Skarlet's POV:

Skarlet was having awful nightmares, she was re-living her whole past as it came back in waves. Each one, be it a good or a bad, send a wave of pain through her head. She was in constant agony from all those flashbacks her brain tried to process.

She remembered how she got picked up by an Octoling named Vulcan, how she became a general in his army, how she tried to keep those dumb Octarians under control that couldn't even open a jar or prickles and how her and her team were the best they could muster.

Then she met Leon, that wonderful Hotshot aka Agent 4 of the Squidbeak-splatoon. He was the first male person she saw besides her surpreme leader and the fat Octo samurai. From the moment she laid her eyes upon him, she wanted to make him hers.

After some intense battles and a change of heart, Skarlet left Vulcan's side as well as her old squad and joined the Squidbeak-splatoon as Agent 9. She had the most wonderful welcome party in her life and got a gorgeous leather jacket from her love Leon.

But Leon was always together with Marie, despite every attempt Skarlet did to make him fall for her, she never got to the same level as that lime green Squid-sister. He also never made a move towards her despite telling her that he likes her. The only thing she got were a few kisses from him.

She was so envious of them. "Why can't it be me? What's so special about her? I'm the far better woman compared to her! Look, Hotshot how can you resist this body of mine?" Thoughts like these started crawling back into her mind as she got to the source of her desperate search for affection.

Thus, a hole began to grow inside her chest, a hole that made her feel so lonely and frustrated, despite being along the best friends she could've ever wished for. So, her constant suppression of those feelings led to outbursts she couldn't control. Even then everyone still wanted to be friends with her.

Those wonderful days went on till the day Vulkan stole back the sample and killed Emily..................

Emily...... that young octoling.......... She died because of her interference in the battle with Vulkan and the Squidbeaks. If she wouldn't have left her old team, if she wouldn't have betrayed Vulkan, if she wouldn't have brought that young girl with her Emily would still be alive.

And if that wasn't enough, all the pain from her time as S.K.A.R.-L nested itself into her mind as she was screaming in desperation. Even though her memories were completely blurry from her controlled mind and the pain she felt, there was one moment she remembered as clearly as her three sizes.

The moment when she let go of Marie to save her and Leon......................

If it hadn't been for Marie, she could've had Leon.

If it hadn't been because of the Squidbeaks, Emily wouldn't have died.

If she hadn't rebelled against Vulkan, she wouldn't be in this much pain.

If that Inkling never said anything, she could've forgotten these painful memories.

Slowly the pain went away, but other feelings took its place instead.

Feelings of uncontrollable anger and rage.

All of her despair happened because of those Inklings........ Yeah those damn Inklings ruined her whole live.

"I'm going to murder all of them-", were her thoughts: "and then I'll take back what's rightfully mine!"

With those thoughts in her mind Skarlet's eyes shot open in a dark red color.

Mikel's POV:

Mikel was sitting in a chair next to his bed, where the Octoling was sleeping he had harmed so much in his blind rage. Sometimes he dozed off when he closed his eyes, since they were hurting so much from the hours he spent next to her crying.

The whole time he was thinking about how awful he just had treated that one girl which was staying with him and that started to mean so much to him. "It's just....... Every time I hear anything about Lena, I'm having these horrible flashbacks from when she left me.", he started to talk towards the sleeping Octoling. "I'll promise I won't do anything like this again, so please wake up."

But no answer came back. It was the same as when he attacked Lena and her new boyfriend. Mikel just let his head sink into his hands: "I really am a piece of salmon-shit."

Skarlet was squirming around in his bed like she was in constant pain, but each time he tried to hold at least her hand, she tried to smack it away. So he couldn't do anything but wait for her to wake up from the nightmares she seemed to have

-Timeskip with a chibi Mikel taking care of a sick chibi Skarlet-

The night passed by and in a few hours the sun would rise as Skarlet's eyes suddenly opened and she looked towards the ceiling.

"Hey Skarlet! You okay?", Mikel was at first overjoyed from seeing her wake up, but he quickly realized that something was off. "Uhm Skarlet?", he carefully asked as she turned her face towards him as her body rose from his bed.

Skarlet's eyes were blood red as their gazes met.

Then without any warning she jumped up and kicked the tall Inkling right into his stomach and made him tumble backwards.

"IT'S ALL BECAUSE OF YOU I LOST EVERYTHING!", she screamed at the top of her lungs.

As Mikel got a hold of himself from the impact, he tried to speak towards the mad Octoling: "UFF What the Scrap----?", but he wasn't able to finish his sentence as Skarlet rushed towards him, picking up the Lamp on the bedside-table and crushed it over the right side of Mikel's face.

