Mak'gar's orcs were holed up at Fort McHenry. A battered flag flew over the wooden walls, thirteen stripes and not nearly enough stars. Offshore, wooden warships pounded the fort with cannons.

"They've really got a whole instance themed after the War of 1812?" Sage asked skeptically. "We covered that in my correspondence History course, and it was like three pages."

"Yeah, that's 'cause you Yanks got your asses whooped," Mitch said.

Team Ragtag had come off of their two-hour nap and was swapping out for the Mongeese. Sage, Grandpa, and I still had a couple of hours of pep pills left in our system. I was planning to use every bit of it.

"We did not," Sage said. "My history book said that it was a stalemate."

"And a stalemate is definitely what Americans call a war they didn't actually win," Mitch said. "I bet it says Vietnam was a stalemate, too."

"Hey now," Grandpa said sharply.

"Right, Colonel. Sorry about that." Mitch looked a little embarrassed.

The Orc team was allied, in this case, with the beleaguered Americans. It seemed like taking the fort would have been a more obvious objective, but this scenario was apparently a multi-round fight in which they would hold off multiple waves of British invaders before, in a grand finale, Queen Victoria spawned and they would have to take her down.

I was pretty damn sure we were at least 40 years too early for Queen Victoria, but I doubt the Orcs cared.

My team was floating in a pair of small inflatable Zodiac watercraft, the kind with a steering wheel and a powerful motor, in between the ships and the firing cannons. The shots sailed harmlessly over our head.

"Oh, oh," Sage called. "Another wave's spawning."

There were ten British warships behind us, all flying the Union Jack. Now they let down three boats full of redcoats each. The boats moved through the water without the redcoats actually having to row. They clutched their rifles and sat staring ahead like marionettes, making for the nearest point of the shore.

"Let's get in there," Grandpa ordered.

Our Zodiacs roared to life and we swept past the rowboats heading in from the shore. The Orcs were gathered on the bank under the walls of the wooden palisade fort. They surrounded a pair of cannons.

“Eye Spy says those cannons have a 60-second cooldown between shots," Sage shouted as both of them fired on one of the boats full of British. The rounds hit mid of the boat, cutting the small craft in two and tossing redcoats into the water. Immediately, fins circled.

The hapless redcoats bobbed up and down silently as they were one by one pulled under. I felt like the reality engine had cut some corners in level design on this one.

"Don't get hit," Sage advised. "Those cannons each did 250 hit points of direct damage and half that in a radius around them of three feet."

"Mitch?" I asked.

He shook his head. "They're considered environmental. I can't Spike Their Trunks on the cannons. I could get the Orcs’ weapons though," he added hopefully, but I had just seen Mak'gar snap to attention as he pointed to us.

The Orcs swapped out their weapons, guns for long energy polearms. We'd encountered those occasionally before. These was the variant that could launch the energy beam head forward as a projectile. It took about five seconds to reform on the head of the weapon and the user was somewhat helpless until then, but they were a formidable threat.

Sure enough, Mak'gar's fifteen Orcs launched a volley at us. I yanked hard on the steering column of the Zodiac I was driving and most of the volley flew harmlessly to my left.

Lara cried out. She was piloting the other Zodiac. "We took some damage there!”

“Dodge where you can," I said grimly, "but get to shore.” We were out ahead of the rowboats now. This was the second to last wave of redcoats, giving us a bit of time to beat Mak’gar’s crew. It would be a long hard fight. I turned to Annie and Wyatt. "Got the device?"

"As soon as we hit sand," Annie promised. She padded her half of the deployable respawn point.

It was thanks to Mak'gar's people that we had one of those. They had used a portable respawn against us back in phase 2 and after capturing it, our crafters had spent a lot of time reverse engineering. This was the first time we had deployed one. They were fantastically expensive to build and Dwight said he couldn't promise more than 20 respawns out of it before it broke. We needed it in this scenario. The closest secret entrance from the Kobold Caverns brought us up into these Zodiacs. Not exactly ideal for getting back into the fight quickly.

We approached the shore and instead of easing back on the throttle, I pushed it in hard. My boat leapt ahead, flying over the water. Spray hit my face as we rushed ashore. Mak'gar's orcs raced down the beach to meet me. The boat crashed hard against the beach, but we'd been planning for it and had braced ourselves. It shot 20 feet up the strand, knocking three orcs flying. I leapt over the side, Quick Drawing my gun and firing a whole Barrage into the nearest orc.

