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Author's Chapter Notes:
free-for-all
After Maximilian’s party rounded the corner at the end of the corridor, Max and Justin quietly stepped out to follow them, the butler following a moment later to lead a very reluctant Bandit in the opposite direction.

From there, the two followed the Young Master at a safe distance, seeking to remain unseen by any other parties along the way as they moved to watch their friends’ backs through what was surely a trap of some sort.

They made it about halfway to the ballroom, when Justin spotted a couple figures skulking around a nearby corridor, pointing them out to Max, who was covering the other direction, and they stopped.

“Let’s check it out,” Justin whispered.

“But what about them?” Max whispered back, not liking the feel of leaving them unguarded, especially the unwelcome recollection of a certain storm-brewing afternoon from the last day of his childhood.

“Don’t forget,” Justin reminded him, “we’re also supposed to be watching out for any other enemies, too. Who knows what they’re up to?”

“You’re probably right…” With an effort, Max put away that foreboding memory, reminding himself that his present-day friends weren’t children, as well as that not investigating this potential threat could hurt them in ways none of them would know until it was too late to do anything about it. “Let’s go.”

Whichever side they were on, they quickly proved themselves more concerned with speed than stealth, and it took them nearly a minute to catch up with them, out on the deck.

The two of them looked at each other for a moment when they got a good look at their quarry, seeing that they had followed a group of four Cyexians out here, arousing immediate suspicion of their most enigmatic foes, and what they were up to.

They got their answer only seconds later, as the pirates started shooting at the automated sail rigging.

Justin gave Max a solemn nod, which Max returned, as they raised their own weapons to ambush them.

Yet as focused as the pirates were on sabotaging the sails, they were still anxious enough about being caught out in the open like this, that when one of them spotted Max out of the corner of her eye, she instantly turned and opened fire on him, and it was only his friend’s dead aim and hair trigger that stopped her shots from tracking him all the way.

By then, the others turned and started shooting at the two of them as they scrambled for cover, even as Max and Justin ducked back into the doorway.

“Hey!” one of Mercer’s men shouted from the bridge, poking his head out of a window to fire on them, “Get away from there, you backstabbing whores!”

The three pirates split up, scattering different ways, and so did Max and Justin, too, taking advantage of the unexpected save to resume their pursuit.

Mercer’s sentry apparently decided to conserve ammo, and let potential adversaries do the fighting for him, letting them pass out of his admittedly limited firing range.

Justin chasing one down the starboard side, Max racing after the other two as they bolted up some stairs to the next deck level, taking off in opposite directions at the top. Max instinctively took off after the one who fled in the direction he was already running, gaining on her steadily.

As she raced around the rear of the cabin, dashing madly up the port side, she snapped off several blind shots at him, missing him by a mile, but slowing him down enough to reach the front of the cabin and turn the corner.

Max, not wanting to allow her enough time to take cover and return fire, came flying around the corner, even as her partner, who had been fleeing from the opposite side, popped out to attack him.

On wild reflex, Max plowed right through her with a flying kick, without even breaking his stride, blowing her over the deck railing with a startled yelp. He stopped short at the same sight that halted his adversary, down on the main deck, which was enough to divert him from looking back at his fallen surprise attacker.

For Justin had cornered the remaining pirate near the bow, had the drop on her as she tossed aside her weapon in a gesture of surrender.

It was seeing her movement out of the corner of his eye that Max caught her partner up on his level taking aim at Justin. There was no way he would reach her in time to do anything, so his only option was to shoot her.

Unfortunately, his shot startled Justin, who wheeled around and very nearly pulled the trigger on his friend before he recognized him.

The remaining pirate used the opening to reach into her coat pocket, saying, “Wait! Don’t shoot me! I’ll drop this—”

Still she spoke too soon, as Justin turned back around and shot her, and the object she was reaching for, which looked to him like some kind of wrench, flew from her hand, clattering across the deck and under the scupper slot, consigned to the deep.

“Fools…” she gasped as she collapsed to the deck, her final words: “You’ve doomed us all…”

“What was that?” Max demanded, his position too far away to see much of anything before it went overboard.

“Hell if I know!” Justin hollered back. “Looked like some kinda tool to me.”

Max looked over to see that the Cyexian he’d stunned had also dropped something, a very familiar-looking radio handset, which he picked up and switched on.

“—any of you bitches are listening,” Mercer’s voice threatened, “we’re coming for you, just as soon as we’re through with the brat and that bounty hunter! You’re all—”

Max switched it off, clipping it to his belt as he turned to his comatose captive. The radio itself was all the proof they needed of Mercer’s newest treachery, even if his single-serving allies had double-crossed him in the end. As much as he wanted to get back to his friends, since Mercer was clearly still on the loose, he already knew what Uncle Angus, whom his run-in with Striker had so recently reminded him of, would say about leaving things half done.

To that end, he reached into his pack for a length of rope he’d prepared during that long stand-off, and tied her up with it to keep her out of the battle when she woke up.

“Come on!” Justin called up to him, his exasperation plain to hear, “We’ve still got a battle to fight!”

That settled, they headed for the Excelsior Ballroom, hoping to pick up their friends’ trail.