The file she shared was a slideshow of frames from the city map. Each was dated, and each showed a slow but steady progression of loss for the Pirates. Their turf stemmed from the ocean onto the mainland, but was stopped at a solid blue wall labeled for the Goons about midway into the downtown cluster from the south. As the slideshow progressed, it showed the undeniable progress that GoonStorm had made pushing them out of the city proper. They were reduced to the ocean itself, a handful of small islands, a few miles of docks and warehouses to the south, and a peninsula to the north.
“We’ve lost about 40% of our fronts, and most of our land based raids already. The CEO of GoonStorm is no fool, he knew he could never beat us outright, so he started hitting us around the edges and wearing us down.” Kitty shook her head, lips pursed. “A war of attrition, and it’s working. We have the ships and people to rain down hell on his troops and I dumped my personal fortune into a special surprise, but we can’t afford a war at the moment. As in literally, our war chest has no money for ammo.”
Gadot frowned at the pictures on her wrist. “How can we help?”
“So glad you asked!” Kitty became chipper. “Allow me to introduce you to our officer core.” She stood, draping an arm around the woman who had shared the turf pictures. “This is RougeWorrier, my raid lead.”
Rouge gave them a sharp nod, as Kitty moved around the table towards the friendly man with the rose-colored glasses Kurt had followed into the meeting room. “This is Nels, goes by FingerNels. I can’t figure out if that’s some kind of metaphor, or just a request.” She gave him a playful shove and ignored his ear to ear grin, moving on to her next target, the man with the shotgun wearing a red bandanna on his head. “BoneCrusher everybody! Our resident heavy weapons guy, and all around grouchy person. I’m pretty sure his game-name is because he has a crush on every boner, but he says otherwise.” She paused for a moment, leaning forward as if sharing a secret. “His real name is, by a wonderful cosmic alignment, Wesley. I personally enjoy the old references to Star Trek, and everybody else just calls him Boner.”
“Please don’t call me Boner.” He sighed and looked hopefully to the new comers. “I’d be happy with just Bones.”
“Shut up Wesley!” Kitty happily shouted as she moved on. “First rule of nicknames is you don’t get to pick your own, everybody knows that.” She poked her marksman in the shoulder, causing him to raise his wide brimmed hat and look around. “Speaking of terrible names, this is Godless. He does our long-range work, and occasionally annoys me.”
Touching his hat at them in a salute, he leaned back in his chair, tipping its legs off the floor. “Call me God.”
Kitty giggled and gave his chair a light push backwards, spilling him over the back of the chair with a curse onto the floor. “Whatever you say Les!” She moved around to the door and poked her head out. “Anybody seen Jerome?!” After getting nothing but shrugs, she shook her head and closed the door again. “Whatever, he’ll be around. He…yeah, he blows stuff up. You guys know him. Anyway, this is our core group. We all have the pleasure of working together!” She waggled a finger at the group. “That means not shooting each other, by the way…for now.”
Letting out a feigned huff, Kitty walked around the table to Kurt. She kneaded his shoulders, leaning in and ignoring the uncomfortable way he curled in on himself. “I have officers leading groups for the other major raids available on the Delight; the casino, the promenade, the ships vault, the armory, even the cabins.” She let go of Kurt, to his great relief, and continued her walk around the table. “Every cabin has a safe on board, all with random goodies. I’ve got crews running every angle, we’ll squeeze the ship for all she’s worth.” She paused there in thought, looking up to the ceiling for a second. “Probably sink her again too, but oh well!”
Rouge fiddled with her wrist again, putting it out into the middle of the table for the others to tap. “This is our objective.” The file she sent opened a standard raid prep list, with information typed onto photographs and short memo style files. Maps of the cruise ships VIP area, photos of armed guards with close ups of their weapon and armor, and a single photo with a red pen circle around a man in a suit. “Fluff says he has a bomb on board and the cruise ship is in grave danger, blah blah blah. It’s a simple ‘dude in suit has a shiny’ op, and we’re gonna rob em.”
“Woah, a bomb? What happens if he sets it off?” Kurt sat up straight, alarmed.
