Kurt woke to his alarm, set for an hour before he was meant to pick up Jimmy for lunch. As he rose from bed with a yawn, he checked his phone to see a prominent message in a new group chat established for himself, Jimmy, and Gadot. She had apparently set it up some time in the night and sent them both a message: “Can we meet today, IRL?”

  Jimmy had responded already, and the two of them had gotten into a friendly back and forth. Kurt read through the messages, gathering that Gadot lived in Phoenix, Arizona, and would take a maglev train to meet them for lunch. With a shrug, Kurt sent a reply: “I agree with everything said.”

  Jimmy replied immediately: “Nobody asked YOU Kurt.”

  Chuckling to himself, he went to shower and dress before pulling his car around to pick up Jimmy. His eyebrows raised when he saw his lifelong friend exiting the house. Jimmy was using a pair of crutches and a more aggressive system of braces to move around. He awkwardly closed the front door of his parents’ house and turned to navigate the steps and sidewalk to the car.

  Kurt leaned over and popped the door as Jimmy approached, using the car’s roof as support to place his crutches in before he sat down with a sigh. After he was in, Jimmy turned to Kurt with a big smile and leaned over to hug him. “Great to see you again, man! I don’t want to act like I’m happy you got kicked out of school, but I’m totally happy you got kicked out of school.”

  With a shake of his head and a smile of his own, Kurt returned his friend’s embrace and laughed. “Yeah, I have to admit I feel pretty good about it. I mean, I probably shouldn’t but turns out I really hate school.” He pulled away from the curb and began driving towards the fusion restaurant. The neighborhood and its carefully sectioned areas of greenery faded away to the cold comfort of predictable concrete businesses and apartment buildings.

  They had grown up in a neighborhood just to the east of Seattle and enjoyed the dichotomy of secluded housing nestled into nature’s verdant splendor, with a major metropolitan city’s uncompromising skyline just over the hillside. As he drove, Kurt flipped through radio stations, pausing to frown at a news report detailing an explosion at MIT. With a shrug, he changed it again, but Jimmy smacked his hand away and turned the station back to listen to the report. Details were sparse, and all they learned was that an entire research building had been destroyed in an explosion in the early hours of the morning, but no one was reported as hurt. Offering a shrug of his own, Jimmy flipped the station to music and swiped at his phone for the duration of the short trip.

  The restaurant was nestled in an industrial park, and was rather unimpressive to look at, with a simple hanging sign declaring the name Hot Fusion.

  Hot Fusion sported a humble outdoor seating area that spread from the restaurant’s front into a tiny park nestled into the middle of the parking lot. A simple, waist-high gate next to the main entrance led into a lovely little covered seating area surrounded by tall shrubs and evergreen trees. Jimmy pushed his way through the gate as Kurt stood with a hand on the entrance, confused. “Shouldn’t we go order?”

  Setting his crutches in a corner, Jimmy sat down heavily and stretched his arms above his head. “Naw, man. They know we’re here. Tammy has us covered. I’ve been coming here pretty often since you left town.”

  With a shrug, Kurt joined his friend at the small, round, metal table. As predicted, a middle-aged woman with greying hair tied up in a messy bun opened the door of the restaurant and approached them with a smile. “Morning, Jimmy!” She paused to take in Kurt, recognition dawning on her face as she lunged in to hug him. “Kurt! So good to see you again!”

  Unable to help the smile that came to his face, Kurt accepted an awkward sitting hug. “Thanks, Tammy, it’s great to be back.”

  They engaged in a brief but illuminating conversation about Kurt’s recent failings at school and his return home. Tammy assured him he would land on his feet and happily took their order. Kurt ordered a bowl of pork belly ramen with a side of tuna sushi. Jimmy just nodded when Tammy raised an eyebrow at him.

  After she left, Kurt nodded towards the crutches. “So, what’s up? Those are new.”

  Pulling a face, Jimmy leaned forward in his seat. “Well, yeah. Degenerative muscle condition. Doesn’t get better, far as I’m aware. Doc says five years tops before I’m in a chair.”

