Chaos rolled across the deck, through the shops and activity areas. Civilians screamed, gunfire peppered the air, and at least one area in the food court was already on fire. The Pirates had boarded.

  Kurt looked toward the rear of the ship to see a wedge formation of Pirates players advancing towards them. Kitty was in the lead, in a burgundy admiral’s coat, her short hair tied back into a bristling multicolored ponytail. She was firing her strange-looking handgun from the hip, and Kurt glared at it in confusion. The rounds caused small bursts of flame anywhere they struck, including on the guards attempting to mount a defense against the incursion. Behind the first wave of Pirates, Kurt could see a boarding area with a group of defenders in heavy armor ensuring that the less-equipped players could climb aboard via the ladders or ropes hanging over the edge.

  A glance at his map showed Kurt that the tug had attached to the rear of the cruise ship, and the Pirates were swarming from it en masse. An older man with stringy grey hair ran past him with a blood-curdling battle cry, clinging to a rusted saber and charging towards a nearby guard station. He wore nothing but a pair of tattered trousers, a gold hoop earring, and a wild grin. Flinching at the sudden explosion of violence that occurred when he reached his target, Kurt turned to face Kitty and her entourage.

  “Hi Kurtis! Glad to see you survived. Good work on the engines, you two. We still have almost ten minutes before the heat even starts. Our best attempt on this place yet,” Kitty commented.

  She fired off the remaining rounds in her pistol before dropping out a boxy, rectangular magazine with a vibrant red line around its base. She slapped a replacement in and holstered the weapon, placing her hands on her hips and taking in the scene. Nodding her head at the nearby guard post, she moved to climb up on top of it as the half-naked older gentleman emerged and began searching for his next victims. He charged at a group of ship’s guards attempting to secure a hotel doorway, but they managed to gun him down before he could kill many of them.

  Kurt stepped up to the guard shack Kitty had scaled and looked up at her with confusion. “So, we can use melee weapons? Nobody told me.”

  “Nobody tells you things because you can’t be trusted, Kurtis.” She wobbled a bit as she stood, then straightened her coat once she had stabilized. “Also, nobody uses melee weapons for pretty obvious reasons, as Steve just demonstrated.” She gestured towards the body of the older man with the saber, nodding when it fell to dust. “They take up a slot, everybody else has guns — it’s a waste. Steve there is . . . well, he’s Steve. Steve likes melee. We mostly let him do his own thing, and he, you know, mostly doesn’t team kill us with his swords.” She glanced upward, recalling a handful of memories. “Yeah, mostly. For sure not when it’s important, like tonight.”

  A series of shouts sounded from the tug and Steve re-appeared, hauling himself up a ladder. He had his rusted saber clutched between his teeth, and a feral look in his eyes. All of the other Pirates in the area gave him a wide berth, as he charged towards the hotel with a scream, bare feet slapping at the deck, saber raised in both hands above his head. This time he used a series of large, ceramic planters hedging the doorway to stagger his approach, and the guards didn’t survive the encounter. A wild look in his eyes, Steve searched the deck before finding another set of targets and rushing after them with his customary battle cry.

  A crowd had formed around the base of the guard shack, all eyes on Kitty as yet more Pirates swarmed over the deck from the rear of the ship. She looked around, searching for faces in the crowd and counting off on one hand.

  “Okay. I think . . . yeah, that looks like everybody. All my officers are going to be picking their crews from whoever’s already on board. Most of you guys are regulars and know where to go, so I’m not worried. Try to keep the wag casualties to a minimum. We have some important stuff going on here tonight and getting washed out by an instant ten bar will bum everybody out,” Kitty announced.

  She glanced at her phone, eyebrows raised. “Alright, ladies and gents, we have a little less than nine minutes before it starts getting hot in here, so let’s take this ship for everything she’s worth!” Kitty moved to step down and Jerome approached to offer her a hand. “Oh, and boss loot priority is whoever the hell you’re with at the time of the drop. Fall behind, get left that way.”

  The gathered Pirates roared a cheer at the phrase, and the various officers began barking orders and gathering their crews, dispersing the players to their gun battles and loot gathering.

  Jerome was covered in grenades and various explosive weapons. His sawn-off 40mm launcher was seated in a hard plastic holder at his thigh, a short metal tube was in a sling over one shoulder, and a boxy green rocket launcher with four barrels was resting on his other shoulder. He loosely held the monstrous weapon as he nodded at Kitty, expecting orders.

  Kitty lit up when she saw him. “Oh good, Jerome! Can you handle . . .”

