Zee headed up the attack team, and kept a cautious eye on the nearby shore. One sea serpent attack was enough. Thankfully the senior dorms were far enough from the shore that she could feel relatively safe.

“Alright, everybody huddle up,” Zee commanded. “Jay?”

The communications expert had rather reluctantly abandoned his post in order to ensure they had as much manpower on the field as possible while the EO students were vulnerable. Zeus-Stephanides had already won some significant victories in the short time the EMMP had been in effect, but they had a long way to go before they made up their massive early deficit.

“They’ve got a secret weapon in a dorm here, and I don’t want to deal with a secret weapon, considering what their public weapons are like.”

A few of her fellow students nodded. While clearing out the senior labs, one of them had almost gotten nibbled on by some kind of mutant barnacle monster. Considering what the Einstein-Odinson crew used publicly, nobody wanted to see what they were hiding.

“We’ve got about twenty five minutes left on this EMMP, so let’s get in there and take their secret weapon out while we still- Hold on.”

Someone was screaming nearby, and the screaming was getting louder by the second. Zee briefly worried that it was one of her own fellow students caught up in some kind of insanity, and then realized it was not a scream of terror, but one of enthusiasm.

The delighted shout reached a crescendo as a flaming blur blazed past Zee’s army and peppered them with paintballs. The screaming blur made a sharp turn and came careening back towards them, trailing smoke all the while. It shot past once again in a tight curve and continued firing wildly. Somewhere amid all the smoke, fire, and paintballs, Zee caught a glimpse of a person.

“How the hell are you moving so fast?”

The superspeed student came around for another run, and this time Zee got a better look at him. He had roller skates on his feet and a rocket strapped to his ass.

“Rocketry ain’t circuitry, brah,” said Rock Rolland the Rocket Roller. “I am unfazed by your EMMP!”

Rock Rolland made another hard swing, and this time dove right into the middle of the ZS army. He bent down and thrust his rocket-powered ass to the side, causing him to go into a rapid spin. As he spun out, he fired wildly in all directions, scattering the Zee and her students in every direction. Zee threw herself to the ground and looked up just in time to see a bad situation get worse. Rock Rolland was the champion of the campus race, but he was not the only racer.

A mechanical spider shot jets of steam from various vents and valves as it charged towards Zee, firing paintballs from air-powered cannons on every side. Atop the steam-powered war machine was a man in goggles and a top hat that for some reason had gears glued to the brim.

“Steampunk? Seriously? It’s 2023!”

“The aesthetic is timeless,” Venrich Gearworthy protested. “And my amazing auto-gyro spider is unstoppable!”

Venrich showed off the power of steampunk, and the power of steam, with another round of paintball fire on his enemies. His mechanical spider rained death on the enemies -until Jay walked up and turned a valve on the side of one of the steam tanks. The mechanical spider slowly started to slow down and sink.

“Oh no, a completely unforeseeable and fatal flaw in my designs!”

“That literally happened to you back in first year, dude,” Rock Rolland said, as he sped by.

“I know, that was sarcasm,” Venrich said. His auto-gyro spider stood back up to full height and blasted Jay with a paintball to the chest. “I installed decoy valves!”

With the auto-gyro spider providing heavy artillery and Rock Rolland outmaneuvering them on all sides, Zee did the only sensible thing and ordered a retreat.

“Come on! In the buildings,” Zee said. They had to duck into the labs rather than the senior dorms, but they would at least be safer. Rock Rolland’s rocket skates couldn’t maneuver well enough for the tight spaces, and Venrich’s spider just outright couldn’t fit. Zee ducked inside, found a window, and returned fire. Rock Rolland stopped racing around to take cover behind the auto-gyro spider, which Venrich angled to absorb most of the incoming paintballs.

“Hey, hey, stop just firing wildly! Do you have any idea how hard it is to get paint off of brass?”

“No, I have no idea,” Zee snapped back. “Because normal people don’t build giant steampunk spiders and take them to paintball games!”

“Boring!”

“Seriously, is this what this place is like all the time? Is this every day for you people? Do you just go between classes on rockets and steampunk spiders?”

“Of course not,” Venrich said. “I have a bicycle.”