  Nodding gravely, Kurt looked down. “Nothing they can do?”

  “Can’t cure DNA, my friend. Damage done. Without eight hundred grand for full on muscle augmentation surgery, not much to be done at all. They call it elective until I’m in the chair, and by then the doc tells me my heart won’t be strong enough for me to actually survive the surgery. Oh, and the new heart is an additional six hundred grand, and that needs to happen first. It rains on the just and the unjust alike, I guess.” Jimmy shrugged as he finished, clearly not thrilled with the line of conversation. “Hey, check this out. You know that woman we’re meeting? I figured out who she is.” He swiped at the air above his wrist, before tilting it towards Kurt.

  Touching his wrist to Jimmy’s, Kurt accepted the video link, happy to change the subject. He concentrated as he watched a scene of carnage unfold. Several cars were set to race on a track, with various weaponry bolted to their frames. The track itself was a simple figure of eight design, with a killing floor of spiked barricades set in the central area. The vehicles rumbled at the starting line, revving engines and boiling tires, or firing weapons in an attempted show of intimidation. A line of text flashed across the screen as a countdown began, indicating the video feed was from the competitive side of The Life of Crime.

  Red lights changed to yellow, and then dropped down to green as the final three seconds of the countdown ticked away. Tires screamed, and the cars jolted off from the line, jostling and ramming into each other right away. A vibrant cotton candy pink 1986 fox body Ford Mustang hung back from the line of battling cars at first. It had two racks of short-range rockets strapped in place, one on the hood and another on the roof facing the rear of the car.

  While the other racers were busy ramming one another out of the way, the pink Mustang launched two rockets into the crowd of cars, blowing apart a cluster of three vehicles. It then roared into the race, the rear wheels boiling smoke as it dove into the first corner. The three cars the Mustang had blown apart blinked back into place at the starting line and immediately began their combative race once more.

  Sliding through the barricades, the pink Mustang clipped the rear end of the car in front of it and sent the vehicle skidding sideways into a row of spikes. The audience cheered. The driver of the Mustang was clearly skilled, using oversteer and drift to major advantage and overtaking or simply destroying the cars in her way. Switching instantly between rocket racks, the driver never allowed an opponent to approach too closely from the rear and deftly avoided any attacks that came their way.

  The final stretch approached, and the pink Mustang ended things with some flare, launching all the rockets from both racks as they slid sideways through the checkered flag, to uproarious applause from the crowd. The driver stepped out of the car and climbed up onto the roof. Kurt squinted at the projection. Gadot was in a bright pink poodle skirt, with a fluffy pink sweater, gigantic pink sunglasses, and a matching hairband. She waved and blew kisses to the crowd before her vanquished foes came roaring around the corner and the entire finish line became a tangle of twisted steel. She hopped off the roof of her car into the sidelines just before the other vehicles struck, and the video ended to the sound of roaring cheers and applause.

  Kurt swiped his phone closed, looking up at Jimmy. “I don’t understand.”

  Shaking his head, Jimmy closed his own phone. “That’s The Getaway Gal.” He paused, an incredulous look on his features. “I forget you don’t follow this stuff anymore. She’s the most famous driver in the game, on the competitive side. Like, high end sponsorships and everything. She almost never loses a race. She drives in the game for a living!”

  Still scowling, Kurt sat back in his chair. “So . . . Getaway Gal Gadot? Like the era movie star?”

  A frustrated shrug was aimed his way. “I dunno, seems likely. There’s plenty of dumber names in the gaming community. What I’m trying to tell you is that’s her! That’s the woman we’re meeting today, the one who drove for you from that art heist! She isn’t even thought to play the immersive side of the Life, man. This is all huge, why are you not into this stuff?” Jimmy stopped his tirade and nodded towards the parking lot. “She’s here! Oh, I’m giddy.”

  Grabbing his crutches, Jimmy stood and held open the gate for their approaching guest. She was around twenty-five and wore a pair of fitted blue jeans with a sleeveless dark purple shirt. Her brunette hair was tied back in a loose ponytail. Kurt noticed for the first time that her lithe physique was the same as he had seen in the immersive side of the game, but in the competitive side she was far bustier and more curvaceous.