“Imagine it blows us all up and we fail the raid. It’s all just fluff and storyline, a Pirates crew thing, you don’t have to worry about it. It’s a cover from the game for yet another fetch quest. Once you’ve done a thousand of em, you start to see through the veneer.” Rouge shrugged as she spoke, clearly not concerned.
The sounds of a helicopter landing on the deck outside cut through the loud music, causing Kitty to perk up and move to the door. “Time to boogie people! Rouge, take Kurt with you. Something tells me he’s a sneak.” She stared at Kurt, a small but knowing smile in place.
Kurt stood and adjusted his jacket, feigning umbrage as he moved past her. He gave Jimmy and Gadot a brief nod, noting that Gadot was still glaring at him with obvious mistrust. Rouge moved up next to him, slugged him in the shoulder, and pointed to the helicopter that had parked in the middle of the dance floor. Climbing down the short ladder, Kurt’s feet slipped and he stumblingly fell the last couple of rungs. He quickly looked around, hoping nobody had seen his mistake. Rouge was the only one who seemed to have noticed, an eyebrow raised as she shook her head, clearly unimpressed. She turned and cheerily conversed with the pilot as he vacated the craft, before taking his place at the controls. The helicopter had a large Illusion News graphic on its side, which Kurt took a quick concerned glance at before moving to his door.
Sliding into the seat next to Rouge, Kurt noticed she was putting on a parachute and rapidly followed her example. With a bumpy jerk, the helicopter lifted off and the tanker became smaller at an alarming rate. Accustomed to Gadot’s somewhat frightening driving, Kurt was able to control his reaction to the jostling ride the helicopter provided.
Rouge looked over at him, narrowing her eyes for a moment. “You ever been on the Delight?”
“No, why? Something I should know?” He didn’t take his eyes off the dark sea, focusing on the small lights in the distance.
She rolled her shoulders in a noncommittal shrug. “Probably. We’ll figure it out as we go, just follow me and watch my back.” Rouge pointed at a particularly bright cluster of lights on the horizon. “There she is.”
Kurt strained in his seat to see as they continued their ascent. The ship came into closer view quickly, and he was immediately struck by the sheer scale of the thing. “That’s a floating city.”
“Ha! Yeah, pretty much.” Rouge adjusted the angle of approach, moving out in front of the gigantic ship. Along the sides of the vessel were what appeared to be full sized buildings, with windows at regular intervals and a vast empty space between them to compose the main deck. At the front of that arrangement was the control tower and helm, placed atop the hotel style buildings. She pointed at it, opening her door. “Try and land there, we need to get close to the helm.”
“What?!” Kurt turned to shout at her, following her form as it plummeted from sight. The helicopter immediately began to buck and wheel around, with no one at the controls. He scrabbled at his own door, finding the handle and wrenching it open to tumble out of the vehicle.
Kurt’s descent was somewhat less graceful than his previous parachuting experiences. He tore at his ripcord when he noticed that Rouge had already deployed her own parachute below him. Struggling to control his angle of approach, he managed to mostly follow Rouge in, diverting further along the rooftop. She landed gracefully, with a few running steps and a quick disconnect of her parachute. Kurt slammed onto the rooftop, stumbling and falling into a slide that rapidly drew him towards the edge of the roof. He fumbled at his straps for a few seconds before managing to get the quick re
lease locks undone, and allowed the wind to take his parachute over the edge without him.
Rouge stood with her arms crossed, the wind tugging at her hood. “Impressive. How new to this are you again?”
“Shaddap. A little warning before you bail out would be nice.” Kurt scowled as he watched their helicopter spiral slowly into the ocean far off to the side of the cruise ship.
Rouge smiled and nodded, lifting her hood as she moved to the lip of the roof, on the inside of the cruise ship. “Yeah, I bet.” There was no railing, and no access doors, merely a handful of sealed hatches scattered across the rooftop. While the area they were on was expansive and large, the constant swaying and wind caused Kurt some hesitation as he sidled up next to Rouge and peeked over. Becoming immediately disoriented, he swayed back and fell on his butt, scooting away from the edge again with concern on his face.
