A thunder crack tore through the fog, not from the heavens but from the waterline off the port bow. It was a low, guttural report that vibrated through the bones before sound caught up with meaning. The Horizon Talon shuddered under the impact as solid iron slammed into her mid-deck broadside, striking just below station six. For a breath, it sounded like the hull had split.

  But the new armor held.

  The reinforced plating deflected the shot with a shriek of tortured metal, splinters erupting from the outer rail where the force carried through. Paint scorched. Bolts groaned. Nothing gave way. Kade felt the deck flex, then settle.

  "Return fire," she barked. "I want that asshole off my ocean."

  Maleko's crews moved as if they had been wound tight for hours and were finally cut loose. Cannon ports flared open, lines snapped taut, and the priming torches touched off the Talon’s response. Half a dozen guns thundered in sequence, rolling through the fog like a god’s ribcage cracking open. The air tasted of salt and fire.

  "Still think that’s the Widow’s Grin?" Bishop asked from beside her, voice level but dry.

  Kade kept her eyepatch trained forward. "I'm big enough to admit I was wrong. Naomi’s ship was faster. Prettier, too. This thing looks like it eats its own crew."

  She should’ve seen it sooner. Shouldn't have dismissed the idea of a ghost ship so quickly. But her head had still been back at Block Island, knee-deep in the wreckage Naomi left behind. Not because Naomi had outgunned them. She hadn’t. She’d just slipped through at the exact wrong moment, all charm and cannon smoke, and kicked over their investigation into Project Catalyst and the fate of the SMC like it was a damn sandcastle.

  Naomi hadn’t even known what she’d done. That was the part that still burned. She wasn’t trying to sabotage their investigation into Operation Catalyst, wasn’t aiming to bury the best chance they had of finding the missing SMC teams. She’d just wanted the prize. Everything else was collateral. Flowers trampled underfoot while she chased her own storm.

  Kade clenched her jaw and forced her focus back to the present. This wasn’t Naomi. And the Talon was still intact. Time to act like it.

  Another volley came three seconds later. This wasn’t some cursed wreck lashing out in blind rage. There was a mind behind the wheel. Maybe dead, maybe worse, but still thinking. More shot ripped across the Talon’s bow in a shallow strike. The deck jolted under the impact, as the helmsman kept the wheel steady with no need to be told.

  "She’s trying to flank," Bishop said. "Angle’s tight, but she’s got speed."

  "Let her try," Kade replied. "We’ve got control. Give me drift to starboard, fifteen degrees. Pour on wind… now!"

  The midships mage lifted both arms, fingers cutting through the air in sharp spirals. Wind caught the sails like a slap, hard and precise. The Talon twisted beautifully, bringing her guns to bear again just as Maleko barked for reloads. Ramrods moved like piston arms. Powder, shot, tamp, ready.

  "Fire."

  The Talon’s guns roared again, the broadside lighting up the fog like a flashbulb, and somewhere in the haze, something broke. A crunch. A whine of snapping metal. Maybe a railing, maybe a gun mount. Hard to say with the fog coiling around everything like smoke that hadn’t made up its mind which way to go.

  Kade scanned the shadows ahead. The enemy ship was closer now, closing the distance faster than it had any right to. It didn’t cut through the water. It dragged forward, as if something below was hauling it along by the bones. The image of its last victim surged up in her mind. She remembered the shredded hull, the twisted deck, the barbed steel buried deep in the midline. Harpoons. That thing hadn’t tried to sink the ship. It had attempted to drag it in.

  She was happy to oblige, but on her terms.

  "Chain shot!" Kade ordered. "I want their sails in the water."

  "Aye!" Maleko shouted from below. His team scrambled, hauling chains and grooved balls into the loading racks. Chain shot wasn’t subtle, and it wasn’t meant to be. It tore canvas, snapped spars, and shredded rigging. You used it when capturing didn’t matter. You used it to stop a ship from running or fighting back.