  “Jimmy? Kurt?” She opened the gate and moved directly towards their table, sitting in the chair Jimmy offered.

  “That’s us. Nice to meet you, Gadot.” Jimmy moved back to his seat, getting out of Tammy’s way as she came to deliver drinks and take the new arrivals order.

  “Oh, it’s uh . . . It’s Summer. My real name.” She turned in her chair to look at Tammy. “Do you guys have chocolate milkshakes or anything really chocolaty, desert-like?”

  The waitress gave her a smile and nodded. “We carry Fauxcolate and the real thing.”

  Gadot blanched with a shrug. “Fake stuff is fine, just really ramp it up, please.”

  Without hesitating Jimmy waved for Tammy’s attention. “Real, my treat.” He paused to look at Gadot. “If that’s Okay, of course?”

  She nodded, a bemused smile creeping onto her lips. “Thank you, Jimmy. I haven’t had real chocolate since I was a kid.”

  Jimmy responded with a smiling shrug. “No big thing, business lunch and all. I mean, I assume it’s business. Though, I have to admit, I don’t know what a couple of small timers like us can offer the Getaway Gal.”

  Gadot faced him with a grimace. “Crap.” She looked at her lap. “So much for my secret identity.”

  Waving his hands defensively, Jimmy shook his head rapidly. “No, no! Your secret is totally safe with us. I’m just a huge fan. You’re the best driver in the game.” He shrugged with a touch of sheepishness. “I just wish I could drive like you, is all. I’m sorry if I embarrassed you.”

  Her head raised sharply at that and she glared at Jimmy as if convinced he was mocking her, before her expression softened. “Well, thank you. I appreciate your discretion, but I doubt it’s going to matter much longer.”

  Jimmy intervened. “I gotta ask though, what’s up with all the pink? And the-the poodle skirt? I watch for the driving, that other stuff seems like fluff to me.”

  “Ha! You don’t like my carefully designed persona? All that garbage is the ad execs, they say I need a ‘crafted experience’ for my viewers. Supposed to drive up the views.” She said, sighing and leaning back with a small grimace. “Anyway, none of that may matter soon. I’m going to war with GoonStorm.”

  Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

  “I’m in. We’re in.” Jimmy shrugged when Kurt shot him a look but didn’t retract his statement.

  Tammy arrived then with their food and drinks, expertly arranging the platter’s goods onto the tiny tabletop. “Anything else?”

  Jimmy nodded, lifting his knife and fork. “Yeah please, Tammy. All of this is going on my account. Just charge it whenever you’re ready.”

  Kurt split the cheap, recyclable chopsticks with a light crack, a smile on his face. “Oho! Free lunch. Thanks!”

  “Hey, man, welcome home. No big thing.” Jimmy happily unwrapped his silverware, preparing to dig into his usual order, Mexican steak with pepper jack cheese and spicy guacamole.

  Taking a long draw from her straw, Gadot groaned in enjoyment. “Ohh this is so much better than the fake stuff!” She paused to look at their meals. “Is that the, uh . . . lab-grown meat? Looks really . . . real.”

  Both men stared at her in confusion before Jimmy nodded. “It is real. Ah, that’s right, you’re from Arizona. The last bastion of the beef barons trying to stop this kind of thing.” He paused, wiping his mouth with a napkin. “Yeah, this is all cultured meat. They don’t really sell the animal stuff anywhere anymore — you know, outside of Arizona.”

  She made a face at him, before contentedly spooning some of her milkshake into her mouth. “Anyway. War with GoonStorm.”

  Kurt spoke up at this, raising a hand slightly as if in class. “What is GoonStorm and why are we going to war with them?”

  Gadot gave him a concerned look. “You really did start last night, huh?” She set her milkshake down on the table and sat back. “Okay, so GoonStorm is a guild, basically. It’s the largest in Illusion, growing every day. All those forum posts about the GoonStorm take-over conspiracy are right. I’ve seen it myself.”