“Really dude?” Rouge shook her head at him, turning around and laying flat on the roof before pushing herself backwards off the edge. She grabbed the lip and swung inward, disappearing from view. “Fall behind and get left there, noob!”
Kurt took a deep breath, turned himself around and laid down flat on the roof. Slowly but steadily, he shoved himself backwards until his legs dangled off the ledge. The ship rolled slightly with the waves and he squeezed his eyes shut, palms flat against the smooth rooftop while he tried to get his fear under control. After taking a couple of deep breaths, he pushed himself back enough to let gravity take over. At the sloped lip of the roof, his hands slid and gripped at the ledge, swinging him inward and allowing him to drop to his feet on the patio of a cabin.
Leaning against the wall with her arms crossed, Rouge gave him a quick nod, turning to open the sliding glass door. She knelt and produced a lock pick gun, pressing it into the lock while peering inside. Kurt drew his Walther and slid up next to her, keeping out of sight behind the curtained half of the door.
She glanced up at him and scowled. “Nice piece. Put it away though, we talk first if we get caught.” Her lock pick finished, she pocketed the gun and stood while sliding open the door. “Always a good chance of talking your way out of trouble in a place like this. The drunken lost guest routine is a good one.”
Clothing was scattered around the room, along with various bottles of liquor, discarded room service containers, and suitcases. Kurt holstered his Walther, looking at the mess of a room while they moved through it. “How likely are we to meet somebody?”
Rouge cracked the cabin door, peering out into the hallway before stepping out, leaving the door open for Kurt to follow. She lowered her hood again and assumed a natural gait, moving down the hallway. “It’s a cruise ship. We’re not in a restricted area yet, so it won’t matter much.”
Thinking for a second, Kurt turned back and grabbed one of the partially filled bottles of booze, slipping it into his large inside jacket pocket. He then followed Rouge out of the door and down the hallway, making sure his jacket was buttoned to conceal his arsenal. They moved through what appeared to be a hotel hallway, aside from the ship terminology on the walls and the slight but constant motion of the deck beneath their feet.
The two stopped at a map in the middle of an elevator hub, hallways leading off in either direction. “Ummm….this way.” Rouge checked their location and moved through a set of double doors, heading roughly towards the front of the vessel. They passed what Kurt assumed was civilian NPCs enjoying their cruise, several with beverages in hand, or wearing black tie dress. He was pleased to watch his disguise skill begin ticking ever upwards once again, and swiped his phone closed with a smile.
After only a few moments of walking, they came to a set of heavily locked double doors with a camera in place watching them. It was a small black boxy thing, quite obvious, jutting out of the corner of the wall and pointing directly at the door. Rouge looked both ways down the hallway, then slipped along the wall towards the camera, being careful to keep out of its line of sight until she was directly underneath it.
“Keep an eye out. This will be fast, so stay out of sight, but get in the door when I say.” She waited for Kurt to nod his understanding before reaching into a pocket on her sweatshirt. Raising a small shining metal disk the size of a coin to the cameras underside, Rouge made sure it was affixed before tapping a button on it. The red light to the side of the cameras lens blinked to green, and she immediately thrust her lock pick gun into the door and opened her phone to watch the progress. A click sounded and she opened the door a crack to peek through, checking the hallway beyond for guards or cameras before turning back to Kurt. “Ok, now.”
He darted through the door as she held it open, noting that it clicked locked behind them again. At an inquisitive look from Kurt, Rouge explained briefly. “That disk is a Looper. You stick one to the camera and press the button for fifteen seconds of looped footage before it wears off. Usually enough for a quick door pick.”
“Ah.” Kurt added Loopers to his mental list of items to always carry, before recoiling as two guards walked past the end of the hallway up ahead, chatting amiably with one another.
Kurt’s hand went instinctively to his rear holster, and the suppressed Walther, but a look from Rouge convinced him to restrain himself. They moved down the hallway slowly, peeking around corners and keeping a sharp eye out for more cameras. The floor was painted with different colored lines; red, blue, and yellow. Following the red stripe, they moved forward on the ship.