"YOU DAMN INKLINGS DESTROYED ALL I WORKED MY FUCKING ASS OFF!", she then began punching Mikel's stomach in a wild frenzy.

Mikel on the other side, despite being wounded badly in his face as ink was dripping out of where the glass shards were stuck inside his skin, wasn't completely shocked at Skarlet's behavior.

"She's just rampaging like I did, when I lost it back then........", he remembered how he went mad over every small thing that happened and started attacking everything on sight.

So he did the best thing that came into his mind, which had been the only solution to his outbursts back in the day. "She needs to let out her anger or something even worse is going to happen." Mikel grabbed Skarlet and embraced her in a tight hug, not letting her go and preventing her from kicking around.

Skarlet of course started to scream: "YOU THINK YOU CAN STOP ME? YOU FUCKING PIECE OF SHIT! I'M GOING TO RIP YOU ANOTHER HOLE AND FEED YOU TO YOUR GODDAMN SALMONS!", but because she wasn't able to move Skarlet to furiously beat into his stomach and tried to bite through the scarred skin on his neck as she spit and insulted in every possible way.

Then he waited............... and waited............... and waited. Enduring the beating from Skarlet, while having flashbacks on how he got enraged by the smallest things back then. Even though he hates to admit it, Mikel was grateful for the brawls with Andrew to let out his anger, or Marco and Isa who calmed him down and ol' Griz who let him work off the remaining steam.

Skarlet on the other side had no one here, she was completely alone and what frightened Mikel was that she seemed to bear such an immense hatred towards Inklings. "If she gets out in this state, who knows what she could do? I can't let that happen.", he decided and was glad that he had all this fighting with the salmons, which toughened him up.

Time passed; minutes of constant pain slowly started piling up. The right half of Mikel's face was completely covered with the Ink dripping out of the wounds where the glass shards were stuck inside his skin, drenching his shoulder. On his left side Skarlet has bitten so hard into his neck that he had marks all over it. "And she's the one making jokes about kisses, damnit. If this isn't over soon she'll bite my skin off." All of this while she constantly hit his stomach with a fury of blows.

After half an hour passed Skarlet's attacks began to slow down, but she still kept going. Mikel on the other side was approaching the limit of what he could take. "Please, Skarlet stop it. I won't be able to take it much longer." In a desperate attempt he moved his right hand up to her tentacles and gently began to stroke her head, while at the same time he started to humm a small melody from the Squid sister song "Fresh Start".

https://youtu.be/mILWyQH-yxY

Skarlet shouted while breathing heavily: "Hah,.......... haaaaaah, finally giving up?", she then used the extra space to swing her left arm with full force into Mikel's side. "UFF!!!!!!!" But he kept himself together so he wouldn't pass out and hummed the melody over and over.

Narrator's POV:

Then finally after a few more minutes, Skarlet's punches started to cease and she just stayed in Mikel's embrace as he was still humming, while gently stroking her head.

"Finally calmed down?", he said with a calm voice when he noticed the change. "You're a real troublemaker, you know that?"

Skarlet's eyes widened as she slowly realized what had happened: "What........... have I done?", she then noticed the bitemarks on Mikel's neck who was still holding her and started to cry: "What have I done........ I'm sorry...... sniff............ I'm so sorry........I.......I....... Uwäääääääää!" The Octoling leaned onto Mikel's shoulder, hugging him back from behind and cried for what she had just done.

But Mikel said with a gentle voice: "It's alright, just let it all out. It's not like I didn't deserver it after what I have done to you yesterday."

After Skarlet stopped crying, Mikel carefully picked her up and set her down on the bedside, while he sat on the chair so he could look directly into her face.

Skarlet looked at him in disbelieve, when she saw the glass shards sticking out of the right side of his face. "Mikel, I'm so---------"

"SHHHHH!", he said as he put a finger on her lips: "First you're going to listen to me."

The Octoling just nodded as Mikel inhaled strongly from the pain in the area around his stomach. "Haaaaaaah, so now that you finally calmed down, I want to apologize to you as for what I did yesterday. And for what happened now, I would assume that your memories came back and you had a hard time processing them right?"

".....................right.", she quietly answered as to avoid the gaze of his tear dried eyes and the look of his wounds.

"Well then everything is alright." Mikel simply declared.

"WAIT WHAT?! Are you kidding me? I tried to kill you and you just say everything is alright? This is not some sort of show you damn buckethead!", Skarlet's temper rose as she heard such an absurd statement.