  Another blast hit. The ghost ship’s third shot grazed the aft quarterdeck. A storm of iron rang out as shrapnel hissed overhead. Bishop flinched when a chunk of spar exploded near his shoulder, but he stayed on the wheel.

  "Beginning to regret that transfer," he muttered.

  "You were bored on that destroyer," Kade said.

  "After being shot at multiple times in the last two weeks, I'll take bored."

  The Talon’s portside guns fired again, this time with the chain shot. Each barrel kicked savagely, as if it wanted to leap overboard. The sound was distinct too. More shriek than boom, like metal claws raking through timber.

  The result came seconds later.

  Through the mist, the shadow of the enemy ship shuddered. One of its masts, the forward one, bent sideways at the midpoint and then gave way entirely. It cracked like a snapped femur, rigging trailing behind it as it went down in slow motion. The sails tangled. For a breath, the shape in the fog listed just enough to show weakness.

  Kade leaned forward, one hand gripping the edge of the helm housing.

  "There it is."

  She didn’t cheer yet, though. It had wounds, but it wasn't dead, and things made of rot and hate had a way of biting harder when cornered.

  "Maleko," Kade called, raising her voice just enough to cut through the sound of battle, "another volley. Target her gun deck. I want them blind and deaf."

  "Aye, ma'am!" came the reply, followed by the bark of ready commands down the line. Crews pivoted. Powder chests slammed open. The gunners adjusted elevation with steady hands and clenched jaws.

  The Talon’s broadside roared again, the deck bucking beneath Kade’s boots. This shot landed cleaner. In the fog-shrouded distance, a ripple of fire licked across the enemy gun deck as cannon ports splintered inward. Gunners would still be alive, maybe. But they wouldn’t be shooting anything for a while.

  "Good hit," Bishop said. "Too bad it looks like we're going to have to take the fight to them if we want to end this."

  "They’re not going to wait for an invitation," Kade replied. "Here they come."

  The harpoons fired with a sharp, mechanical snap that echoed across the water. Heavy metal cut through the mist with unnatural speed. One of them struck the main rail, embedding deep in the reinforced frame. Two more slammed into the upper deck, dragging lines behind them that hissed as they snapped taut.

  Another found flesh.

  The crewman barely had time to cry out. One moment he stood at the portside coil station, the next he was impaled clean through the chest. The force of it yanked him off the deck and into the fog, his body vanishing over the side like a puppet. There was no scream. Just the wet crack of impact and a dark smear across the boards where he’d stood.

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  "Arms topside!" Kade shouted. "Prepare for boarding action!"

  Below, the response was immediate. The hatch burst open with the clatter of boots and steel as Briggs emerged at a dead sprint, Marines close behind. His axe was already in hand, and there was a grin on his face like someone had just handed him a birthday. The rest of the Talon's strike team surged up behind him in a wave of armor and readiness, crossbows slung or blades drawn, eyes locked on the rail. They moved as if they’d been waiting for this moment since the ship left dock.

  "Hell of a way to start the morning," he called as he charged up to the rail.

  Myers was right behind them, blades swinging at his hips, head tilted with that cocky half-smile he wore when something stupid was about to happen.

  "Boss, if I get the chance to do the heroic pirate boarding action of swinging across on a rope, I'm taking it," Myers called to Kade with a bit of a wicked grin.

  Kade was surprised when she saw Robin come up next. Her revolver was already in hand, the hammer half-cocked and her eyes tracking every shadow on the enemy ship. Terrible trigger discipline, but Kade would take it in this situation. Colt brought up the rear, shoulders hunched low and warhammer slung across his back. He looked less like a fighter and more like a wrecking ball that had grown legs.

  Levi was nowhere in sight, and Kade didn’t waste time wondering where he had run off to. Whatever his excuse would be later, it wouldn’t matter now, but she would remember his lack of help.

