I had nothing to do for fifteen minutes but stand around and wait. I stared out across the waves toward the island until my eyes hurt. Finally, at last, I saw our two boats sailing toward the ship. Grandpa, Sage, Bob, and Bill were in one boat, Team Mongoose was in the other. That just left Team Ragtag on the island.

It was a calculated risk. We had over five hours until the next wave had to be cleared. Theoretically, Ragtag shouldn’t even have to do anything, just stand there and look pretty. If one of our rival teams decided to try to attack us, though, they'd be in big trouble.

I was making a gamble, but one I thought could pay off big. The NPC sailors hauled the boats up into their hoists as Grandpa and Sage climbed up to join me.

Sage was wearing the hat she'd stolen from the first pirate captain we'd killed. "Are we ready?" I asked.

"No sense wasting time," Grandpa said.

Sage put her finger on the beta node island. "Set course for Sage Point," she ordered the NPC captain.

The captain saluted her. "Aye aye, Captain Sage."

Wind billowed in the sails. The helmsman turned the wheel, and our ship set course for the other island.

"Did you hear that?" Sage exclaimed in delight. "He called me captain! It must be because I stole the hat. I got a promotion now. Do I have a title?" She dove into her menus and emerged again a moment later, looking disappointed. "I don't. That's not fair. I want to know how to get the title. I need an achievement." She looked up at the sky overhead and addressed the system. "I want a pirate captain title. Do you hear me? Make me an achievement for that."

"Don't go changing your class now, Sage," I said. "Not when you're doing so well as a Barrel Rider."

She pouted. "I wanted Rodeo Queen, but that wasn't one of my class evolution choices. Maybe next time. Or maybe I will multiclass. Horses aren't much good on a boat."

"Are those even options?"

"They should be."

It took us about 40 minutes to reach the other island. Once there, we took both boats over. Grandpa ordered the NPC captain to return to our island without waiting for us. The two boats were programmed to return to the ship no matter where on the map they were. It was another calculated gamble. If we all died without recovering one of our boats, we would respawn on the pirate ship, which would be anchored off the coast of our island, and have no way to reach the shore. However, by sending the ship on ahead of us, we were that much closer to getting back to our node control point.

We assembled on the beach, and I looked at Jones. "How's our camo working?"

Part of my planning had included perusing the skill list from the five Mongeese. Jones and the others all had entirely different names listed on their skill sheets, but Grandpa and I had agreed to respect their covers and use the names they had given us. I had been nearly overcome with laughter when I learned Tall Smith’s class was [Ring Knocker]. I’d had to go off on my own and take long deep breathes for a good five minutes after that one.

Anyway, Jones, who was a [Army Scout] had a camouflage skill which would keep all of us from appearing on enemy minimaps unless they had a high enough level of pierce camouflage. Hopefully they didn't. We had activated it before leaving our ship.

"I can keep it up for another twenty minutes," he said, "but only if you stay within a hundred yards of me."

This island was about three times the size of ours. A hundred yards was a long way, but hardly enough.

I checked my minimap. There were red dots on the far side of the island, and blue dots mixed in with those red dots, as well as blue dots around what I presumed was their node capture point, since it matched the location where their sigil had been on the big map.

"All right," I said, "looks like there are eight of them. Five are busy with clearing a wave. As we know, that doesn't take too long, so we've got to hit hard and hit fast."

We moved off through the jungle toward their node point. This island looked a lot like ours, right down to the same kinds of trees and jungle. Their node, however, was at the bottom of a bowl-shaped valley. It was a big stone ring about eight feet tall in the center, devoid of trees, with stone steps cut into the side of the bowl. Three aliens patrolled the bottom of the bowl, glancing frequently up toward the jungle. We lay low beneath the concealing fronds of palm.

"Those are the ugliest aliens I've seen yet," Sage said.

They really were. They had three legs and an odd rolling gait where they would rotate which leg was in front, like they moved forward by spinning. Their heads had two wide multifaceted eyes, one on each side, and they had cilia-like tentacles hanging in front of their maws. If I knew anything from Grandpa's lectures on hunting, the eyes meant they were a prey species originally, trying to watch everywhere for predators. They would likely see us as soon as we came out of the trees.

"Sage, how close do you have to be to activate your three-barrel race skill?"