“Does the bike have unnecessary gears on it?”

“Unnecessary is a strong word, I feel that the aesthetic value is-”

“Hey, shut up,” Zee said.

“You’re being unnecessarily rude, lady,” Rock said.

“No, shut up, this is a combat related shushing,” Zee said. There was another odd sound rapidly approaching. It sounded like grinding wood. “What the hell is that? What are you guys throwing at us now?”

“Oh, that’d be the pirates,” Venrich said. “About time they caught up.”

“Oh, the pirates, of course,” Zee said. “Why would you not have pirates, that makes perfect sense!”

Zee decided to do the sensible thing and walk away. She found a back exit from the lab and ran away, barely sparing a glance over her shoulder to see a massive wooden ship, complete with sails and a black flag, come rolling across the quad.

“Pirates. They have pirates,” Zee said. “On land! They have land pirates!”

Even without advanced technology or magic available to them, the Einstein-Odison students still found a way to be plain old-fashioned lunatics. Zee took one more look at the black flag flying overhead, and pulled out her phone. She knew where to find an old-fashioned lunatic too.

“Hey Akira. Remember how I called you crazy for bringing a samurai sword to this thing?” Zee said. “Well, turns out crazy is the name of the game.”

She turned back to the senior dorms, where the supposed secret weapon hid.

“And I got a situation.”

----------------------------------------

“Welcome to the party.”

“Howdy, Samson,” Harley said. She climbed the side of the ship and then leaned on a paintball cannon. “Pirates. Thanks for the assist.”

“Happy to help,” the captain said. “I know it kind of breaks tradition, but I like this version of the paintball game much better. Really builds school spirit.”

Harley nodded in agreement, but raised an eyebrow.

“What’s that look for?”

“Well, it’s just kind of odd seeing a dude on a pirate ship in a full pirate getup not doing a voice, you know?”

“Yarr, all that gravely intonation be killer on the vocal cords, matey,” the captain said, doing his best pirate impression.

“I know, I’m not saying you have to, it’s just odd on my end, is all.”

Any further debate on the matter of piratical accents was put on hold by Lee’s arrival. She finished climbing the shipside ladder and looked around at the forces on deck.

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“Hey Lee,” Samson said. “You check in with Venrich down there?”

“No, just, uh, overseeing the-”

“You fell down the ladder,” Harley said.

“I fell down the ladder,” Lee mumbled.

“This is why I always climb up first,” Harley said. “Anyway, speaking of checking in…”

Harley deliberately trailed off and let Lee reclaim her dignity by resuming her leadership role.

“Captain. I assume from your ship’s lack of a new paintjob you haven’t seen much action,” Lee said.

“Yeah, most people start running away from us the moment they see the pirate ship,” the captain said. “We get some of them with our cannons while they run away, but it’s mostly the intimidation factor with us.”

“Perfect. I think you should patrol the perimeter of the senior dorm, to dissuade any attackers,” Lee said. She ten took a stroll over to the edge of the deck and peered down at a steaming mechanical spider. “Mr. Gearworthy!”

“Yes ma’am?”

“Take your spider and start patrolling, we still have ten minutes or so left before the electronics kick back in, and your heavy artillery will come in handy.”

“Understood!”

“And where is Rock?”

“Rock Rolland the Rocket Roller is on recon, ma’am,” Venrich said. “He was pursuing the enemy leader. Given his speed, he should be back…”

Venrich paused for far too long. Lee waited patiently. Given that he was still this deep in the steampunk aesthetic, Lee didn’t exactly expect him to be timely.

It took about thirty seconds, but the waiting did pay off. The smoking trail of Rock Rolland’s rocketing skates appeared around the corner and came to a screeching halt by the side of the pirate ship.

“Good evening, Mr. Rolland, are you- oh no.”

The roller skater didn’t say anything. He didn’t need to. The bright blue slash of paint across his chest said enough.

The samurai was coming.

Lee whistled loudly to get the entire ship’s attention, and tossed her phone to Harley.

“Harley, get in touch with Hawke, tell him to get everyone here as fast as possible,” Lee said. “I don’t care if the comms are working yet or not, tell him to run around and shout for help if he has to. He’s good at screaming, he’ll manage!”