  The Talon heaved beneath her as the harpoon lines snapped tighter. The enemy ship wasn’t dragging them anymore. It was pulling them in, hand over fist, like a prize already claimed.

  "Give me full right rudder. Don’t fight the pull."

  "You sure?" Bishop asked.

  "I want her close." Kade responded.

  "Hooks ready!" came a call from middeck. Marines hauled up thick boarding lines, each ending in a triple-hook claw designed to bite deep into wood and stay there. The Talon’s crew hurled them into the fog as soon as the distance closed. They caught fast. The two ships groaned as they locked together, hulls grinding.

  Figures lined the rail of the enemy ship. Dozens. Their skin pale and stretched, bloated with water and rot. Black eyes stared across the gap, unblinking. The drowned were waiting.

  The crow’s nest ballista thumped once. Then again. The ballista cord snapped forward, each bolt tipped with cold iron and flying clean through the mist. Two of the drowned dropped, one torn in half at the waist. A third lost most of its shoulder and collapsed in a heap across the rail.

  Ramps slammed down, heavy wood soaked in salt and scraped raw from battle, locking the two hulls together with a thunderous finality. Steel boots thudded into position. Blades rose. Crossbows steadied. The drowned stood shoulder to shoulder across the enemy rail, pale and silent, eyes black and bottomless. They didn’t growl or posture, they just watched.

  So did the Talon’s crew.

  Then Briggs stepped forward, raised his axe high, and broke the silence with a roar that shattered the last thread of calm.

  "Get some, you waterlogged bastards!"

  And just like that, all hell broke loose.

  Marines poured across the boarding planks with barely contained aggression and blades drawn. The drowned surged to meet them with the hungry silence of the dead, black eyes empty and unblinking, mouths just beginning to open with that guttural hiss Kade associated with too many bodies and not enough graves.

  Kade ran down from the helm, cutlass drawn, her hair whipping to the side as she hit the main deck and crossed to the nearest ramp. Steel rang out ahead of her. Briggs was already halfway across, locked in with a drowned that slammed into him with brute force and no finesse. They wrestled along the narrow plank, neither giving ground. Then Briggs twisted low and used the haft of his axe like a lever, flipping the thing over the side. It hit the water with a splash and vanished beneath the foam.

  Further up the deck, Myers took a rope and swung past the boarding planks entirely, boots landing squarely on the ghost ship’s rail. He grinned like a pirate from someone else’s fever dream and went to work, sword in one hand, long knife in the other.

  Behind him, the rest of the Marines poured across the boarding planks onto the ghost ship deck, moving in tight squads, pushing hard. Fireteams split to cover the upper deck while a second wave came in behind them, pressing the advantage. Shouts rang out. Steel found rotten flesh.

  Robin didn’t wait for orders. She moved as if she’d been waiting her whole life for this. Once the ramp ahead of her cleared, she was across in three strides. A drowned lunged at her. She shot it mid-charge without breaking pace. Her rapier was in her other hand before the first body hit the deck. She weaved through the melee as if someone had choreographed a merciless just for her. One cut. A parry. A pivot through a second attacker. Blood spilled. She didn’t slow.

  The Talon shuddered as more drowned tried to board from the far side. One of them leapt from their deck with a rusted boarding axe raised high, aiming straight for Kai Maleko. The gunner caught the downswing with a belaying pin and drove the butt up into the drowned’s throat. It staggered, gurgled, and went down under the boots of another crewman, who finished the job. Maleko didn’t even stop moving. He was already shouting reload orders and repositioning his deck gunners to cover the flanks.

  Further down the deck, one ramp groaned as more drowned tried to force their way across. Colt was waiting for them.

  The big man didn’t look like much from a distance. No armor or fighting stance to speak of. He was a slab of muscle with a warhammer braced across one shoulder. But when the first drowned stepped onto the plank, the hammer came down with a crunch that folded the thing in half and tossed it back into the water. Another climbed over the railing. Colt met it with a sideways swing that took its head off clean.

