Glancing at his map again, Kurt noticed a patrol approaching and watched from his hiding place as a third guard entered the area. Nodding to himself, Kurt stepped out from his hiding place and rushed forward. He raised his Walther and shot the two guards on the ground level once each, dropping them before raising his gun and taking down the third guard. His aim was low, hitting the guard in the stomach. They fell forward, tipping over the rail and landing with a clatter behind the civilian workers.

  Kurt stepped closer, pointing his gun at both of them and motioning to get on the ground with the barrel. They immediately complied and submitted to the zip ties he applied to them. Dragging them both to their feet, he checked his map and hauled them back into the access room before zip tying their legs together and leaving them in place. He tried to glance at his map but was distracted by a new skill notification awaiting his inspection.

  Specialist

  Small Bore Rank 1 (Combat)

  “9mm vs 45. ACP? Bickering about caliber effectiveness is for people who can hit the ten ring. Argue less, practice more.” Unknown.

  Bigger doesn’t always mean better. Small caliber firearms have a niche role that only they can fill. 2% Reduction in map ‘ping’ notification for small caliber discharges. 2% Reduction in cost for exotic ammunition and weapon modifications.

  He added the new specialist skill to his watch list directly next to Magnum Force and closed out his phone. Once that task was accomplished, Kurt returned to the hallway and discovered the guards’ bodies were still in place. He frowned and glanced at the map, noting more guards milling about in their own areas and only a few actually patrolling. The bodies not dusting out must be a stealth mechanic, he decided, as he moved to intercept an approaching guard.

  A handful of guards and civilians later, Kurt had secured most of his area, with one notably large cluster remaining in a room off from the engine block. He frowned and attempted to zoom out on his map, only to discover it was at its maximum range for his skill level and would not allow him to see what was happening on Rouge’s side. A quick shake of his head and he decided to reach out. “How’s it going over there?” He spoke in a normal tone of voice, certain she could hear him above the engine noise.

  “Uh, yeah. Good. Why?” Rouge sounded more concerned about his progress than her own, and immediately made him self-conscious.

  “No, I’m fine. Wasn’t aware bodies didn’t dust out in stealth is all.” He paused. “Also, I have a big cluster up ahead, I think it might be the breakroom.”

  “Ah, sorry. Yeah, a bunch of stuff is different in stealth mode. If you drop a magazine, it also stays around until you break stealth.” He could hear her weapon fire a burst. “And I’m done. I’ll come join you. It’s definitely the breakroom, I already cleared out the first aid joint.”

  “I’m not too proud to accept help. This is a lot of wags.” Kurt happily reloaded his Walther and leaned back against the wall in a crouch, waiting for Rouge to arrive while watching his map. She surprised him by showing up in the hallway in front of him, without appearing on his map until he actually saw her. “Your stealth skills must be up there.”

  Her eyes went up and to the left as she considered. “Yep. Most of them are maxed out. I’ve been doing this for the Pirates since before Jimmy left. The specialist skills can be a bit . . . creative I guess?”

  Rouge noticed him staring at the air above his wrist and glanced at her own. “For example, the map skill gets ridiculous after a few levels. Progress on that one crawls, and most people give up on it. But there’s a trick to it.” A smile flashed across her features as she saw she had his full attention. “Glance at it, then act on that information. The longer you look at the map, the lower the EXP bonus.”

  Kurt thought about that for a moment, still looking at his map. “So basically, since I’ve been sitting here staring at this next room, I won’t be getting much EXP once we clear it?”

  “Not map EXP, no. Everything else has its own weird little rules. You can look up some of them on the forums — that can be a big help. But a lot of this game is just word of mouth or trial and error. People are pretty tight-lipped, and we don’t have the community size Brescia has.” She shrugged while checking the magazine in her tiny SMG. “This place is cleared aside from the breakroom, so I’m ready to breach when you are.”

