“Ta daaaaa. Welcome to our new secret base.” Marcus rubbed his hands together at his ceremonious announcement, pride gleaming in his eyes. “So, whaddya think?”

Damien started at it in confusion, then turned to Kat, who was sporting an equally perplexed look on her face. This had to be a joke.

“…a noodle shop?” Damien finally said in disbelief. “Really?”

“Not just any old noodle shop, my friend. This is Grandma O’s noodle shop.” Marcus’ expression still hadn’t changed. Either he was serious, or he was fully committed to the bit.

“We’re gonna use your grandma’s shop as our secret base?” Damien asked.

“First of all, she isn’t my grandma. She’s my friend’s grandma, and she’s the sweetest lady you’ll ever meet. Secondly, set your sights higher my crew mates.” Marcus pointed up toward the higher floors above the entrance.

“Ah, the shop’s just a front,” Kat said with some relief. “These places are often family-owned, and the owners use the upstairs suites as their home. Let me guess, you managed to convince the old lady to let us use the space above.”

“Bingo. Grandma O runs a chain of noodle shops around the city so she doesn’t live up there. The previous tenants moved out and I managed to get it at a great price. All on me, of course.”

Now it all made sense. In that case, it was starting to look like a good idea to Damien. From the outside it was just a small inconspicuous shop, so no one would have any reason to suspect that there were pirates using the upstairs space. It helped that it was located on a quiet road lined with Mom-and-Pop shops, and it was just off of King Street, one of the city’s main arteries. Marcus’ had done well to secure this location.

A tiny, old woman with a face resembling a wrinkled fruit waddled out of the noodle shop. She picked up a broom that surpassed her in height and started sweeping near the entrance in a mouse-like fashion. When she noticed Marcus, she waved and gave an endearing smile at the three pirates. They returned the gesture.

“Is it really okay for us to be using her space?” Kat asked. “I wouldn’t want to get her in trouble.”

“Don’t judge a book by its cover. Grandma O was a pirate herself back in her day. She’s long retired, but she’s more solid than most of these street thugs that’re running around here, and she’s as anti-authoritarian as they come. If the NPD were to nab her, she wouldn’t give them a shred of info. Hell, she’d talk their ear off about anything and everything else she could think of until they get sick of her and let her go.”

It sounded a little far-fetched to Damien, but he knew better than to dismiss the notion. Even outlaws eventually have to slow it down and integrate more into society as they get older. Assuming they survived until old age, that is.

“Now, follow me,” Marcus said as he made his way to a side entrance near the front of the shop. “We won’t be doing anything crazy here. It’ll just be our hideout. Our secret base. I’ve been thinking of a name, and I think The Shack is a pretty good one. Gives the imagine of something strong, proud, and-”

“Filled with tools,” Kat interrupted as they stepped through the door and began ascending the stairs. “It better not be a literal shack.”

Marcus chuckled a mock evil laugh. “That’s for me to know, and for you to also know in a matter of seconds.”

After climbing a few flights of stairs, he brought them to the entrance of their new secret base. With one bombastic motion, he swung the door open and made his grand reveal, and… it was pretty much what Damien had expected to see. The central area looked like a modern lounge, with a set of connected sofas surrounding a wall-mounted TV. Sunshine beamed in through the large windows that overlooked the small park on the other side of the street, and a small kitchen took up the far end of the space. There was even a UTS terminal stashed away in the corner. All in all, it was modest and entirely reasonable for the purposes, and Damien approved the new hideout.

“Not bad huh?”

Damien and Kat stepped inside, nodding along in approval.

“I’m working on charming the landlord into giving us access to the roof,” Marcus said. “Oh, and by the way, Dame. There’s extra bedrooms in the back if you ever wanna bring some chicks over.”

“Absolutely not. This place will be business only.” Kat said.

Marcus grumbled something about her being a party pooper before quickly shaking it off and waving Damien over to the corner. “Remember when I asked you to ship the gear we looted at the yard through a specific channel? Check this out.” He tapped away at the UTS panel, and the grappling hook that Damien had taken from the Royals popped out. He studied it closely, then let out another frustrated grumble. “Huh. The damn thing was supposed to come out of this side fully repaired.”

“Really?” Damien said, taking the hook from his crew mate’s hand.

“Nah, I’m just messing with you. But you can leave your hot loot here if you don’t wanna keep it at your place.”

“Can’t believe I fell for that.” Damien tried to fire the grappling hook once again but it failed, just like before. Resigning to the fact that it was still broken, he left it on the counter and promised himself that he’d get around to fixing it some time.

“Now that we’re officially here, let’s commemorate our first day in The Shack with a fat meal,” Marcus said as he stepped into the kitchen. “I’ll be the gracious cook.”

“You? Cook?” Kat said. “Every time you get in the kitchen there’s a 50-50 chance that whatever comes out of there will mess up the stomach of whoever eats it.”

“Hey! My cooking isn’t that bad!”

“Yeaaah, it’s pretty bad,” Kat said, almost reluctantly. “But since it’s a special occasion, I’ll take the risk this time.”

“She’s just joking around, Dame. With my secret ingredient…” Marcus’ voice fell behind the sounds of clattering pots and pans.

“Not the secret ingredient thing again.” Kat dropped herself onto the sofa and turned on the TV.

Damien joined her. “As long as it doesn’t make me sick, I won’t complain. It’s the thought that counts, right?”

Kat nodded along regretfully. “He tries his best.” She flipped through multiple TV channels for a moment, then paused. “I guess I forgot to mention this earlier. I’ll be busy the next few days, but I’ll think of something for how we can approach this mission.”

“Busy with your own jobs?”

She nodded again. “I hate that the timings had to clash like this, but I’m positive we can make it work.” This time, her voice sounded truly regretful. “Maybe I’ll fill you in on everything some day, just not now. In the mean time, I’ll find some intel that’ll help us get close to Horaka, and you think of a way to sneak Zero’s packages into their HQ. Maybe we can find a way to solve both problems at once.”

The sound of food violently sizzling started in the kitchen, followed swiftly by cursing from Marcus.

“Need help back there?” Kat called out.

“Er- no, no. Everything’s fine.”

Damien sank into the sofa and stared blankly at the TV, letting his mind wander. Solving both problems at once would certainly be nice, but it seemed like such a long shot. A hopeful dream, and nothing more. His eyes drifted to the UTS, and the thought of how his grappling hook had been transported here. An idea took shape in his mind.

“The port that we helped secure for Big G is still a used for legitimate purposes on top of the illegal stuff, right?” he asked.

“Yeah…” Kat narrowed her eyes at him, as if she was trying to piece together where he was going with this. She must’ve picked up on the fact that he’d an idea.

“And UTS terminals are used for private and public purposes all across the city, right? That means that any decently sized corporation would have a UTS terminal, right?”

Kat nodded slowly.

“What if we used to the UTS to sneak Zero’s packages into the four HQ buildings? We could load them in through the docks so they look like legitimate imports, and we could use Lana’s Freedom Channel to mask their contents.”

Kat stared at him for a moment, the gears in her head clearly turning. “That’s… not a bad idea. Didn’t expect you to come with something so quickly. In theory it sounds like a good option to explore, but we’ll have to gather a lot of intel to make it work.”

“Alright! This one looks cooked enough!” Marcus declared. “Who wants the first bite?”

Kat pursed her lips. “Here we go. Prepare your stomach and pray that the 50-50 coin flip is in our favor.”