PERSONALITY

Jae tends to be a very closed-off person, preferring to distance himself and run away from the past rather than acknowledging that any of his trauma actually happened; he’s a pretty bad workaholic as a result, throwing himself into whatever work he can get his hands on. Oftentimes, he’ll be running so many odd jobs and errands for others that he gets lost in what he’s doing, visiting places multiple times and never taking the most efficient route to get anything done -- but once he’s signed up for a responsibility, he’ll get it done, no matter how long it takes or how much embarrassment he feels whenever he has to visit Ammo Knights three times in the same day to buy weapons or equipment for the three different people who hired him.

He cultivates a very self-confident and prideful mask, despite his inner insecurities; it’s hard to catch him ever taking a break, his head held high and back straight no matter how fearful he is of being questioned for living in Inkopolis or how he constantly feels like he doesn’t belong, whether it be in Octo Valley or in Inkopolis. When being questioned about his actual emotions or asked to open up about his past, however, Jae gets incredibly defensive and even angry, if he’s pushed to that point -- it’s the easiest way to get under his skin and cause his mask to crumble, for however briefly it does.

Despite all the work he does, Jae tends to feel like his life is pretty aimless, especially now that he’s escaped from Octo Valley and the influence of the Telephone; on one hand, he wants to go back and try to free the Octolings he used to know from D.J. Octavio, but on the other hand, he’s too afraid of the consequences of having to go back through the Deepsea Metro to get there, justifying his passivity by trying to convince himself that the New Squidbeak Splatoon have it under control. He spends most of what little free time he allows himself listening to music, fully-clothed, in the bathtub -- which honestly summarizes his hidden personality more accurately than any other description could.

HISTORY

Jaedin originally worked for D.J. Octavio as a standard Octoling soldier, specializing in ranged weapons and sniper rifles, finding splat bombs and close-up weapons to be too risky -- especially when considering that, after all, he was good at what he did. He was part of Octavio’s first plan to steal the Great Zapfish; in this battle, he managed to steal an Inkling’s E-Liter 3K, which he later customized with his own scope, notching the barrel of the sniper once for every Inkling that he managed to splat.

However, once Agent 3 took down D.J. Octavio and he heard the Calamari Inkantation for the first time, Jaedin managed to break free of his conditioning, attempting to escape Octo Valley despite the eyes constantly on him, being one of the most well-known snipers within the Octoling army itself. He managed to make it down to the Deepsea Metro, undergoing C.Q. Cumber’s tests in an attempt to escape to the Promised Land. Commander Tartar intercepted Jaedin’s journey, though, and he was almost sanitized; instead of taking the train to the surface, Jaedin ended up traveling most of the way on foot, splatting whatever Sanitized Octarians got in his way.

Reaching the surface of Inkopolis, Jaedin began introducing himself as Jae as a way to distance himself from his past; in fear of imprisonment or being splatted by the Inklings in Inkopolis, he began illicitly working for Grizzco Industries, which provided him with temporary shelter as long as he participated regularly and performed well during Salmon Runs. After the Great Zapfish was stolen a second time, Jae left the Industries to help fight D.J. Octavio and free the rest of the Octolings under his control; being inspired by Marina’s freedom and fame as part of Off the Hook, Jae began staying in Inkopolis, where he currently turfs for whichever teams hire him, works Salmon Runs, and works part-time at the Shoal.

OFF THE HOOK

Most of the music that Jae has downloaded on his phone is of Off the Hook’s albums -- ripped off of the Squid Internet, of course, considering he barely makes enough to scrape by in terms of rent in Inkopolis already. He looks up a lot to Marina, especially, for living so openly as a freed Octoling and even making friends with Pearl, an Inkling -- when Jae’s too afraid of Inkling judgement to really even talk to any, no matter how friendly they seem. His favorite song from them is Ebb & Flow.

D.J. OCTAVIO

Jae has mixed opinions about D.J. Octavio; on one hand, he knows that D.J. Octavio was trying desperately to salvage the crumbling Octarian civilization after their defeat in the Great Turf Wars, but he thinks that there could’ve been a better way to do it, especially when Octavio’s solution was to steal the Inklings’ main source of power and eventually doom them to the same fate that the Octarians faced. He feels like he should apologize to Octavio and his fellow Octoling snipers for leaving and essentially leaving them to whatever splatting awaited them, but he firmly believes that a freed, aimless life in Inkopolis is better than a controlled, task-driven life in the Octo Valley.

GRIZZCO INDUSTRIES

Jae feels like he owes a lot to Mr. Grizz, considering he was willing to give relatively-illegal shelter to an Octoling before they became common in Inkopolis, for work that Jae found to be fun and fulfilling at the same time; even though he still doesn’t know what Mr. Grizz looks like, he feels like he’s obligated to trust Mr. Grizz regardless of that fact. He works at Grizzco Industries from time to time with other teams of Inklings and Octolings; of course, the more Octolings a team has, the more comfortable he feels walking up to them and asking for a spot in the next Salmon Run.