Harley ran off to make the call, and Lee hopped on to the railing of the pirate ship, grabbing on to the rigging for support.

“The rest of you, man every cannon, drop the anchor, hoist main sails or whatever the fuck it is pirates do when things get serious,” Lee commanded. “We’ve got a samurai to fight!”

The pirates raised paintball guns and gave a raucous cheer, raising paint cutlasses and flintlock paintball pistols to the sky. Lee joined them, but her enthusiasm died down moments later.

“I’m sorry, no offense, but it did just occur to me that this would be so much easier if pirates beat samurai in that Rock Paper Scissors nonsense.”

“That would be convenient, wouldn’t it.”

“If you got any roman legionnaires we’ll kick their asses, though.”

“Maybe next year,” Lee said. “For now, get ready for the samurai.”

The pirates went to work preparing their vessel, and Lee took up position at the helm of the vessel, watching out for any approaching feudal Japanese warriors. The weather’s sense of drama kicked in, and a light breeze started to blow, causing her hair to billow in the wind. It still felt a bit odd to be aboard a pirate ship that wasn’t actually on the water, but Lee endured.

“Hey Lee, I appreciate the posing,” Harley said. “But heads up: Samurai’s coming from the other direction.”

Lee swore under her breath and ran from the prow of the ship to the aft. The samurai was approaching from the rear, with a hand on one of his two sheathed blades, flanked by Zee and a large troop of ZS students.

“Turn hard to- whatever side the most cannons are on,” Lee commanded. She really should’ve looked up some nautical terminology for this.

“We’re giving it all she’s got, ma’am,” the captain said. “We ain’t exactly got power steering!”

The pirate ship’s wheels allowed it to roll over land, but not make sharp turns. It was almost slower maneuvering over land than it would have been on water.

“Damn it. Venrich! Cover our turn.”

The steampunk racer saluted, nearly knocking a gear off his tophat in the process, and powered up his auto-gyro spider. The contrived contraption of gears and steam clanked to life and then stormed towards the enemy, paintball guns blazing.

“This thing again,” Zee sighed. “Akira, honey, if you would?”

With a quick grunt of acknowledgment, Akira grabbed his blade and ran full speed towards the enemy. Zee watched him dodge and weave between bursts of steam-powered paintball fire and nodded approvingly.

“Moses, you’re with me,” Zee commanded. “We’ll go around the building and flank the ship.”

“Wouldn’t going around put us at the front?” Moses asked. “Is it still flanking if you’re attacking the front?”

“Yes, baby, the ship is facing that way, but everyone on it is facing this way,” Zee said. “It’s still flanking. Come on, let’s go.”

While the two remaining doppelgangers went the long way around, their samurai charged directly at the enemy. The auto-gyro spider’s formidable cannons proved too slow for the nimble warrior, and Akira closed the gap with a diving leap. He landed on the spider’s leg, rebounded off of it, and landed on the helm. Venrich reached to his side and withdrew a single personal paintball pistol. With a swipe of his paint-edged blade, Akira swatted his arm aside, diverting the shot and eliminating Venrich in a single blow.

“We just lost the steampunk guy,” Harley said. “Pirates, how’s it looking?”

“We’re almost done with the turn,” one of the pirates said. He dropped the anchor to give them a hard point to pivot on. “Cannons free!”

The pirates obeyed the order, and the below-deck cannon hatches swung open to extend the guns. One such hatch did double duty and acted as a springboard for an unwelcome guest.

Landing from his flying leap with surprising deftness, Akira righted himself and took a combat stance with his blade held over his head. The pirates tensed grips on paintball pistols and cutlasses, but no one moved. Harley took aim at the samurai with her own guns, and held her breath.

“Surrender,” the samurai said. “And embrace defeat with dignity.”

“Have you met us?” Harley asked. “We don’t do anything with dignity!”

Harley’s taunt broke the short stalemate, and she fired at the samurai. Akira dodged to the side and the leapt upwards to evade the pistol shots from the pirates. One daring crewman swung from the rigging to try and intercept him mid-leap, but Akira cut him down in midair.

