"Secure your belongings and move—there's an intruder at Gate Twelve!" the PA snaps as alarms scream.
"What's going on?" a woman next to me cries. Her voice cracks. People stand, stumble toward the aisles, luggage clatters.
"Stay calm. Follow the crew," a steward orders. His hands shake.
Kiana's voice is a soft velvet I learned to read like a scoreboard. "Lace, we should go with Cooper. Now."
I grip my tote. "Why are you whispering like that? Speak up."
She lowers her face and smiles a practiced smile. "Cooper says he has contacts who can smooth things. We should do what he says."
Cooper steps forward, fingers fidgeting with the cuff of his jacket. "Bribe them. Pay a fee, make them take the cargo. Quick and quiet. No one gets hurt." He looks at me while he says it. He looks like a client deciding on a table setting.
A man in a cheap leather jacket cuts through the crowd, one arm bristling with a rail of pistols. He isn't nervous. Pirates always carry proof; this one carries contempt.
"Hands up! Phones off! Secure side aisles!" he bellows. His accent laces with shipboard jargon.
A passenger beside me sobs. "Please—my daughter—"
"Cardinal rules," Kiana says, as if reciting an estate protocol. "Safety for a price."
"You didn't have to give them the manifest," I say. I keep my voice low.
Kiana's smile thins. "We can't be ideological on a public liner