Mikel just raised his hands a little to calm her down and said: "Hey first, you didn't kill me, which wouldn't happen if you were my enemy. Second, I did something horrible to you yesterday and you did something horrible to me today, so we're quit. Third, I'm going to a public respawn later and with my constitution barely any scars will be left. So there's nothing to worry about."

"You can't be serious?", she just shook her head in disbelieve.

"Why not? If something went wrong, then it is that your kissing skills totally suck!", Mikel crossed his arms in front of his chest with a serious look.

"Don't you dare to insult my seductive skills you freaking masochist!", she snapped back towards him.

"Hey! I'm no masochist, you were the one that tried to eat me up!", the tall Inkling got all flustered as he tried to counter her.

"Oh yeah and you just held me and enjoyed it.", Skarlet's voice sounded serious but with a strange tone.

"Hey I didn't.................. wait are you snickering?", he noticed that Skarlet had her mischievous grin on her face.

Skarlet: "......."

Mikel: "........."

Skarlet: "MPFH!"

Mikel: "SKAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARLEEEEEEET!", he shouted as he realized he fell into one of her jokes.............again.

Skarlet bend forwards and held her belly from laughing as her large breasts bounced around: "Hahahahahahaha!"

Mikel just watched her in disbelieve, but as of how she got him, he couldn't help it but join her.

Mikel&Skarlet: "Hahahahahahahahahaha!"

Thus the tension left, as both of them dispelled the moody atmosphere with their laughter, which echoed through the house.

-Timeskip with a chibi Mikel and a chibi Skarlet eating a huge pot of porridge with a lot of cocoa-

Narrator's POV:

Mikel and Skarlet were sitting at the table, opposing each other, while Mikel had himself a glass of whisky and Skarlet was having a glass of wine. Both of them were sharing now stories about their past.

Mikel told about how he started out at Grizzco, how Vulcan nearly destroyed the business and killed his younger brother. Then about how he met Lena and the horrible way she betrayed him.

Skarlet on the other side talked about how she started out in the army with Vulkan, how she and her squad were the best they had. Then she came to the part where she met the best Hotshot in the world, also the cutest male she had ever seen. Leon Spletzer was his name.

To Skarlet's surprise Mikel was relieved to finally hear his name as he explained, she often whispered his name while sleeping.

But aside from relieve Mikel felt a slight pain inside his chest, but he shoved it onto the beating he had from before, as he had been to a public respawn.

"......................... So, and then that old bastard dared to kidnap such a young beauty as me, can you believe that?", Skarlet said as she told about the time Vulkan kidnapped her.

"Wow what an piece of garbage..................but-", Mikel tried to say but was interrupted.

"Oh you want my butt?", Skarlet immediately stood up, turned around and gave her butt a slap that it wiggled around.

Mikel was secretly enjoying the spectacle but quickly pulled himself together: "C'mon seriously? I just wanted to know how old you are, since you already know I'm 24."

"Oh, my aren't you interested?", she said with a seductive tone, but for the sake of Mikel's nerves she added: "I'm 19 Hotstuff, but say what date do we have today?"

"19?! Damn that woman got one hell of a well-developed body for her age!", he thought. "Well it's the 29th of July. Why do you ask?"

Skarlet just answered with a monoton voice: "Then I'll be 20 by tomorrow."

"Aha,...............WAIT WHAT?! Your birthday is tomorrow?", Mikel completely freaked out.

"Yeah, and?", she looked at him with a strange expression.

"We need to arrange a birthday party!", the tall Inkling looked completely worried.

Skarlet just couldn't understand why he was so restless: "I can understand a welcome party, but why should you celebrate a birthday?"

This question hit Mikel like a Scrapper: "You're kidding me, right? A birthday is the biggest reason to throw a party!"

"No, not in the Octarian society. At a birthday you're often getting a test to determine if you're ready for another rank in the army.", she said as if it would be a normal thing.

Mikel then went around the table, grabbed Skarlet at her shoulders, which startled her a little and looked deep into her eyes. If he would be just a few inches closer, she could've licked over his lips.

"That's an absolute NO-GO, you hear me?", Mikel stated with a serious voice. "I'm going to show you how to celebrate a birthday! That's a promise!"

Then Mikel quickly ran outside the house, quickly dialing numbers on his phone, while leaving a speechless Octoling behind.

?????: "..........Hello?"

Mikel: "MARCO WAKE ISA UP ASAP I NEED YOUR HELP! SKARLET'S BIRTHDAY IS TOMORROW!"

(A/N: Uh Oh........... Mikel's going to prepare a birthday party for the craziest Octoling in history? With all the insane people that are around him?

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Let's see how this goes. Stay tuned for the next chapter of "A fateful Salmon Run"!)