  His lips pursed and he nodded, a scowl on his face. “Aye, I have the main deck and Company defense.” Jerome grumbled. He moved to climb up onto the guard shack Kitty had just vacated, grunting in exertion from the heavy loadout he wore. He wisely left the M202 Flash launcher below, perched against the guard shack.

  With a wide grin, Kitty smacked him on the rump. “You’re a peach, Jerome! I couldn’t do a damn thing without you.”

  Jerome fired his sawn-off grenade launcher into the air above his head. A piercing whistle cut through the screams and gunfire before a vibrant flare sparked to life above the deck. “All stragglers to me fer assignments! Every Pirate gets to raid, just get yer arses over here and I’ll find ye a spot!”

  Kitty played with her phone for a moment, ignoring Kurt and Rouge standing in front of her. In that stretch of time the rest of their group arrived. Jimmy and Gadot shoved their way through the crowd and stood beside Kurt.

  “Hear you saved the whole raid or some nonsense.” Jimmy shoved Kurt lightly, a small smile on his lips. “Good work.”

  Gadot was silent and wouldn’t look at him, a scowl dominating her features.

  BoneCrusher, FingerNels, and Godless followed shortly after them, moving to stand by Kitty and Rouge. Kitty made a small twirl in the air with her finger, moving away from the crowd as Jerome handed out raid assignments and groups scattered across the decks. Kurt moved to follow her, and the group walked underneath a nearby awning.

  “Okay, I think I’m patched into everything I need to be patched into,” Kitty said. She swiped at something in the air above her wrist. “Jerome, darling, we’re off. Let me know if my presence is required in any of this glorious mess.” Moving towards a covered doorway, Kitty waved nonchalantly for her group to follow.

  The Pirates officer core and the Lace members all followed her into a hotel lobby. A massive chandelier still swayed from the impact of the tug, crystals tinkling faintly above them as the sliding doors shut out most of the noise behind them on the main deck. Red leather and chrome trim dominated the decorating scheme, with giant fronded plants abutting each walkway. Behind a lavish counter, a single NPC huddled whimpering to himself as Kitty approached, boot heels clicking on the marble tile. She took out her strange-looking gun and laid it on the counter, swiveling it to face him as she motioned with her other hand for him to stand up. Kurt wasted no time in scanning the firearm, drawing a disgusted look from Kitty.

  FightLite Raider

  Pistol. Sidearm. Weapon drops upon death only if equipped in the Primary/Secondary slot.

  Caliber: 5.56x45mm NATO.

  Rate of Fire: Semi-Automatic.

  Capacity: 10 round magazine.

  “Ew, gun perv!” Kitty shoved Kurt away from the counter. “No respect for personal space. Sheesh!” She turned back to the visibly terrified and confused NPC behind the counter. “Sorry about that. Gimme the key for the elevator, I need to get to the Penthouse.”

  When he didn’t immediately respond, aside from raising his hands in surrender, Kitty gave a short sigh and drew one of her flintlock pistols, firing it into the ceiling above his head. “Do the thing!” she insisted.

  The hapless NPC shrieked as plaster dust rained down around him. He ducked beneath the counter and rummaged frantically before sliding a single key across the counter, only his hand appearing above it. Kitty blew him a kiss and sauntered away from the counter, snatching the key and her gun as she went. She tossed the empty flintlock over her shoulder, and Kurt had to step aside to avoid being struck.

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  Confused, he stooped to pick up the ancient weapon. “Don’t you need this?”

  Kitty stopped and turned around, glancing at her wrist while holding her coat open so the brace of flintlocks was clearly visible, one missing from its place. “In three, two, one . . .” As she finished counting down, the flintlock turned to dust in Kurt’s hand, falling through his fingers as it despawned. He looked up to see a fresh flintlock in its place on her chest. She drew it and fired past his head at the chandelier, causing a massive jangling crash as it fell into the center of the lobby. Kurt flinched away as she turned and headed toward a hallway, tossing the flintlock over her shoulder again.

  Jimmy stepped up beside Kurt. “That’s her Unique weapon. It’s a brace of flintlocks that respawn every thirty seconds, or three minutes if she uses all four of them. They hit like a truck and get free ammo. It’s a pretty sweet item.”

  Kurt nodded as Kitty turned and moved down the hallway while staring at the air above her wrist. Before the rest of the group could get to her, she appeared again, shaking her head. She entered the hallway opposite the one she had emerged from, still glaring at her phone. “Okay yeah, this way.”

  Jimmy chuckled and moved to follow her, Gadot checking behind as she walked beside him. Kurt narrowed his eyes as she passed him, carefully not looking his way. A quick shake of his head and he fell into step with the group.

