Emma Adams is a perfectly ordinary young Canadian woman with a perfectly ordinary hobby: privateering.
Unfortunately, privateering has been out of fashion for a couple of centuries. Emma considers this a bureaucratic inconvenience rather than a meaningful obstacle.
A devoted monarchist with a somewhat imaginative understanding of Canada's constitutional relationship with Britain, Emma firmly believes Canada would be better off as a proper British colony again. More importantly, she believes King Charles III retains the ability, and hopefully the good sense, to issue her letters of marque, granting her royal authority to pursue enemy vessels and seize them as prizes.
She has written to the Royal Family about this.
More than once.
While she waits for the Crown to recognize the obvious strategic value of her proposal, Emma has already begun preparations. Her flagship is a roughly decade-old four-seat recreational jet boat, from which she patrols the Bay of Fundy dressed in remarkably sincere 18th-century pirate attire. Armed with a spyglass, nautical charts, an extremely optimistic interpretation of maritime law, and nowhere near enough deck space for a boarding party, she surveys the local shipping for potential prizes.
The local shipping is almost entirely fishing boats. The twice daily appearance of the MV Fundy Rose is her white whale.
Emma nevertheless takes reconnaissance seriously. Lobster boats are appraised. Hulls are studied. Captains are observed. Potential boarding strategies are contemplated. Occasionally the realities of freeboard, commercial fishing equipment, and the fact that Emma's mighty warship is essentially a used pleasure craft become apparent.
None of this discourages her.
When she isn't at sea, Emma's privateering career involves considerably more email than piracy traditionally did. She drafts increasingly formal correspondence to British royalty, checks her inbox for royal authorization, maintains charts of prospective operating areas, and prepares for the glorious day when His Majesty finally realizes that what North Atlantic maritime security has been missing is one woman in a tricorn hat with a jet boat.
Emma isn't pretending to be a pirate.
She isn't cosplaying.
She is simply a privateer whose paperwork hasn't come through yet. 🏴☠️