“Where are we going?!” Kurt hissed in a whisper as they huddle around a corner, waiting for a uniformed ship security agent to walk away.
Rouge glared at him for a moment before answering in a low volume. “There’s emergency access to the engine room from right outside the Helm. If we can just get through these guards…” As she spoke, the guard turned and started to walk away. They slipped around the corner and approached a door marked ‘Helm.’ The red line on the floor ended there, the way forward looking heavily locked and reinforced, with long metal sidings. Another camera was in place over the door, but they diverted and moved down a nearby hallway, approaching a door marked ‘engine room access.’
“OK, watch my…shit.” Rouge paused, her lock pick gun out. She glared at a small white box directly above the door, with wires leading from it to the doors frame.
Kurt glanced at her in confusion, facing the hallway they had come from. “Ew, no.”
“No smartass, its alarmed. Once we open that door, the alarms go off and totally screw our time-tables.” She pocketed the lock pick gun and leaned against the wall, slowly scooting down until she was seated with her knees raised in front of her and her wrist held up. “Hey, yeah problem. The door is alarmed.” She rolled her eyes at an unheard response. “Yeah, cause I control the randomized mechanics. How far out is the tug?”
Nervously peering around the corner, Kurt noticed a guard coming their way and turned back. “We have a problem.”
“Shit. I guess we pop it and hope for the best. Gotta run, get here fast.” Rouge started getting up, but paused when she saw Kurt holding his specialized ECM to the alarm.
He aimed the antenna at the alarm box and pressed the button on the side, causing a tiny shower of sparks to erupt from the box. No alarms sounded, and he shrugged to Rouge as he pocketed the ECM. Wasting no time, she stood and jammed the lock pick gun into the door, impatiently watching her wrist as it worked. The door clicked open and they slipped through before the guard could walk past the short hallway and spot them.
“Dude. You just saved the entire heist. Several heists. That alarm goes off and it starts to eat up our Heat response buffer. Company would be swarming before our boat even got here.” Her gaze was frozen to the special ECM in his hand for a moment. “You really downed Clancy already?” She looked him over, a more serious expression than usual on her face. “You might be alright after all. C’mon.”
As she moved away from the door, Kurt took a moment to look at the room he was in. It was tiny, not much bigger than a supply closet. The o
nly thing in the room of note was against the rear wall, opposite the door. A part of the wall bowed out into a tube shape, from ceiling to floor, with a long metal handle on the side of it. Rouge moved over and grabbed the handle, sliding a door open and revealing a cramped area that held a fireman’s pole. A smell of oil seeped from the hatch, with the muted sound of machinery.
“Uhhh…” Kurt nervously stepped over to the pole and looked down into the cavity, immediately regretting it. He swayed back from the massive drop and looked at Rouge.
“Yup!” She cheerfully smiled at him before lifting her hood and grabbing a tiny SMG from a holster behind her back. It was small enough to fit in one hand, had the general appearance of an UZI, but had a suppressor jutting from its barrel and an oversized magazine sticking out from under her hand. She gripped the pole and slid down out of sight with a small laugh.
“Why is there so much to do with heights in this frigging game…” Kurt sighed and drew his Walther, stepping gingerly into the cavity and gripping the pole with the soles of his shoes. With his eyes squeezed shut, he loosened his grip and promptly lost control of the slide, dropping his gun as he attempted to recover. It rattled and banged down the pipe and landed with a soft thud as he followed, desperately trying to slow his descent to a survivable speed. The landing was not soft, but it didn’t cause any health damage either, just forced him to fall on his butt in front of an amused Rouge again.
“Don’t start.” Kurt grabbed his Walther from the padded mat beside him and went into a crouch beside Rouge. “Ok, what are we doing?”
She snickered and shook her head. “I’m gonna have to run with you again dude, this is fun. Gotta find some more stuff for you to fall off of.” Pointing ahead of them with her SMG, she stood and moved towards the exit door. “Once we get into the engine room, we have guards to kill and engineers to capture. We have to make sure we get all of them, and it’d be great if we could do it without the alarm going off.” She glanced back at him. “You have zip ties?”
The Life- Illusion Page 26