She rubbed her hands. "I'm looking forward to this!" She had only gotten a chance to use it in combat once before. It let her designate three locations, one where she started and two others within 300 yards of that first spot, and then teleport between them as much as she wanted.

There were big piles of crates, boxes, barrels, and bags in the valley below, like at our node but even worse, like the aliens were having a big rummage sale. It didn't look like the aliens had started to unpack their supplies, just piled them up wherever they felt like it. The patrolling aliens had to weave around between them.

Sage marked out the two largest piles. "Those are mine," she said.

"Right." We were going to need to get a little bit lucky here, but I thought we would be able to do it. I took a deep breath. "Bill, Bob, you're with me."

I grabbed for Bob. This was a move I had practiced, but not yet used for real. We stepped out to the edge of the trees, and I activated Fastest Gun in the West with my arms wrapped securely around Bob’s torso. We rushed forward right into the center of the bowl.

The aliens pointed their weapons at us right away. I cast Call ‘Em Out, even though that probably wasn't necessary, just as Bob cast Babble. Then the rest of my team broke from the trees to join the fight.

The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

I focused on the nearest alien, who was suddenly having trouble using his weapon. Bob’s Babble skill had leveled up. Now, in addition to making it hard for them to work together, it also sometimes made them have trouble using complicated equipment. It looked like I'd gotten lucky.

I put a Trick Shot through the appendage holding the weapon, just for good measure, and then shot the rest of my cylinder into the alien's torso. Big, green globs of bloody flesh tore loose.

Team Mongoose were firing their M4s, and I was glad they had a skill that meant their weapons didn't hurt us, because the bullets whizzed right past my head as I reloaded. Sage had Lassoed one of the three aliens. It was running around in circles, pointing its weapon at the ground and firing. It shot big, purple blobs of jelly that turned the grass to dust where they hit.

"No fair! I can't attack the others while he's got the Babble debuff," she said in disgust as we took down the aliens. A moment later, their bodies vanished, presumably to respawn on their own ship. Respawn was almost instant, but getting back took time. We only had two landing boats, which took almost ten minutes to reach the beach from our ship. I hoped the aliens had the same constraints.

"Go, go," I told Team Mongoose. They took off for the north. I watched my minimap. All of the previous blue dots were now red, presumably because we had attacked them, which made it hard to tell which ones were the aliens and which ones were the NPCs. My guess, though, was the five red dots heading our way were the aliens. Babble might have prevented the three here from alerting their friends, but as soon as they had died and respawned, they would no doubt be able to communicate again.

Team Mongoose sped north as I pinged the map where the aliens seemed to be. Then Grandpa, Sage, Bill, Bob, and I got to work stealing the aliens' gear.

We went through those piles like a kid through Christmas, grabbing bags, crates, boxes, everything we could pick up, and stuffing them in our inventory.

A couple of the crates were over my weight limit. I could now store anything that weighed less than 120 pounds in my inventory, but there were a couple of big coffin-shaped boxes that I couldn't manage. That made me want them even more. I spent some time trying to figure out how to open one up. It seemed to have some sort of fingerprint ID, or the equivalent for those aliens, and I couldn't get anywhere with it.

Bill noticed what I was doing and came over. "I think I can help with that," he said. He pointed his finger, and a yellow stream of liquid came splurting out in a jet. It cut into the side of the box.

"What's that?" I asked. He hadn't had that skill the last time we had worked together, I didn't think.

"It's called Environmental Safety Hazard. There's a couple different forms it can take. I picked it up from a skill seed on that last mission, you know, the one with the weird kung fu people."

I wasn't going to complain. A circle fell out of the side of the box, revealing the contents. I reached in and started grabbing. There were several smaller bundles, all weighing less than my weight limit. I took everything.

Jones sent us a message. We got three of them. Smith's down.

Buy us a few more minutes, I said. Then make for the boats.

I pinged my mini-map again and spotted a single red dot moving from the ocean to the sea. I swore. "Looks like they're landing really close to our boats." Cancel that. Disengage. Get to our boats now. Whatever you do, get one of the boats away. I turned back to my team. "I think they're going to try to cut off our escape. We need to get out of here."

"There's still so much to loot!" Sage exclaimed, popping up next to one of the two piles she had marked. She grabbed armloads of boxes.