"I see you, Shad Williams!" Mak'gar shouted. He leapt for me and I laughed.

This was deadly serious, don't get me wrong. If we lost, I didn't know what we were going to do. Proxima and the others would walk all over us. But at the same time, I was facing a nice uncomplicated fight against a nice uncomplicated opponent, skill versus skill.

I loved it. I never felt as alive as I did in combat. Now that I didn't have that pressing worry about Sage getting killed, I had grown to enjoy my role here. Right now, as the stress of the last few days faded away and all I had to do was take on a dozen orcs who outweighed me by 100 pounds and had been raised to this life since probably before I was born, I felt good.

I combined Trick Shot with a quick Called Shot, aiming at Mak'gar's dominant hand and firing a round that hit and did double damage, localized to his fingers and wrist.

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My people threw abilities; the orcs countered with their raw strength and equipment. We had the advantage that the orcs were trying to take out the red coat soldiers as well. The soldiers beached their boats, disembarked, formed up into columns five men wide, and marched forward toward the walls of the fort. Meanwhile, the orcs chased them down and slashed and stabbed as my people harassed the orcs.

Mak’gar shouted. Blood ran down the haft of his energy weapon, but it didn't stop him from racing toward me. As he approached, I ducked low and swept my leg up, kicking sand at him. He spluttered. I leapt around him, coming in behind and firing three rounds into the back of his neck.

Of course, he had 300 hit points, so it didn't kill him, but he was starting to hurt. He whirled faster than I expected, the edge of his polearm sliced through my jacket and caught my shoulder, tugging, but it didn't do much damage.

Lara went down with a shriek a cloud of orange smoke. A second later she messaged us: on my way back. The respawn point worked great!

We actually had the advantage on respawns: Mak’gar’s orcs came back inside the fort and had to make their way down. Plus, their resurrection fees were mounting with every death, and ours were free. Against any one team, we had an unfair advantage. Against all the others together, it was still an uphill battle.

One step at a time.

"I thought you were an honorable warrior, Williams,” Mak'gar roared. He raced for me, slashing with his weapon. I danced back and fired a shot; at this range, I couldn't miss. I was out of ammo, so I reloaded, dropped a Barrage, reloaded again.

"No honorable warrior would stoop to these tactics," Mak'gar continued.

“Honor is for fair fights," I snapped. "I'm trying to win a future for my people."

“You don't understand how things work. You are flailing against an order that has existed for thousands of years, since before your people dared to look at the sky with anything except fear."

"You came into our home!" I yelled. "You took us away from everything we knew and threw us into this crucible, and now you're telling us we never even had a chance. And you claim you're the honorable one, working for a corrupt system like that?"

"This is how the world is, Williams. There's no use fighting it. Raging against the inevitable never won a battle. Become strong. Fight for your people's future. This engine will be taken, despite your interference. All you're doing is making it worse for your own people at the end. I know what it is like. My people went through the same thing a mere 1,200 years ago. We just didn't have these preposterous classes that are giving your people false hope."

"What do you mean, false hope?" I snapped.

"Hope that you can win. Hope that you can somehow hold out against the might of an entire galaxy when you have something they want. Perhaps if you understood how a reality engine was to be used, you'd have a chance. But you're children, Williams. You're children in a rage.”

“Better children than slaves!”

Mak'gar roared in anger. The battle raged around us. I fired at Mak'gar, then took a Trick Shot at an orc whose health was dipping down. I killed him just before he could take out the last of the NPC redcoats. Two other orcs took his place and finished off the spawn wave.

One wave still to go. We had to stop Mak'gar's team.

I coordinated in chat. Focus on the ones coming back from respawn. Orcs don't like being spawn camped. It makes them irrational. They should be easier to get down. I'll keep Mak'gar off balance.

One of my usual tactics when fighting orcs was to kill their leader. Orcs don't listen to a leader who's not in the fight. But it took so little time to respawn, and Mak'gar was already so angry, I didn't want to give him a chance to clear his head and come back thinking properly.

Mak'gar was shaking his fist at the sky. "And you, System! I don't understand why you're cheating for the humans so much. They would not be nearly as powerful if they didn't have these absolutely ridiculous classes. How can you allow this? It's a violation of everything we've ever seen."

