"My name's Marika, captain of the pirate s.h.i.+p Bentenmaru." She doffed her captain's hat with her right hand and waved it ostentatiously to the crowd, then bowed deeply from the waist. "I've come to plunder the Princess Apricot. I hope you can all forgive the intrusion."

The usual cheers and applause were joined by unfamiliar hoots and wolf-whistles. Taken slightly aback, Marika signaled behind her with a wave of her hat, and soon enough one of her uppercla.s.smen had stepped forward wearing a bunny outfit and balancing an oversized beam bazooka on her shoulder with her slender arms, while another cla.s.smate dressed as a cheerleader leveled a large-bore rifle that was longer than she was tall.

The two of them made clear eye contact, and a moment later the modulated beam bazooka and the heavy rifle let out an unnerving boom and an extravagant flash across the main hall, leaving only the pirates visible.

"Obviously those were just warning shots."

The audience was speechless—perhaps the pirates' timing was off, or maybe they were shocked by the spectacle. But either way Marika soldiered on with the script.

"They were powered down, and there shouldn't be any lasting damage to the Princess Apricot. Of course, the s.h.i.+pboard monitors are temporarily disabled, so there's no real way of knowing."

Marika giggled and flashed her retail smile, then began a leisurely descent down the grand staircase. Usually the audience's eyes would have all converged on her, but she felt like half of them had been stolen by the pirates behind her.

She raised her right hand to regain the crowd's attention. "Raise the lights! I want to see the pa.s.sengers' faces!"

"Bring the lights up." Captain Harlay's order brought the stifled lighting back on in the main hall, including the chandelier. Marika sensed the audience's eyes on the pirates arrayed on the staircase's landing behind her and glanced back over her shoulder.

"Wow."

Though she'd been imagining what they must have looked like, the impact was still enough for her to give the feeling voice. Her usual boarding party—combat cyborgs, fatigues, powered suits, ninjas—was for today only replaced on the stage by an array of lady pirates, bunny girls and cheerleaders, chainmail bikinis and maid outfits, witches and superheroines, and even a kunoichi with a period-accurate ninjato strapped to her back.

"What a mess."