"You want to get caught and have them make us give it all back?" I demanded. "Come on."

I grabbed a last few goodies myself. Team Mongoose had disengaged, like we asked. They were down to just two. And now three more of the enemy were approaching the shore. "Let's go," I said.

We ran for it. "I didn't really get to use my ability," Sage lamented. The plan had been, if the aliens had made it back, that she would dart between the piles, doing as much looting as she could, and then use her third point as a getaway.

I debated trying to give Sage all of the loot, and then shooting her in the head to make sure she got away. But that didn’t feel right to me. Even if it was a good strategic move to make sure we got away with everything, I couldn't kill my own sister. Not even temporarily.

Besides, if we didn't get those boats, we were screwed. Hold up, I told what remained of Team Mongoose. They're on the beach. We need to hit them hard together. We need to assume they've got some sort of tracking skill like mine, and know we're coming.

Yeah, no, they won't, Brown replied. I've got my camouflage up.

Good. Whatever it takes, get those boats off the beach, even if you have to leave the rest of us behind. We'll respawn, and it'll be fine.

Roger.

My team had just become the distraction. If we could draw the aliens' attention while Smith and Brown stole the boats, this would be an all-out win. A couple of respawns was nothing compared to what we had just looted. They have a spot about 15 yards from our boats. They haven't moved in a minute. I think they're setting up some sort of entrenchment.

I pinged my map. "We're going to come in on this side, away from the boats. They may see us anyway, but it'll draw the attention away while Brown and Smith get the boats out. Sage, I want you to try to get away."

She shook her head. "It's too risky. If I don't go with you, they'll know it's a feint. We don't have any way of camouflaging."

That, at least, was true. I nodded. "All right. Bill, Bob, we're up first."

Bill and Bob had their guandao polearms out, I had my revolver, as we charged across the sands like it was the beach at Normandy. The aliens must have been taken off guard. They turned, raising their weird guns to shoot us. One lobbed blobs of purple goo my way, but missed. I shot him. I couldn't tell if it was the same one I'd killed previously, because-- I hate to say it, but they all looked the same to me. They had shiny silver uniforms with various different alien decorations on them that meant nothing to me.

I felt tingling on my arm. I looked down. One of the purple blobs had hit my left arm. It was crawling up it, encasing my arm in purple jelly. My skin burned. I tried to shake it free. I didn't dare claw at it, even though I wanted to. Instead, I raised my gun and fired again, taking one of the aliens out of the fight.

Smith and Brown were at the boats. They were hauling one to the edge of the water together. Smith jumped in, got one hand on the oar and the other on the tiller, and the boat started off. Brown went back for the other boat.

"Help him out!" I shouted. Sage had Lassoed one of the aliens again, preventing it from shooting at us. She ran for the boat, Grandpa on her heels.

Bill, Bob, and I charged the aliens. They had erected a small metal wall facing toward our boats and had something that looked a little too much like a machine gun for my liking aimed right at them. One of the remaining aliens dove for the machine gun. I shot at him and missed.

The burning in my arm was intensifying. I glanced down and nearly lost my lunch. My arm was gone. I could see white bone under the jelly, and it was crawling up higher. It had begun to wrap around my chest. I fired a Trick Shot at the alien with the machine gun and winged it. Bill and Bob blasted away with their mini guns. Another of the aliens fell forward.

Across the beach, Grandpa and Sage had reached the small boat. They were helping Brown pull it toward the water.

There was one alien left. He had a gun, and he was aiming it for my family. It didn't matter to me that death was only temporary right now. I wasn't going to let some alien melt my sister.

I threw myself forward and wrapped my jelly-covered skeleton arm around the neck of the alien. The goo moved off my arm and onto its face. The alien began flailing and kicking, letting out the most horrendous noises, like a pig being butchered if that pig had swallowed an accordion. I felt triumphant. I also was almost dead.

"Get to the boat!" I yelled to Bill and Bob. As I wrestled with the alien, they took off running, not even stopping. My health was still ticking down. I had a debuff on me called "Eaten Alive" and about 30 points of health left.

I saw the boat hit the water and start away. They were safe.

I reached for my revolver. I couldn't aim it. The pain was too much. I was lying on the sand with the alien under me as the purple blob ate away at both of our health. I had almost nothing left.

I fired a Trick Shot right at my own head.