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As your previous encounter with the Umbrella man becomes nothing more than a fading memory, your life continues at cafe Capucci Normi.
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"Here, your coffee..."
"Thank you."
"Waiter!"
You slip through the tables, ready to take the next customer's order.
"It's been 10 minutes since we finished, we want to order dessert" the disgruntled woman says, her partner staring at you with cold eyes.
"Yes, I'm sorry, we're a bit short-staffed at the moment..."
"It'll be two tiramisus."
Not again. "Ah, forgive me but we're all out of tiramisus, may I suggest the fruit salad?"
"The fruit salad??" the woman looks at her partner in disgust.
"Ma'am, this is the only option left, if you'd like I can make you a coffe-"
"No need, we're leaving, the receipt please." her partner chimes in.
You curse internally. "Very well"
As you go back to the kitchens, a customer catches your eye. He's sitting at a table in the corner, his chin resting on his hands, watching you from afar. Oddest of all, he's wearing a cloak indoors. He's going to scare away the customers, so you decide to speak to him...
The entrance bell rings. "Hello!" Yet another customer can be heard from the entrance.
"Coming!"
Once you finish assigning him to a table, you turn back to look for the cloaked man...
He's not there. Did he just vanish? Must be your imagination, after all, you still haven't changed the light bulb in the back, so maybe no one was there? Having to run everywhere must be getting to your head, that must be it...
***
It's now been 7 months that you started working at Capucci Normi, and in the meantime, the cafe's grown exponentially. Thanks to the only other cafe in the area, Caf'n Go, quitting business two months ago, customers have been flooding in, and it's a lot for the small cafe to handle. Well, a lot for you to handle.
After yet another exhausting day of work, you slump on one of the cafe's sofas, finally taking some rest. Thankfully the cafe's closing for a week after this, since the owner's taking a vacation. Finally some freedom...
The doorbell chimes.
"Hey... Well looks like you're having fun."
"Veronika!" You sit up as you try to adjust your hair as much as you can.
"I was passing by, so I wanted to pick you up. It's your last day for now, after all."
Veronika, your childhood friend, takes the seat across from you. She's always been kind of a weirdo, with her video game shirts and the like, and she still hasn't grown out of it. Today she's got a "Welcome to Hell" hoodie, whatever that means...
"Don't tell me you're here for a three course meal."
"I'm not! Though I could use a cup of tea, and apparently, so could you." when she hears you groan before standing up, she adds "Oh but not right now! You look like you got run over by a car."
You slump back in the sofa. "If getting run over by needy customers is any equivalent..."
"Are you still handling this all by yourself? It obviously isn't good for you."
"I'm not!" You sigh, this is the third time you've been asked about this just this week. "There's still the cafe owner behind the kitchens..."
"While you suffer through all the Karens?"
"Well... Yes. But it's fine! We're hiring!" Just last week, the owner agreed to get another waiter to help.
"Damn, took you long enough. Did you get any candidates?"
"Just one guy so far."
"Only one guy? Do people really not want to work here?"
"Does it look like I'm having fun working to you?"
"You know what I mean... where did you post the announcement?"
You point at the door behind her. "Just the one paper I stuck there so far, we wanted to get locals before anything"
"Then obviously you didn't get many candidatures..." She mutters as she spins around. She freezes. "Was the creepy blood message part of the plan?"
"What?" Looking at the door, there's something written in red marker over the text. "Oh you've got to be kidding me."
She laughs as you scramble to get to the door. You can't help the smile on your face... Taking the paper, it says:
THE KIT WAS THE
PROBLEM ALL ALONG
:o
There's little doodles of... faces? With teeth on the bottom? Or no, jaws? It looks like it's been drawn by a kid...PROBLEM ALL ALONG
:o
"Let me see! Let me see!" Veronika comes up to you, but you hold the paper out of her grasp.
"Only if you apply too."
"What? No fair! I saw it first." She manages to take it out of your hands. She laughs. "What even is this??"
"Ugh, don't ask me, the faces are what's confusing me the most..."
"Faces? Oh no, those are squids! From Splatoon! You know, that one game!"
"Splatoon??" You can't help the chill going down your spine... But it's been so long... "Well... Whatever, I'll reprint it." You go put it in the bin in the kitchen. She follows you, silently gauging all the mess you'll have to clean. "Oh and guess what, tomorrow I'll have to do the job interview myself since the cafe owner is going on holiday for a week."
She groans. "Wait so you're not even on vacation yet? And for a job interview?" You nod solemnly. "What are you, the manager? Who's the candidate, if you don't mind me asking?"
"I haven't checked, at this point I just hope they take the job..."
***
Oh not this again...