  Jimmy perked up at that. “If they control all the turf, they control all the heists.” He stopped and looked at Kurt. “If you control turf that a bank is on, for example, you can hit that bank and not get heat for an extended period of time. You can even have your NPCs respond to any assets being threatened. It’s a massive advantage, and lets guilds basically farm heists every week while making sure no other guilds can touch them.” He blanched, his face screwed up in thought. “GoonStorm’s fluff is that they’re some paramilitary corporation, like those old super shady mercenary gangs of the twenty-first century. I think they call it a ‘company.’”

  Sitting back in his seat with a contented sigh, Kurt shook his head. “I can’t pretend to understand it like you guys do, but GoonStorm thugs killed us last night and stole Jimmy’s favorite gun. They crossed my friend, and if he’s in, I’m in.”

  Nearly choking, Jimmy laughed into his napkin as he smirked at Kurt. “That wasn’t my favorite gun, dude. I have like . . . four copies of it in storage.”

  “How many are in your crew?” Kurt asked, ignoring his friend.

  Gadot gave him a grim look but nodded appreciatively. “As of right now if you guys are in? Three. I only started recruiting a couple nights ago, and nobody but you guys has made the cut so far. The Lace is my crew, so I’m particular about who I let in.”

  Jimmy looked at Gadot. “That explains a lot. So, three of us against the entire GoonStorm army? They only have two and a half thousand players, with a standing NPC force of roughly seven thousand. Poor bastards don’t stand a chance.”

  Kurt’s jaw dropped. “Woah, what?”

  Ignoring both of them, Gadot swiped at her wrist before extending it into the middle of the table. “This is the first op. We’re doing everything through The Lace, so post nothing about anything on any forums. The game’s AI monitors that kind of thing and if you do it, The Lace won’t talk to you anymore. We’re very serious about our secrecy.”

  Kurt waved his hands in front of him. “Hang on, hang on. The game gave you a quest to hurt another guild?”

  She shook her head, before seeming to remember something and squinting at Kurt. “Yes and no. You guys know The Lace already, you must have been on an op for them last night. Who are you with? Crane?” Both men nodded, and she continued. “Yeah, she recommended you guys to me. I think she likes you.” She paused for a sip of her milkshake. “I can order ops. That’s what this is, an op I put together. We need to do all of this with The Lace, we need their resources. They’re allowing us to borrow certain vehicles and specialized tools in order to shut down another crew’s operation — namely the peace talks they’re involved in.”

  Jimmy intervened for Kurt’s benefit, “If you get high up enough with a faction, you can basically become a quest-giver, or just make and do your own quests. Ops in this case, but it’s pretty much the same thing.”

  Gadot continued, “So GoonStorm has a sit-down with the two remaining powerhouse guilds in Illusion, Ursa and the Pirates.” Jimmy shuddered at the mention of the Pirates, causing Gadot to raise an eyebrow before she continued, “Talk is they’re planning on a buyout, and will fold both guilds into the GoonStorm Company at that point. My contact says it’s all on track, and if this goes through, GoonStorm will become unstoppable. There won’t be any organizations in the city large enough to fight them.”

  With a shake of his head, Jimmy scraped up the remains of his meal, hovering his fork while he spoke. “Pirates are . . . well, a bunch of pirates. They won’t be bought like that. Do we really need to encourage them to go to war? Won’t they just go to war by accident like they always do?”

  Gadot laughed at that. “You’re right, we probably don’t need to push them very much. Really we just need to have a sit-down with them. I’m more worried about the Russians. The Ursa is sharp, organized, and their leader trusts nobody. They’ve agreed to a meeting with us, but it’s on pretty shaky ground. We need to be careful with them.” She paused again, taking a long draw from her shake. “It’s all about the timing. If we just break down peace talks for now, GoonStorm will stay strong and eventually come back to this point. The problem is that nobody really fights them, they have too many players. But if we can start a war against them, they’ll take a hit where it counts: morale. We need to cripple them—” She stopped, going pale as she realized what she had said.