  With a quick nod, Kurt stood and pressed his fist to the swinging door. He counted to three with his hand still pressed to the door, then shoved it open while moving aside for Rouge. The breakroom was populated by roughly a dozen civilian engineers in jumpsuits. They were clustered around a table with a birthday cake in the center, bright blue frosting glaring from the plate. Three guards looked up sharply and immediately reached for their weapons.

  Rouge stepped forward and raised her gun, shouting in a commanding tone. “GET ON THE GROUND!” She took one-handed aim at a nearby guard, and they opened fire on one another simultaneously. Going down with a pained grunt, Rouge crawled under a table while clutching her stomach.

  Kurt’s eyes widened as he leaned back and allowed the door to provide him some cover. He noticed the civilians had not bothered to comply with Rouge’s order, having seen their security supposedly deal with her, and one of them was hesitantly moving towards a bright red panic button on the nearby wall. His hand went to the patch of grenades at the small of his back and he shouted, “Hey Rouge! Over here!” while tossing a tube past her into the middle of the room.

  She turned and glared at him in confusion as he shut the door an instant before a loud, concussive explosion sounded in the middle of the room. Kurt entered again, raising his Walther and dealing with the remaining two guards, now dazed and helpless. Rouge was on the floor, cradling her head with ears covered, rocking back and forth while the effects of the flashbang wore off and bits of bright blue cake dripped from the ceiling.

  Kurt busied himself with zip tying the civilians, who were all in various states of distress, none of them capable of much more than holding their ears and moaning. When he saw Rouge stand and move to zip tie the other civilians, he waved meekly at her, a concerned grimace of a smile on his face. “Sorry,” Kurt offered.

  Rouge shook her head. “No way, that was exactly the right move. We were losing control.” She paused, looking at him with eyes narrowed. “I honestly wasn’t expecting a new player to just flashbang the wags like that though. Or me, for that matter.”

  “The way I see it, we’re the bad guys, but it’s like the old movies. It’s a job. Only hurt ‘em if you need to, but don’t hesitate when that time comes.” He thought for a moment, moving from civilian to civilian with his zip ties. “Actually . . . as a thank you for the map skill tip, and by way of apologizing for flash banging you, I have a pointer of my own to share. If that Uzi variant you use is 9mm, you can load it with rat shot for a quick and easy way to blow tires.” He looked back to her, seeing her eyebrow raised in interest. “I like blind-firing a drum mag of it out the door of a moving car. You blow out all the tires in a line and basically shut down the lane behind you as you go.”

  She frowned in thought before shrugging. “Rat shot is usually garbage ammo, but that actually makes a lot of sense. Thanks, I’ll try it. I always carry every type of special ammo I’ve unlocked, I can toss some in a stick mag.” Rouge turned back to their task, nodding to herself as she went over the idea. After they had finished, she looked around the room with her hands on her hips and smiled. “Not bad. Usually much more difficult to clear this place. Here.” She reached in a pocket and produced a palm-fitted silver ball that opened to display a geode interior filled with jagged red crystals. Nestled in the center was her card.

  Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  Rouge Worrier

  Shadow

  Kurt took the card with a smile, reaching to give her his in exchange. She tipped him a salute with it, before stuffing it into a pocket without bothering to read it. As he pocketed hers, he glanced at his wrist to watch her name appear on his contacts list.

  “Yay, stealth friend.” Kurt said in a small voice to no one. She snorted a laugh and killed their coms connection, tapping at her wrist as she set up a new one.

  “Hey. Yep, we’re clear and ready for you. No alarm. Let’s get this party underway.” Rouge paused with a frown. “Oh, okay. Yeah, we just have to go find the control override. Didn’t realize the tug was that close.”

  Leaving the break room with a wave for Kurt to follow, Rouge glanced at her wrist and moved down past the rumbling engines. Kurt followed her to a control panel with a glaring red button over a wide metal handle. He looked around to take in the small area they had entered, more of a hallway connection than a proper room. On either side of them, the halls ended in elevator doors, roughly fifty yards away. Behind them stood the break room door, down a hallway of piping and engine machinery. The button was labeled ‘Emergency Override’ and the handle had all the ship’s speeds etched into a metal plaque next to it. She flipped up the plastic case protecting the button and smashed her fist into it. Red lights flashed as a claxon blared over speakers tucked into corners. Rouge turned to face Kurt, an inquisitive expression on her face. “Would you care to do the honors?”