"Good afternoon to you." The Umbrella man stands at the front door, smiling wide, apparently very proud of himself. He's dressed in some comically professional suit.
"Just go away." You start closing the door.
"WAIT!" He puts himself in the doorway. "I applied, didn't I?"
"Don't tell me you're actually looking for the job. What do you want really?"
"What do you think? I'm here for the interview, not like there's many candidates." He gestures behind him. "Besides, my photo's on my resume, you knew what you were signing up for." You didn't look at the resume, you just trusted your boss, damn it. You pick up the resume you left on the table.
Alright, deep breath. "Fine, take a seat, Mr... Ledell Carbyrec?? That can't be your na-"
"That's me! Thank you." He sits politely across from you, waiting for you to join him.
"So it was you that drew on the recruitment paper... I'm not even surprised."
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"Don't act all innocent now, last time we were in this situation, you talked my ear off about some... videogame weapon. I know it's you."
"Can you prove it? Did you put the paper in the... recycled bin?" He has the gall to wink at you.
Groaning, you hold your head in your hands. "For god's sake... of course I don't have proof." He doesn't respond, just stares at you expectantly. Wanting to avoid a staring contest, you add: "So... why did you even apply to this job?"
He beams at the question. "I'm glad you asked! I'm always happy to be in contact with others, and if it means I get to work at my favourite cafe, there was no reason not to apply!"
"This isn't your favourite cafe."
"But it is! I've made so many great memories here!" At your unimpressed stare, he adds. "Anyway, I'm surprised you're not asking about my job experience..."
You check the paper.
Previous job experience:
Reached 3101.1 X power in Sizzle Season 2024 with the Recycled Brella Mk II
"Reached 3101.1 X... What does that even mean?"Reached 3101.1 X power in Sizzle Season 2024 with the Recycled Brella Mk II
"With what?"
"With the... Recycled Brella Mk... II? Don't tell me this is about videogames again."
"I'm glad you asked..." He stands up straight, putting his hands on the table, suddenly looking serious. "I've come here to apologize."
"You... want to apologize? To me?"
"Well... that too. But I'd mostly like to apologize to Recycled Brella." You simply stare at him, dumbfounded by this man. "I've misjudged it in the past, and since last time, I've grown, I'm now a new man. I've been haunted by our previous encounter, so I need to make amends. I'm going to rant about Recycled Brella, and you can't stop me.
This weapon simply didn't fit the kit it received at first, I kept trying to make it work, but it didn't lead me anywhere. What this weapon sorely lacks is consistency. It has very unreliable shots, poor paint, an unreliable kill time, and a weak shield to make up for that in theory. When you pair this already extremely difficult weapon - I called it a 2 shot squiffer in the past - with an Angle Shooter and a Big Bubbler, you get a weapon that has to play perfectly to splat anyone. Angle Shooter is just as hard to hit as the main weapon, but deals significantly less damage. Its only benefits are that it's less laggy than your shots, it can paint your feet at times, it's got more range if you're looking to combo with other weapons, and it makes your kill time slightly faster. But all these benefits all require you to land those hits, which is precisely the hardest thing about Recycled Brella. It's frankly a waste of a sub weapon, it might even be a burden for this weapon, since the ink efficiency felt significantly worse when using Mk I. You get baited into using 40% of your ink tank for frankly, unecessary benefits.
Big Bubbler sounds good on paper, it's better than it used to be, but it's very easy for Recycled Brella to get rushed down in its bubble. The weapon's kill time isn't very fast, technically. If you get the jump on it, it has to land two shots, while you just need to shred a weak shield to splat it. It makes it a sitting duck.
This kit gave me the wrong impression of the weapon. It made it feel more ink hungry than it is, doesn't make up for its paint, no, hurts its paint, and doesn't play to this weapon's real strenghts. After a month, I couldn't handle it anymore, I stopped playing it, it was too weak, I didn't have fun anymore.
And then... Recycled Brella Mk II happened.
When it was revealed, I was simply too tired to care. This weapon left a bad taste in my mouth, a second kit would never make up for it. I wrote it off, doubly so when it was found that it got Toxic Mist. Balance wise, the second worst sub in the game, no question. Triple Splashdown on it seemed fun, but not enough for me to pick it up again. Though there was one thing I was sure of: this kit looks good. The yellow stick, the purple tip, golden accents on the shield, the cuttlegear logo... the first Recycled Brella didn't do too much for me, but I'll admit, this second kit really struck a cord, design wise. It might be my favourite second skin, besides Zink Mini Splatling.
Be that as it may, I didn't pick it up at launch. I was much more interested in the other kits on offer. The Custom Douser Dualies, the Heavy Edit Nouveau, the Wellstrings, and the Bamboozler Mk II in particular were all great fun, as a typically more support-oriented player. Though none of them stuck with me long term...