  They all crammed into a small elevator and Kitty used the key to get it moving towards the penthouse.

  “Alright, gang, when these doors open we are going to be in one hell of a fight. Our objective is this man,” Kitty announced. She held her wrist up and each member of the group tapped their own to it, accepting the file. “Do not shoot him, please and thank you, he needs to open a locked briefcase for us, and our client on this run would like him left alive. We need every cent from tonight’s raid, so I’d love to be able to collect the bonus for not killing him.”

  Drawing her Raider, she stepped back behind Jimmy and placed a hand on his shoulder with a fierce smile. Jimmy sniffed and moved towards the elevator doors, taking a position beside Bonecrusher. Both heavily armored men readied their shotguns and took an aggressive stance at the front of the group, ready to step out when the doors opened. FingerNels stepped up behind Bonecrusher and drew back the bolt on his rifle before placing a hand on his partner’s shoulder to indicate his readiness. Godless and Gadot each went to a knee behind the front men, shouldering their rifles and taking sight between the crew members in front of them. Rouge nodded to Kurt and they flattened themselves against the walls towards the front of the elevator, ready to slip out at the first opportunity. Rouge drew her Tokarev, and Kurt his Coonan.

  The elevator pinged as it reached the penthouse floor and the doors began to slide open.

  Gunfire erupted from the room in front of them, sparking off from the walls and spattering into the armor of those in front. Jimmy swung his long-barreled shotgun and unleashed eight booming rounds into the armed guards in front of them, taking a few quick steps forward as he did. He performed a speed reload, grabbing four shells from his belt rack and practically throwing them into the underside of the shotgun before doing it again. Jimmy was back to firing within a few seconds, drawing looks from the Pirates. Bonecrusher in particular looked at him with amazement, struggling to hurriedly reload his own shotgun as FingerNels stepped in to cover him. The gunfire died down as Kitty’s team charged into the room, allowing Kurt a moment to squeeze around the corner and look for a place to hide.

  The room was populated by a handful of armed guards, their numbers shrinking quickly under the onslaught emerging from the elevator. Only a few of them remained by the time Kurt entered the room, and they were tucked away behind an overturned table facing the elevator. Keeping low, he darted to the edge of a long couch and used it as cover to approach the group of guards unnoticed. They were focused on Jimmy and the others, who were clustered near the elevator doorway firing at their cover. Standing during a lull in the firefight, Kurt hopped onto the arm of the couch and vaulted over the upended table, landing gracelessly on his side next to the stunned NPC guards. A smile and three gunshots later, and the room was clear. He stood and dusted off his suit jacket sleeve, turning to face his friends in front of the elevator.

  Kitty rolled her eyes at him. “Yep, that’s our Kurtis.”

  The Pirates spread out and cleared the room, finding no further armed foes. The penthouse suite took up an entire wing of the hotel, spreading along the top floor from aft to stern, each room large and spacious. As they looked into various areas, a fresh hail of gunfire erupted from a nearby double door leading further aft. Kitty flinched, lightly closing the door with an amused expression on her face. “Think it might be this way.”

  Jimmy had found a fire extinguisher and was busy putting out the table and couch Kitty had managed to set ablaze. Bonecrusher approached hesitantly, his SPAS-12 cradled in his arms. “Hey, man . . . how do you reload that fast?”

  Jimmy barked a short laugh, making sure the flames were out before setting down the extinguisher and pulling his Super 90 around from his back. He flipped the shotgun over and pointed to the loading port. “First thing you’ll want is a filed loading port. It’s a quick reload mod, allows for speed loading. It’s really basic and low level, though, so a lot of players overlook it.” He paused, pointing to his belt. “I also use a lot of these quad loader ammo rigs. They only hold four shells each, but you can grab them in a specific way, and that really helps a lot. After that, it’s just up to you. Research and practice, man. Hit up the old web, there’s plenty of instructional videos you can find on it.”

  Bonecrusher looked thoughtful, turning away and nodding. “Appreciate it. Kitty wasn’t joking about you.” He appeared unhappy, and Kitty walked over to throw an arm over his shoulder. She spoke under her breath in his ear and he started laughing, shoving her away. His mood appropriately improved, he moved to the balcony to look down the line of windows on their deck. The moment he drew the blinds, glass shattered and he grunted, a heavy round striking him in the chest and flattening against his armor.

  “We have snipers!” Bonecrusher closed the blinds again and stepped back, instinctively drawing his sidearm from a covered holster at his hip. It was another FightLight Raider, apparently a popular firearm in the Pirates, given the advantages of a sidearm-classed weapon that fired rifle rounds.

