The Cephalo Diaries 2017

Just another day in the warehouse. It seems a bit busier, the stage has parts of the floor removed, with some squids reworking the wiring. It seems Sleak has found a crew willing to help out for cheap. As for Sleak himself, he's in the back room, working on something on his laptop. Considering the opened mail laying there, likely bills.. Though one postcard, at the top of the stack, tells a brighter story. Greetings from Camp Triggerfish. Obviously not a bill. But as of yet unread by Sleak.

She had hoped he’d gotten her message about popping by today. It was kind of a sudden decision with having the rest of her day free.  Walking through the warehouse, Torch noted the renovations being made. At least the technical part of it. Who wouldn’t notice floor boards being removed? Still she made her way to the back to hang out. She didn’t give a knock, just opened the door half singing “heyoooo” as her greeting. Ready to toss her bag to the side, she paused, catching sight of the more colorful pieces of mail, biting the inside of her lip before speaking, “oh, so you’ve uh.. heard from your sister?” Unlike the original plan, Torch just settled herself on a seat and placed her bag down.

"Hey Torch." Sleak gave a quick wave from behind the laptop. Seemed he was definitely focused on what he was doing. Until he was asked about his sister. "Huh?" He popped his head from behind the laptop, looking at things.. "Oh, the postcard? I guess, I haven't gotten to reading it.. As always, the fight with the city continues. If it's not licenses and regulations it's... Bills." He sighed, and looked back at his laptop. "If you're interested, I don't mind if you read it. I bet she's just bragging about getting some badge out whatever." Though hidden behind the laptop, Sleak gave a soft smile. He liked his sister, but it sure was easy to tease her.

Her brows furrowed a bit, “not even to give a second to read your own sister’s post card?” Hypocrite. Still, given the OK, Torch reached over to swipe the card and read it for herself. “...ooo...” she glanced up from the card, “looks like it’s not going so great..” looking back at the card, she studies its contents again her face growing hints of worry, “uh.. geez.. camps can uh.. getting sick over there, that’s normal right?”

"It's not that I don't care, it's just that the postcard will be here even after I've made sure there'll still be electricity in here tomorrow or that I'm not getting kicked from this warehouse any time soon. Things with deadlines first, then I'll get to my sister." Sleak handwaved the notion, without an actual handwave. "..Wait, not going great?" Again, his head appeared from behind the laptop, showing a small sign of worry. "..Getting sick? Well, I suppose that's a thing that happens in all camps, I guess? ..Is SHE sick?"

Torch is still scanning the card, as if making sure she’s not missing any information, “doesn’t say she got sick, the uh..” her mouth twitched to the side, another moment before she looked up to summarize, “they had a flag hunt right off the bat instead of training and-“ she had to blink, looking to the side, “geez all this time?” She shook her head, getting back to the topic, “uh.. yeah. And finally getting into training, seems people got sick and couldn’t train after all.” She picks the card back up to her view, “says she wants out. Oh and meeting some other squids. A cyan one in particular?” She shrugs, unsure what to make of the last bit of information.

"Ah, alright..." Sleak's head slowly went back behind the laptop.. "..To be honest, that was gonna be my other guess. That she hates it and wants out. Hard to believe it's cause of a LACK of training, though. I expected her to either give up when it gets too hard or when she decides turf war isn't actually for her.. Gotta admit, I'm proud of her tenacity in that regard.. Perhaps Triggerfish just wasn't the right camp for her." He paused for a moment.. "...Meeting other squids, and she actually mentions one in particular? Sounds like she's making friends.. or rivals.. Either works." Sleak closed the laptop, having finished typing what he was busy with. "...Actually, perhaps.. Do you remember what camp that your.. what was it.. cousin?.. You mentioned a cousin, right? Who also went to a training camp? Do you remember which camp? Maybe I can look into that one for her. I really don't want her to give up on turf war just cause the camp she went to wasn't right for her."

Torch leans over again to slid the postcard back on the table as he spoke, crossing her arms and slouching back once she had. “Oh. Right uh..” she looks to the side, just imagine that animu sweat drop. “Actually, it’s the very same camp.” She gives a mix of an awkward and apologetic smile with the answer. “Guess I could imagine her frustration though, for a flag hunt of all things.” She can only hope she diverted attention.

"The same, huh..? Dang, seems like I'll have to actually look up camps properly.." Sleak shrugged. "Wonder if they met, though. Your cousin wouldn't happen to be cyan, right?“ He joked.. "If anything, Elle really isn't the social type, so having to go around and look for flags probably had her having to meet others.. And with her mind set on training.." Sleak shook his head.

