Squidward Tentacles was no stranger to injury. In fact, it could be said that he was close companions with injury. His familiarity with injury made it so that he would often find himself in situations where he would end up injured. Therefore, it was not unusual that he sometimes felt the urge to slap himself across the face.

Like right now.

Squidward's face stung from the resounding smack that somehow surprised him despite it having come from himself. Out of the corner of his eye, as he rubbed his stinging jaw, he noticed a family of three that was seated at a booth near the register. They were the only customers in the Krusty Krab other than a middle aged male fish who was quietly eating his food at a table in the corner. The mother and father who had been playfully teasing their toddler daughter with a dangling kelp fry just a moment ago stopped their fun to look at him, confused. Once realization had dawned on them, they turned towards each other, snorted, and exchanged a not-so-discreet high five. The little girl simply pointed at him, giggling.

Well, it could be worse, Squidward thought, eye twitching at the family's unabashed glee at his pain, the ache in his jaw briefly forgotten; at least he didn't make a small child cry for once.

Squidward's shift would be over soon, but he felt certain that he would not survive the rest of the evening. His eyes were bloodshot, his throat burned, and his head throbbed.

Worst of all, he was still alive.

Squidward wavered over the cash register, finding it increasingly difficult to keep from collapsing to the ground. He did vaguely remember at least a few customers rolling their eyes at him for practically drifting off as they were ordering their food. Hey-it was a miracle that he even made it to work without falling asleep behind the wheel.

And why was he so tired?

Well, how could he sleep when it sounded like his neighbor was slaughtering fish next door all night? In SpongeBob's book that may have been a "party", but in Squidward's...well, it was a night of screaming out the window until the cops came and asked him to keep it down. By the time the cops were done lecturing him about keeping the peace and asking him why he wasn't invited to the party, he was too drained to do anything but curl into a ball in his walk-in closet. He wasn't sure who had called the cops on him, but it took all he had to keep from releasing his volcanic rage on the idiots next door. He didn't bother picking up the art supplies he'd set up neatly beside the window either.

So much for that oil painting competition...and getting any rest at all.

Honestly, Squidward had no idea why he felt pressured to slap himself awake because he cared so little for this job anyway. Besides, it was quiet in the restaurant and had been for a while as it was a slow evening. If he wanted to, he could just flip through the Interpretive Dance Quarterly he'd been trying to read earlier.

Actually, that sounded like just the thing he needed right now.

After looking around to make sure Mr. Krabs wasn't nearby, Squidward ducked down and opened the cabinets underneath his register drawer, thinking he might have placed the magazine in one of them. He swept aside rubber bands, receipt paper rolls, and napkins, but there was no trace of the magazine. His upper lip curled in annoyance as he dropped to his knees and began to scour the floor nearby, all the while trying to resist the temptation to rest his aching body on the ground and go to sleep.

The floor was calling to him. It really was.

...Although it was hard to believe he could hear its cry considering how there was garbage scattered all over it. Squidward grumbled as he kicked an empty paper cup aside, not caring that it had rolled away from underneath the cash register and was now in the customers' plain view.

Crouching even lower now, he began to brush aside the dust bunnies and old moldy burgers that were scattered across the wooden floor. Geez, did anyone clean this dump besides him and SpongeBob? Okay, he never really helped with the cleaning, but still. This was ridiculous.

Squidward's face was practically touching the floor now and it didn't take long for his eyes to drift towards the dark swirls in the rickety floorboards. On days this slow, he often took to studying even the most minute details of his environment. One of the perks of this deathly level of boredom was that he sometimes discovered stress relievers. He imagined himself gliding along the swirling lines, as though he were in a whirlpool that would take him away from this job...this life. His head grew heavy with the promises of sleep and he groaned happily as he slumped to the ground.

"Um, hello? I'm sorry, but..."

The rest of the words blurred together as Squidward's eyelids slid shut. "Mmm, 'ello," he murmured with a groggy smile. He rubbed his weary face against the cool floor and nearly teared up because of how amazing it felt. "Hello, my sweet, sweet floor..."

Magazine? What magazine? All he wanted now was a fluffy pillow. And a blanket.

Sure, the floor smelled like rotten ketchup and mold and sure, he may have to tweeze a few splinters out of his face, but it was something to lie down on and for that he was-

"Excuse me? Sir?"

Squidward's eyes widened briefly at the interruption. They slid downward just as quickly when he realized it was just the floor speaking to him again. It had such a feminine voice, too. He wondered why it was trying to interrupt his nap. Perhaps Squidward was heavy and it needed some breathing room? Well that wasn't happening. He'd already marked his territory.

"Just let me rest a minute, will you?" Squidward croaked desperately. "We can talk later...I promise…"

His body relaxed against the floor and he began to drift off. A tear slid out of the edge of his eye and down his face. But just as he was about to black out...

"Hey!"

Squidward gasped and sat up...and smacked his head against an open drawer. Hissing in pain, he doubled over and cradled his head in his tentacles for a few seconds. As he struggled to his feet, he rubbed his newly bruised head and groaned, his blurred vision slowly focusing on the irked fish who stood in front of him with her fins crossed and teeth bared.

"Talk later, my tailfin! Where do you think you are, buddy? Your bedroom?"

Sensing that she was waiting for him to say something, Squidward couldn't even muster the energy to sigh. Instead, he flipped open his notepad.

"So what'll it be?" he asked with a touch of insistence to make sure she got the point.

The fish stared at Squidward, jaw hanging open. She then shook herself into awareness and gave Squidward a quick once over before scoffing, as though she'd just seen him for the first time.

Squidward wished he could just tell her to get on with her order, but somehow he wasn't even energized enough for that.