  She stepped back from the lever and flourished a hand over it. Kurt stepped forward cheerfully. “Don’t mind if I do.” He wrenched the handle down to ‘Full Stop’. The ship deaccelerated noticeably, causing both of them to grab at handrails to steady themselves from the sway. “Cool. Now what?”

  Kurt turned from the handle to see Rouge climbing onto the catwalk above them. Once she was atop it, she reached underneath her top and drew a ridiculously short pump shotgun before nodding behind him at the hallway. “Now we defend the room. Hope you brought something a little less civilized than that Walther.” She grinned at him from her perch.

  Turning to face the indicated hallway, Kurt saw an elevator door slide open. Spilling rapidly out into the hallway, shouting and pointing, came a swarm of uniformed ship’s guards. He fumbled to draw his Glock and sprayed a magazine down the hallway, forcing them to take cover behind various engine parts and buying himself a moment to look for cover of his own.

  Stopping to take stock was a bad idea, and earned him three rounds to the back, another squad of guards having come from behind. As the breath was blasted out of him and he fell to the ground in debilitating but brief pain, he noticed the underside of the control table was hollowed out. Kurt dragged himself underneath it, shoving and kicking as bullets pinged off the metal floor around him and blew sparks from the nearby piping. From his new vantage point, he could see clearly down the main hallway, but neither of the side halls were visible.

  His eyebrows peaked in frustration as he struggled to remove a magazine from his holster, crammed under the console as he was. It was jammed against his side and refused to come out, but the Coonan slid down across his chest into view, still nestled in its holster. He could see the guards were rapidly approaching from both sides. Kurt shook his head and grabbed the magnum, letting his Glock drop to the floor in front of him.

  Kurt fired at any legs that came into view, hearing a pained shout from the catwalk above. The roar of his magnum was deafening in the enclosed space, and he very nearly smashed it into his own face with the recoil more than once while emptying its magazine. He could hear the shotgun above him discharge as the last of the guard swarm fell to the floor in front of the console. He shoved his way free as Rouge berated him.

  “The hell are you doing down there?” She had laid down on the catwalk, tucked partly beneath a system of piping, slipping shells from her belt into the shotgun and glaring at him.

  He cast around for a moment, retrieving the Glock and reloading it. “A bad job, obviously! I got swarmed, leave me alone.” The elevators pinged again, and he narrowed his eyes. Taking a shooter’s stance, he downed the cluster of armed guards who poured out from one side and flinched away from the rounds he took to the back in the process. Turning with a grimace, he used careful bursts to pick off the guards coming from the opposite side. With a glance at the central hallway, Kurt released an expletive and dropped his empty magazine. Stepping up to the corner, he slapped another magazine into place and blind-fired around it before dropping out that spent magazine as well. When he reached for another, he realized the holster was empty and, glancing at his wrist, saw that the timer showed ten seconds to recharge. His health was also dangerously low, but his armor upgrades were holding up nicely, with just over fifty percent armor remaining. If he could just keep from getting shot long enough to regenerate some health, he figured he might just make it out of this.

  “Rouge! I’m out!” Kurt shouted.

  She glanced at him, whipped out her micro UZI, and sprayed a line of rounds into a wide pipe above the hall in front of him. Jets of steam hissed from it and shut down the walkway, giving Kurt time to regenerate a magazine of +P. He slapped it home and aimed at another pipe above the opposite walkway, creating another wall of impenetrable steam that allowed him time to regenerate.

  Rouge was busy keeping more guards at bay up on the catwalks, unloading and reloading her shotgun repeatedly. She was hiding beneath some pipes that made it hard for the approaching guards on the second floor to hit her, but completely exposed her to fire from the ground level. Kurt shoved his Glock in its holster and switched back to the Coonan, slipping in a magazine of armor piercing .357 rounds and waiting for the walls of steam to drop.