  Kitty sighed, looking between the door and window before glancing at her phone. Her eyebrows raised and she looked around the room again, hands on her hips. “Okay. Les, Gadot — window please. Counter snipe as you can. Boner, JimJam, secure the place for me, darlings. The Company will be knocking down that door in five or less. I seriously doubt we’ll be done in here by then.”

  Godless and Gadot moved to open the blinds as everyone else sidled away from them. Each sniper took one corner of the curtains and crawled away, drawing them open while staying low and out of sight. Gadot then took a position in the corner of the room, leaning out of the already smashed floor-to-ceiling window while keeping the majority of her body out of sight. Her lever action rifle had no mounted scope, so she produced a monocular and peered through that instead.

  “Looks like . . . three snipers across the deck. No, four — last one is on the roof. The other three are posted on the top floor, under cover on the balconies,” Gadot reported. She paused as Godless stood and stepped out into plain sight on the balcony, beginning what appeared to be a strange dance. He moved from one side of the balcony to the other in quick jerky motions, holding his rifle to his shoulder and attempting to aim through the scope on top.

  “What . . . uh . . . what is he doing?” Gadot asked. She spoke over a shoulder to Kitty, who huffed and pursed her lips.

  “He calls it an ‘Emergent Strategy’, claims all players who snipe will be doing it soon,” Kitty answered. She leaned against the door to the next room, crossing her arms as Godless continued his absurd-looking motions. He darted from one side of the balcony to the other, firing and cycling his weapon as he went. “I call it the ‘wiggly sniper’ and happen to think it’s intensely stupid.”

  With a shrug, Gadot brought her lever action 45-70 rifle to her shoulder and leaned around the corner, taking aim. “Les, knock it off. You’re not hitting them like that.” She fired a few times between his erratic bursts of motion, frowning when she couldn’t hit her target.

  “Don’t hate.” Godless was already out of breath from the exertion, and bullets from the opposing snipers were raining down across the balcony. Bonecrusher and Jimmy had both stopped their barricading efforts to watch the spectacle, leaning on the large table they had been shoving up against the elevator doors.

  “I’m not trying to oppress you or something, I just can’t hit anything with you in my line of sight.” Taking a quick breath and holding it, Gadot leaned out and took a shot at an enemy sniper. She leaned back behind cover, slipping four oversized shells into the gun one at a time.

  Godless grunted as he took a round to his armor. In response he increased his back and forth motions. “Sounds like you just suck at sniping to me.”

  Gadot took a deep breath through her nose and held it for a moment, pressing her temples with one hand. “Okay. Sorry Kitty.” She drew her large, black handgun and shot Godless in the back of the head. As he dusted out on the balcony, she leaned around the corner and fired four times, cycling the rifle with its lever and taking down a sniper with each shot. After finishing up, Gadot turned to look at Kitty.

  To her relief, the other woman had a huge grin on her face. “Couldn’t have happened to a nicer guy,” Kitty said, laughing. She moved to the balcony and picked up the guns, clothing, and armor he had dropped, tipping them over the rail. With that, the Pirates’ leader turned to give Bonecrusher and Jimmy a withering look. “That elevator isn’t gonna blockade itself, boys. And I’m busy.” Stepping towards the next enemy-infested room, she drew a flintlock and blew a hole in the thick wooden door. Once the return fire stopped, she leaned over and peeked through the hole for a second, before dodging backwards with a light giggle.

  Waving at the rest of the crew, she beckoned them over to her. Kitty then began sorting them, moving RougeWorrier and Kurt to stand next to the double doors, with Gadot and FingerNels directly behind them. BoneCrusher and Jimmy were busy shoving a table into the open elevator doors, ensuring that it would remain on their floor and hinder any NPC breach of the penthouse. “Okay, here’s the plan,” Kitty started, pointing to Gadot. “Gadot, on my signal, grab the door. Nels will cover you while I cause a little chaos so Rouge and Kurt can slip in. The room is a kitchen, so there’s a counter that will provide cover just to the left of the door.” She looked up. “Yeah, we wing it after that.”

  Kurt nodded and gripped his Coonan magnum, crouching into a runner’s stance. “Of course we do.”

  Rouge raised an eyebrow at him and shook her head. “And I didn’t believe you knew her.”

  Kitty chuckled at them and nodded, looking back at Gadot while reaching into her coat. She produced a bottle with a rag sticking out of the top and grinned while she shot the rag, lighting it on fire. “Okay, go!”