Landing in the midst of several pirates, Akira deflected three cutlass swipes in a row with his katana, then cut down the pirates wielding them. As the samurai cut through his enemies, Samson took aim, fired, and missed. All his shot accomplished was attracting the samurai’s attention, and Samson promptly hauled ass when he realized Akira was after him.

“A little help here?”

His quick retreat came to an end when Samson reach the ship’s railing. Jumping overboard only worked on water, not solid ground, so he turned around to take a stand. Akira’s sword knocked the gun right out of his hands, and he prepared for another swipe to eliminate Samson permanently -from the game, at least.

Before the final blow was struck, another pirate diverted Akira’s attention, and a quick barrage of paintball fire from Lee made him retreat. While Akira turned his attention to more of the pirates, Lee helped Samson to his feet.

“Are you alright?”

“Yeah, I’m good,” Samson said. He looked around for his gun and could not find it. “Can I use somebody else’s gun for this?”

“Yes, it’s fair game,” Lee said. Wielders got taken out of the game, not weapons, so any participant in the paintball war could use any weapon available to them. Samson picked up the nearest dropped cutlass and grabbed it in both hands.

“Alright, round two. Samson versus samurai, let’s go!”

With cutlass firmly in hand, Samson charged forwards towards his enemy. He made it about two steps before a paintball hit in squarely in the chest.

“Sorry, bud,” Moses said. “Looks like we know which one is the better duplicate now.”

In the time it took Moses to taunt, Harley shot him right in the chest.

“You’re bad at gloating,” Harley said. “Lee, move!”

Zee climbed on deck just as Lee backed away, and missed the first shot she took at her counterpart. Lee’s quick retreat led her right into the line of fire of the dozens of ZS students boarding the ship on the other side.

“Think it might be time to abandon ship,” Harley said, eyeing the nearby chain of the anchor. Akira was fighting off the last of the pirates already.

“We only need one shot,” Lee said. She took aim at Akira, while Zee took aim at her. Harley rolled her eyes.

Lee shot first. Akira almost effortlessly dodged the bullet. Zee fired second, and while Lee’s reflexes were good, they were not quite good enough. Thankfully for her, Harley had a head start. She endured the quick sting of a paintball to the back and then grabbed Lee by the shoulders.

“I don’t mind taking bullets for you guys,” Harley said. “But you better make it worth it.”

With a quick shove, Harley pushed Lee onto the railings of the ship and over. Lee grabbed on to the anchor’s chain and slid down to the ground. She looked up at the eliminated Harley just long enough to see her flash a smile and a quick thumbs up, and then Lee took off running, paintball gun in one hand and phone in the other.

“Hawke! Where are my reinforcements?”

“Pinned down on the beach,” Hawke said. “We’re outnumbered and we still can’t get any of our tech working!”

“Oh, this is all my fault,” Lee said. “I’m the one who told everybody to lean on gimmicks.”

“Lee, do you really think people built portal bombs and pirate ships in like four hours?”

“Well, no.”

“This place is crazy, it’s been crazy, and it’s going to keep being crazy,” Hawke said. “You didn’t make anyone do anything. All you did was get people excited about how crazy they already were.”

Lee tightened her grip on her gun as she ran.

“Thank you, Hawke,” she said. “Any chance you can follow up that pep talk with a heroic cavalry charge?”

“Nope, still pinned,” Hawke said. “I could try swimming.”

“Maybe- no, that snake would’ve shrank back to normal with the magic out,” Lee said. She could not hope for Skye’s intervention either. The threads of magic that had been chased off by the EMMP were returning, but would not be back at full strength soon enough to save Vell from the samurai. In the distance, Lee could hear that the battle with the pirates had ended, and the samurai would no doubt be heading for Harley’s dorm in mere moments.

Lee wracked her brain for anything she could do, any last minute trick she could pull, or secret weapon she could call on. A thousand thoughts raced through her mind, and the sound of a crashing wave knocked them all aside.

“Hawke? How much do you trust me?”

“Probably enough to do whatever stupid thing you’re about to say,” Hawke said.

“It’s not stupid,” Lee said. “It’s crazy.”