going to miss it completely!" As the squid was celebrating, he failed to notice that another Inkstrike was headed straight for him. Although Roenaldo was shielded by his vehicle, he still felt like he was caught in the middle of a hurricane, being knocked around all around the mech's cockpit. When the attack finally ended, Roenaldo laid on his back in a daze as the same feminine voice said, "Warnung. Warnung. Schilde wurden durchbrochen. Automatischen Auswurfvorgang aktivieren." After this was said, the compartment started flashing red, all the buttons switching between multiple different colors as the machine twirled around like a ballerina, bringing upon Roenaldo even more nausea. Suddenly, a spring activated below his seat, ejecting him out of the now-open window onto safe ground. He looked back to see that the machine had erupted in flames, and it rolled into the river. "Cripes," said the captain as Roenaldo looked forward with shock, "It's a good thing that you weren't in that hunk o' junk, right Agent 3? The good news is that you're almost at the place where the UFO is!" Hearing this, Roenaldo took one last look at the ruined robot before moving forward.

Since Roenaldo has made it through most of the area with little stealth, he decided to just bolt it for the area that the saucer was hovering over. Dodging missile after missile, the Inkling eventually made his way to a platform just beneath the flying object that had a handy launch pad on it. Leaping off of said pad allowed Roenaldo to jump right on top of the UFO, where he met a very surprised and angry Octostriker. "Oho," exclaimed the captain, "Thar he blows! Now's your chance to get after that obtuse Octostriker. Now, get your Hero Shot ready and CHARGE!" Roenaldo nodded and gave pursuit to the flying Octarians, who appeared to be a giant Octobomber with advanced goggles and black skin. The Octostriker attempted to stay as far away from his foe as possible, launching quick Inkstrikes to ward the squid off. However, Roenaldo remained persistent, and he used a combination of running and swimming to chase down the ranged octopus, who was a massive target. After taking enough hits from the powerful Hero Shot, the now-yellow Octostriker convulsed in pain before swelling up and bursting in a giant explosion. Located in the middle of the UFO was a large pool of purple ink, but this lake was covered completely by the sheer amount of yellow fluid. The purple substance was immediately dissolved, resulting in the pool now being composed of Roenaldo's ink. He morphed into a squid and dived right in, as he had always wondered what swimming in his own fluid would feel like. As he was doing so, he heard a faint crackle. Before he could figure out the cause, the pool was electrocuted, giving Roenaldo a jolt. It was then that he realized there was a Zapfish in the ink. He swam downwards to find said Zapfish, whose barrier had already been broken. He quickly grabbed it with his right tentacle and swam up before he could get shocked again. With the fish in hand, Roenaldo Super Jumped back to the hole he had arrived from, finding the return trip to be much more tolerable than the entrance.