“Oooo but Paisley is..” she muttered. Torch gave a small shrug, “at least, as far as I remember. It’s been a while since I’ve seen her, things might’ve changed.” She hoped anyways, “‘Sides, there’s plenty of cyan.. turquoise squids around, it’d be one hard coincidence if it happens to be the same one aheh..” Torch plopped her chin in her hands, leaning over her knees, “why doesn’t she go right into the field again? I’d think you’d learn faster if you were dealing with the real thing..”

"Paisley? That's your cousin's name?.. Ah well, if anything, with us all being able to change colors, having a specific color is.. Well.." Sleak eyed Torch's tentahair.. "..I was gonna say rare, but... I honestly can't imagine you not being orange. And the last time I wasn't this green.." He sighed. "A-anyway... Elle tried to, but she couldn't get into it. I suspect it's cause she's adamant about using a roller, rather than trying other weapons. Even I have used many different weapons, before settling to my roller. Heck, even now I sometimes switch. And even though I've settled on the roller, I'm specifically using the Krak'on set... Differences in the sets matter, too.." Sleak sighed yet again. "Probably didn't need to tell you that, though... But yeah, the long story short is that she has been playing a lot of turf war, but she couldn't get the hang of it. She's too focused on emulating me, I think.. She asked our parents for a roller for her birthday, got one and.. I just.. don't think it's for her. Triggerfish was supposed to have training in all weapon types, so I figured she'd then discover a weapon that suits her better... But it seems not."

"aheh.. I don't think I'd live up to my namesake if I were any other color.." Torch kept her head in her hands, merely watching him talk..Probably didn't need to tell you that, though...She huffed out a chuckle with that, ah, rambling. "I see... I'd suggest challenging her but I think you might've tried that already eheh..." she slouched back, folding her hands onto her stomach, "well at least that's the only thing she's complaining about, nothing too terrible. just uh.. hope they don't catch whatever's going around.."

"Elle is rebellious and stubborn. I told her to try other weapons, but she's dead set on using rollers cause I do. And I've challenged her personally, only for her to go 'oh I couldn't possibly beat you'.. I have tried asking others, but that just results in her losing cause she can't use rollers well.." The sighing did not end, as Sleak once more proceeded to do so. It seems this situation really did upset him. "Maybe I should ask her to.. Nah."

“You’re gonna lose all your air if you keep sighing like that,” Torch quipped, trying to lighten up some kind of mood. Though talking about all of that she couldn’t help but wonder if she had faced Elle. Either at some point or perhaps in a different timeline where she’d offer to help. It only brought back nam flashbacks so she only shook her head slightly to snap out of it. She sat up some with the unfinished thought, “ask her to what?”

"Ah, well.. You know.." He threw his hands up. "Move here. To Cephalo. Rules are more open, and the general skill level is pretty low.. And honestly, I am thinking Shiro might be able to infect her with the Weapon Hype." Sleak noted. ".. Seriously, you should have seen her when she got word of these.. Splat Dualies things? Barely any news yet, but Shiro's in love."

"oh!" duh. she should've probably guessed it. Maybe she was just afraid of getting that wrong. Though it didn't sound like a bad idea.. weapon hype may just get anyone to test other stuff. "I've seen gossip here and there," Torch nods, "hell, I'ma litle hyped myself for those things. the fire rate sounds like it's  super fast!" oops she's got that excited/murderous look in her eye combined with a smirk. really she's just excited now that it was brought up.

"Heh, I'm talking about hyping up my sister, and there you go." Sleak chuckled. He noted Torch's murder look. "Looks like it'd be a good idea if I.. Hrm. Ah well. Too bad the wiring is getting redone, huh? Bet you'd gladly run the arena. I got this new setup for the warehouse, written by a few of the.. Ah.. Underground players. Got a bunch of nice training sims, that can actually splat you back."

She let out a small laugh upon being caught, crossing her arms and looking up in thought, “that sounds.. interesting really. Is it AI based or just,” she narrows her eyes acting all skeptic like, “robots...”

"Hehe.. It's just a simple AI, I can't afford robots. It calculates how much hits you'd have taken and activates the 'out of bounds' system if you're meant to be splat. It's been community tested, so it should be pretty accurate.. The only issue is the lack of feedback, the AI will respond to your ink 'hitting' it but on your end there's no actual ink hitting you." Sleak opened the area app on his phone.. "With the lighting setup we got here, it's not that hard to set up so it'll show proper holograms, might work better with vr goggles.. There's also like virtual balloons and all that jazz, for like aim practice, and you don't get splat back.. But yeah, can't actually run it right now. Maybe next time. I definitely don't want ink around while they're working."