A bolt of lightning from the sky arced down to earth. It struck Mak'gar, outlining every bone in his body. Brilliant blue. My eyes dazzled. I fell back, expecting that Mak'gar had been killed. But as my vision cleared, I saw him standing there, arms still outstretched. His weapon fell from his limp hands.

"What is this?" he breathed. “I am a [Scion of a Proud Warrior Race]?” His eyes fell on me. He pointed and shouted, "You have no honor!"

Invisible bonds wrapped my limbs. I couldn't move. I tried to shout, but my voice was muffled. In chat, I yelled, Mak'gar just did something to me! I'm out of the fight for... I checked my status menu. It said, "Dishonored. 30 seconds, unable to move. Five minutes at reduced damage. Face an honorable duel to remove this debuff."

I swore to myself. How the hell... Sage! Eye-Spy on Mak'gar right now!

"He's had a class evolution!" she yelled back.

How?

Mak'gar turned to his men. “Do our ancestors proud!" he bellowed. I could feel the buff go out from him as he shouted. Mentally, I groaned. He's one of those idiots who has to shout his attack name aloud. Great.

I still didn't understand how he'd gotten a class evolution, but it didn't matter. My timer was ticking down. A couple of seconds later, I had use of my limbs again.

I Quick Drew my gun and it flew to my hand. Mak’gar pointed at me and shouted something the System didn’t translate. My revolver transformed into a longsword. Mak'gar's own weapon shrank down to about the same length, but his had a nasty hook at one end of the blade.

"What the hell is this?"

"An honorable duel," Mak'gar said. He grinned madly. "What, Williams? You didn't think you were the only one to be able to compel your enemy to do what you want?"

He lunged for me. I blocked his thrust.

In chat, I shouted at my team. Kill them! Get them down! Find out if that buff on them sticks around once they respawn. Focus fire! We can't let them beat us back!

Mak'gar and I exchanged blows. His eyes blazed with fury. I was on the back foot here. I had no experience with swords. I had to keep Mak'gar focused on me, so I shouted at him. "So now you'll be able to win? It's a fair fight?"

Mak'gar swung. He looked furious. "You are tenacious. Your people have great courage and great strength, but you need to learn wisdom. When to talk and when to be silent. When to wait and when to return. You will not win your own engine. You will spend many cycles paying down the debts. But while you do, your people will learn what it means to be part of this world. You will carve out a niche for yourselves. Perhaps like my people, as companies of honorable warriors, fighting to claim the resources that our progenitors left behind us. It is a noble calling, Williams, but you must learn."

"Sorry, Mak'gar. My people are just really bad at giving up."

In frustration, he ran at me. I blocked his attack.

Keep it up, Sage encouraged me in chat. We're near a tipping point. The next wave of soldiers is about to land and the orcs are not prepared.

I lunged at Mak'gar, swinging wildly. He blocked me easily. "You see," he said, "you are so reliant on your little tricks that when your weapon is taken from you, you are like a flailing child."

I caught his counter and threw it back. "And all of you are too reliant on your equipment. Doesn't mean you're not a threat."

Mak'gar snarled. I barely blocked his blow this time. The next wave of redcoats reached the beach and pulled up their boats on the strand. There were twice as many this time. Some of my people dropped back to cover them as they advanced toward the walls of the fort. Half of Mak'gar's orcs were coming back from respawn.

Focus down as many of the rest as you can, I ordered.

"Come and sit down again at the table," Mak'gar said. "I can ask my employers to find a solution to this that is agreeable to us all."

I set myself to exchange another round of blows with Mak'gar. “We can negotiate after my side wins!”

Mak’gar swung so fast I didn’t even see the blow coming. It cut me in half, stem to sternum, for a second and a half the worst pain I’ve ever felt.

I was still swearing as I respawned a couple of seconds later, a little farther down the beach. But it didn't matter. Our assault had worked. Mak'gar's people were mostly dead.

Someone fired one last shot, and Mak'gar's head exploded. A couple of seconds later, he was a cloud of dust and the System roared.

[Firebrand's attempt to defend Fort McHenry has failed. 24-hour countdown timer starts now.]

"Let's get out of here," I snapped to my team. I didn't really want to exchange any more words with Mak'gar. Besides, I had something else to worry about.

How the hell had the orc gotten a class evolution?