  By the third, they started hesitating.

  Kade was halfway across the central plank when another drowned lunged. She drew and fired, the revolver kicking once, twice. The shots punched through its torso and shoulder, spinning it to the deck. She holstered in motion, cutlass already back in hand as her boots landed on the ghost ship’s deck.

  Marines to her left were locked in and going to work. The drowned weren’t clever, but they were tireless and unafraid of pain. The only way to win was to put them down faster than they could climb over each other.

  A rasp of breath behind her was the only warning she got. Kade spun to see a drowned officer bearing down, blades in both hands, rank medals half-rotted into its uniform. She brought her cutlass up to parry, and steel rang off steel.

  [Analyze] First Mate Rukhan | Level: 10 Elite | Status: Hostile | Class: Dark Buccaneer

  They exchanged three quick strikes, blades flashing in tight arcs. Kade ducked one, rolled through the next, and came up ready to counter. The ship rocked under her boots, but she moved with it, letting the sway feed her rhythm. Her deck fighter ability gave her an edge as the ship rocked back and forth.

  The drowned officer pressed harder, blades darting like teeth in a closing jaw. Kade shifted her stance and prepared to break the deadlock… then a heavy thud cracked the air behind her. Something wet collapsed just out of reach.

  She turned half an inch and caught sight of another drowned sprawled across the deck behind her, a massive ballista bolt driven clean through its chest. Its arm had been raised. It had been aiming for her spine while she fought.

  Kade glanced up while still engaged with the drowned officer.

  Corporal Ava Mercer stood steady in the crow’s nest, already reloading behind the ballista, one boot braced on the rail like she’d been born up there.

  "Pay attention, Lieutenant," Mercer called down. "They don’t like it when you stab first."

  The drowned officer didn't give Kade a chance to respond as it feinted low and then snapped high, its rust-pitted blade slicing against the edge of her pauldron with a screech of steel. The blow forced her a half-step back, shoulder ringing from the impact.

  She didn’t give it a chance to follow up as her boot came up fast, catching the creature just below the knee. Bone cracked. The thing dropped to one leg with a wet snarl. It was still fighting, still dangerous, but slower now and off-balance.

  Kade batted aside its next strike and came over the top. Her cutlass clipped the thing’s ear, then bit deep into its upper chest, sliding through decayed flesh and shattered bone. The blade carved down, cleaving the shoulder clean from the rest of the body.

  She planted her boot against its chest and kicked. The corpse slid off her steel and crumpled backward onto the deck in a heap of ruined uniform and twitching limbs.

  She didn’t wait for it to stop moving. Kade gave a sloppy salute up to Mercer and then turned back to the fight.

  The crew was holding the line, but not gaining ground. until Briggs rallied the Marines on the deck, barking orders over the sound of steel and screams. He kicked one of the drowned off the edge, planted his axe in another, and pulled it free in one smooth motion. Blood sprayed. The Marines surged with him, pressing forward across the main deck.

  Behind them, Colt remained where he was, still holding that boarding point like a stone in a river. A dozen bodies lay broken at his feet, and he hadn’t taken a step back.

  Myers had worked his way to the forecastle stairs, blades flashing in arcs as he cleared the path forward. Robin followed behind, covering his flank and putting down anything that moved. Even her reloading had a rhythm to it. Efficient and lethal.

  Then the drowned broke. Not all at once like often seen in the movies, but in how dying things do when they run out of bodies to throw forward. They faltered. They lost ground. The Talon’s crew pressed harder, reclaiming one foot of deck at a time until the fight had fully shifted onto the ghost ship.

  Kade’s boots landed on the aftcastle stair. She had reloaded her revolver, and her cutlass was ready in her hand, still dripping with drowned blood.

  The helm loomed above, dark against the fog-choked sky. Behind her, the sounds of battle kept going.

  The captain was waiting.

  That is the place to go if patience is not your strongest stat.