  Guards came in great supply, and Kurt continued swapping between his guns, even being forced to use the Walther in one particularly rough wave when both other guns’ ammunition supplies reached their cooldowns quicker than usual. He tried the Ratshot in his drum magazine, but it was more or less useless, as his friends had warned him. Its power levels and accuracy at range were terrible, and it took most of the 50-round magazine just to bring down two guards behind partial cover.

  After the fourth wave of guards attempting to reach the console fell to dust, Kurt lost his patience. “What exactly are we waiting for?”

  “Don’t worry, you’ll know it when it happens. They were close. Shouldn’t be long now.” She peeked out from her hiding place and fired the shotgun with a small chuckle. “Thanks for tanking for me, by the way.” Rouge winked at him when he glared up at her.

  Kurt laughed at that in spite of himself, checking quickly to see which gun he should start with on the next wave. His Glock’s ammo was recharging again, and the Coonan had a magazine finished, so that’s what he went with, exasperated but ready.

  Midway into the next wave of guards, Kurt was thrown violently from his feet and sent sprawling across the floor. Rolling over, he shot the remaining two guards with his magnum before they could regain their footing.

  The entire ship started screaming in pain, the sounds of metal tearing and shrieking permeating their level. Kurt looked around for more guards before turning to Rouge. She was clambering out from her hiding spot and smiled widely at him.

  “We did it. C’mon, let’s go,” Rouge said. She vaulted the railing and dropped down to Kurt’s level, landing in a crouch. Then she turned and walked towards the hallway. She stowed her tiny shotgun beneath her top again and drew a wood-handled handgun with a long, bulky suppressor attached.

  “What pistol is that?” Kurt asked.

  Raising it to fire at an oncoming guard, she frowned at him. “Cover our back, noob.” Rouge looked around, glanced at her map, and apparently decided they were safe enough for her to explain. “It’s a Tokarev.”

  Kurt nodded as if that meant anything to him. He followed Rouge into the elevator, leaned against the wall and raised an eyebrow. “So, why that gun?”

  Rouge pressed the button for the main deck. “You don’t think much of other players having secrets, huh?” When his only response was a shrug coupled with a slight smile, she sighed and continued. “The scan screen won’t show this, but the Tokarev has slight natural armor piercing. You can stack it to pretty good effect with stuff like steel core ammo. Punches right through heavy armor and does major damage when used to sneak attack.” She waved a hand. “Game is full of little easter egg details like that.”

  Nodding again, a thoughtful look on his face, Kurt swiped his phone open to check his skills. Rouge continued, “For example, this is sort of a section break for this place. Any experience bonuses you’ve earned for a section aren’t applied until the section breaks. It can be hard to find out exactly where they are, but it tends to be location or loot-based in the bigger raids.”

  The elevator jostled to a soft stop, and the doors chimed as they slid open. Kurt’s phone made a much noisier series of chimes, the same celebratory sound it had made when he unlocked the Infiltrator class. Since he was already browsing it, the notification commandeered his screen.

  Class Upgrade

  Ghost

  Good at getting into places they are not permitted and dispatching foes without being discovered, the Ghost is a powerful ally.

  While the Ghost class is equipped, a bonus percentage equal to ten ranks is applied to each of the following skills:

  Cartography, Disguise, Gunslinger, Liar, Planning, Small Arms, Sneak Attack, Stealth, and Underhanded.

  Specialty services, clothing, and weaponry have been unlocked for purchase and use. Lock Picking is 25% faster with this class equipped. Map presence is reduced by a further 25% with this class equipped.

  Kurt stared at his upgrade, a smile growing wider as he read the benefits. “I just got a class upgrade!” He turned to see Rouge already part-way down the hall and hurried to follow.

  “‘Grats, noob.” She turned back towards him with a scowl. “Easy part is over, though. Keep up. We have to go meet up with the rest of the group.”

  Still smiling, Kurt fell into step beside her and happily opened the door onto the main deck.