But then, curiosity took the better of me. I picked Recycled Brella Mk II, expecting the worst, slapped some Quick Respawn gear together, and dived into X rank. And this happened.
I was livid, in complete shock at us somehow winning despite me fumbling around for 5 minutes. But most importantly... I felt something after this. I was laughing, enjoying myself like I never had before. Something clicked with me with this game, I... had fun. I don't think I'll ever forget this match. So I made an effort to investigate, I had to know more.
This weapon is meant to die. Everything about it seems built to dive the enemy team over and over, intentional or not. The weak but fast shield, the high damage, and most importantly, the high potential of the weapon. If you play your cards right, you can kill the entire enemy team, you've got the tools for that. The damage on this weapon is genuinely very threatening, I don't think players truly realize this. It's not consistent, I wish the individual pellets dealt more damage than 15, so you could two shot reliably. But if you hit your shots, this is as close to the .52 gal as nintendo has ever come with another weapon. The only issue is that a lot of the time, you'll fumble and miss. But when you strike, you hit hard.
So this weapon needs Quick Respawn, it's essentially a tetra dualies for the brella class. The first kit seemed ink hungry, but once it got mist, the sub weapon took a backseat, as there aren't many use cases where mist is useful. So this weapon actually has a lot of gear freedom. Once you play to QR, this weapon suddenly makes a lot more sense. No point being passive, be a constant threat that the enemies need to watch at the risk of getting wiped.
And mind you, I played QR on the first kit, but it never clicked for me. And there's Triple Splashdown to thank for that. This weapon is very good with it, easily the most synergistic out of every Triple Splashdown kit, and much better than I initially thought. The shield lets it go in with mobilty and even some protection when players try to stop you. Recycled Brella naturally has a lot of mobilty thanks to that shield, it moves around a lot, it can force itself in at times. Recycled's vulnerable at getting rushed down, as it has to hit two difficult shots, so Splashdown gives it a way to splat up close opponents. It's a painting tool too, the special makes up for the weapon's poor paint more than you may think. It even combos with 60 damage. Splashdown lets the weapon get kill streaks, it can keep going and going all the way to the enemy base, all thanks to this special. The momentum this weapon can build is astounding.
And most surprising to me, Toxic Mist is a good fit for the weapon! It's a hyper mobile weapon that's difficult to aim, so giving it a way to slow down opponents is a great way to guarantee a splat. Toxic Mist is a reliable sub, you don't have to aim it, it can hit behind cover, which the weapon is basically incapable of. It can hit longer ranged opponents, and it's a location tool too, which is more useful than it seems.
But most importantly, Toxic Mist is a great pair to Triple Splashdown. Being able to slow down targets to hit with splashdown is crucial at higher levels, and gives its splashdowns much more potential than the others. No matter how reactive you are, if you get hit by a mist before being splashdowned, you cannot get away on time. This combo is somewhat gimmicky, but it's a lot more threatening than people give it credit for.
This kit may be flawed, but it has undeniable synergy. It's difficult, without Splashdown you're left with a weapon that has a hard time comboing with itself, and can't deal with longer ranged weapons very well. It would undeniably be better with a bomb to combo with. But I love this kit. Recycled Mk II isn't worth learning to play it competitively, for now I hope, but it's worth it for how fun and satisfying it feels. The playstyle it offers leads to some of the coolest moments in the game, this weapon screams hype when it gets something going. And it can get going fast. If it gets kills, it gets to charge a Triple Splashdown, only to keep going in the enemies' direction to splashdown them and gain unprecedented momentum. It can take space fast, very fast. And maybe that's what drew me to it, even as Mk I. No brella has this speed, no brella deals this much damage, no brella is as focused on slaying. And it still keeps that shield!
This shield may be weak, but it's strong enough to tank stamper slashes, charger shots, shooter bullets, crab tanks, even whole trizookas! And since you get it so fast, you can play around your ability to counter one hit. It's fun, it keeps those core brella traits.
In the end, despite my experience with Mk I, I ended up 5-starring Recycled Mk II in a bit more than a month, which is the fastest I've ever 5-starred a weapon, by a mile. I played it a lot in X rank, and became pretty undeniably one of the best Recycled Brella players... in the world, simply put. I was pushing the weapon to really show what it was capable of, and people were surprised to see it. Even now players I've fought bring up my Recycled Brella way more than my Tenta Brella, despite me doing better with the latter. I'm hoping I can find a way to push this weapon competitively. It's better than it's given credit for, and much better than I gave it credit for.
So, I'm sorry, Recycled Brella, you brought me on one hell of a ride. In a way, you truly did bring back 90 damage brella, and I'm grateful."
To be continued?