"What'll it be?" The fish leaned forward and placed a fin on Squidward's notepad, prompting him to arch an eyebrow as it was lowered. "Well, let's see. One, you didn't greet me as I entered the establishment. Two, I had to wake you up so that you could take my order. Three, you don't even apologize for being rude and wasting my time."

"And your point is?" Squidward yawned noisily. He wished he hadn't responded to her at all, so that he wouldn't be dealing with this now.

"My point is...how about you get someone else to help me because you're clearly a lowlife who wandered into this restaurant and stole the real cashier's "uniform"?"

She peered into his eyes as though she were searching for a sign of understanding. Squidward met her stare, an impish smile tugging at his lips.

It was getting harder and harder to keep a straight face when this happened.

Biting back laughter, Squidward plucked his notepad out of the fish's fin and began reciting what he liked to think of as his introductory speech to each new customer.

"Alright. Here's the 411. You're at a fast food joint, not a five star restaurant. I'm not gonna pretend that I care how your day went. If you want that, maybe you should just give mommy or daddy a call. Or better yet, seek therapy."

The fish's jaw dropped. Just as she began to respond, Squidward interjected. "Oh, let me guess. "Holy shrimp! What kind of customer service is this?""

The fish didn't respond, but he could tell from her eyes that he was close, if not right on the money.

"Well, I'll tell you what kind," Squidward said with a smirk. "It's the fast kind."

He chuckled, amused by his own clever rebuttal.

Before Squidward could fully savor the moment, however, the fish snapped out of her shock, grabbed him by the throat, and pulled him over the counter. His notepad and pen fell from his tentacles to the floor with a clatter.

"Hey!" Squidward tried to peel her fins off of his throat, but she was too strong. His back arched painfully as she pulled his face up to her level.

"Listen, pal," the fish began, making Squidward gasp as she pulled him even closer to her. "I've worked in this wretched business, too, and normally I can sympathize with the poor guy behind the register. You, on the other hand, are a bonafide meanie and I have never in my life experienced such a disturbing lack of empathy."

Squidward felt a sharp jolt of pain in his lower back and he found that he was alarmingly close to fainting on the spot. He would have shuddered at the thought of landing face first onto the fish's chest if he wasn't too weak to even do that much. Instead, Squidward patted the fish's fins with a shaky tentacle. "T-That's great and all, but...y-you think you can not...fracture my spine?"

The fish grudgingly loosened her grip, allowing Squidward to breathe, lean back and adjust his shirt. She shook her head in disbelief.

"Curse you...and curse that beautiful billboard for luring me to this fiery pit of evil."

Squidward stretched his aching back, watching numbly as the fish began ranting about how she had no idea why this restaurant was so famous and how she'd never come back. Most Krusty Krab customers were like her, so he wondered how every one of them managed to be uniquely irritating.

Realizing that she still hadn't ordered yet, Squidward picked his notepad and pen up off the floor. He then cleared his throat and she looked up at him and scowled.

Tapping the notepad with his pen, he said, "Your order?"

She stared at him, her jaw hanging open. "Sweet Neptune..." She laughed darkly as she looked towards the other customers for support. "You see this guy?"

While the man who sat alone kept his back to them, the parents who were now gathering their child and belongings and sliding out of their seats only shrugged at her sympathetically. But, dim though it was, a glint of amusement still shone in their eyes, Squidward was annoyed to note.

Squidward clamped his eyes shut, trying to control himself. He didn't want to take her insults lying down, but he also didn't want a verbal flaying courtesy of Mr. Krabs.

The fish pulled up her left arm sleeve and looked at her watch. Her eyebrows furrowed. Then, not even caring to look at Squidward as she spoke to him, she muttered, "Okay, whatever. It's not even worth it."

Squidward opened just one eye, peeking at her tensely. He was beginning to feel like he might just start screaming...or at least tell the fish to just take her money and go give the Chum Bucket some business.

But it was becoming more and more apparent that there was no escape from idiots like this.

"Just get me a number two for here," the fish said. "No pickles. Diet Dr. Kelp. And I'm in a hurry, so tell him to make it fast." Although the flames in her eyes had momentarily been extinguished, her words were punctuated with silent threats.

Squidward scribbled down the order, gritting his teeth as he suppressed his irritation. They were always in a hurry, weren't they? He tossed the paper slip to the window behind him and Spongebob, as always, caught it with a dance in his step and a "Comin' right up!".

After the order rang through and Squidward had handed the fish her change, she still stood waiting in front of the register and it took him a few seconds to realize why. His eyes nearly rolled into the back of his head as he turned towards the window to the kitchen.

"And can you make it fast, please?"

The words dripped with a syrupy sweetness that Squidward didn't know he was even capable of emitting. The fish simply smirked when he returned to his position, before finally stalking off to a table where she waited for her order.

It was then that Squidward realized that Spongebob had been abnormally quiet up until that point.

His eyes widened. What was going on in the kitchen? He muttered curses under his breath as he decided to check out the situation, despite Mr. Krabs ordering him to watch over the register even if he was bleeding out on the floor.

And, unsurprisingly, the kitchen was a disaster. The putrid aroma of charred hamburger meat, mold, and dishwasher fluid made Squidward gag and pinch his nose. As he absorbed his surroundings through squinting eyes, he saw dried up ketchup and mustard stains on the walls, meat crumbs scattered across the tile floor, and mysterious sludgy spills he didn't even want to know the details of.

In the midst of all this was SpongeBob, humming giddily as he flipped a patty over the grill.

Squidward felt an overwhelming urge to join the patty. He would be more than happy to allow the scorching heat to cook him to a crisp. Anything would do, really.

As long as it helped him escape this fiery pit of evil.