  Jimmy looked between her and Kurt, eyebrows raised. “What?” He shared a quick smile with Kurt. “Oh, you said ‘crippled.’ Yeah, I wouldn’t worry about that. Kurt is, for sure, intellectually handicapped, but he doesn’t mind. He’s a happy fella, aren’t ya, buddy?” He leaned over and prodded Kurt in the ribs, eliciting a yelp from his friend and bringing a smile back to Gadot’s lips.

  “I am sorry, though. It was thoughtless of me,” the young woman said.

  Reaching over to Kurt’s plate, Jimmy stole one of his remaining bits of tuna sushi and popped it in his mouth with a grin. “Don’t even fret. I walk through life in a perpetual haze of bliss, impenetrable in my ego-built armor. So, how do you propose we cripple GoonStorm?”

  “And there’s where the plan gets complicated.” She tapped at her phone, tilting her wrist towards them to share what she had prepared. When they both had the file, Kurt inspected the photos she had sent. The screenshots were of a gated compound somewhere out in the desert surrounding Illusion. He could see several dozen vehicles in a parking area, a series of large-barreled artillery guns, and a small airport behind a squat, concrete building that looked like a bunker.

  “GoonStorm’s operation is massive, but it only has two main tactical strengths: this artillery emplacement, and their fleet of vehicles. They can field ten jets, a dozen attack choppers, three dozen tanks, and almost two hundred technical trucks with mounted .50 cals.” She paused, swiping through the pictures with a shake of her head. “That fleet is a vulnerability if we do this right. We need them fighting on multiple fronts, fielding as many vehicles as possible. Which is where the Pirates and Russians come in. Their turfs are naturally set up for this to work. If they both attack, GoonStorm will have to respond to a wider area, spread out across their borders. I can take out plenty of their tanks if Ursa keeps GoonStorm’s jets busy.”

  Brushing her hair over her shoulder, Gadot leaned back in her chair. “So, yeah. I hear rumors the Pirates have something that can neutralize GoonStorm’s artillery. I just need Ursa to field their own air superiority to counter GoonStorm’s, so I can waste their fleet from the air. Our meetings over the next couple of days should help iron that out. We just have to get everyone to understand that the Goons are not invincible first.” She paused, frowning. “And all of this has to happen within the next four days, or GoonStorm owns a whole server in the Life.”

  Kurt nodded, a hand on his chin as he looked at the pictures. “Once they have it, they’ll never let it go.”

  Gadot nodded grimly. “It would change the entire game on this server to whatever they want it to be. Solo players and smaller crews would just be crushed.” She paused, bringing up more data on her phone before leaning over to them once more. “Here’s the first step. We hit their biggest op of the week to show all of Illusion that they can be beaten.”

  Jimmy reached over and tapped his wrist to Gadot’s. He began swiping through the quest details, giving a low whistle and shaking his head every so often. “Summer . . . this is beyond insane. First and Central Bank? GoonStorm hits that every week like clockwork, and everyone knows it. It’s their best defended op of the week. How are we supposed to crash that party?”

  A predatory smile crept onto her face as Kurt sighed and tapped his wrist to hers. The quest details popped up on his phone and he swiped to accept, adding his name to the roster. He began browsing the details, focusing on what GoonStorm was expected to do. Every week they did the heist the same way, which made them predictable. At first other player-run gangs had tried to attack them and steal their take, but GoonStorm had quickly shut that down with the use of a tank, backed up by a small army on highly mobile off-road motorcycles.

  Each week roughly fifty members of GoonStorm would descend on the bank. One guild officer would bring the tank, four main heist members (also officers) with special items and training would go for the vault, while the rest of the GoonStorm thugs held the lobby and fended off any players or NPCs that tried to stop them. The estimated take was between one and two hundred million in dirty cash, depending on how badly the rank and file abused the civilian NPCs. For this particular heist, the penalty for civilian casualties was one million each.

  Gadot explained, “While the Goons hit the bank, we cut into the basement from the subway tunnels. We avoid the lobby and kill the vault crew. If we do it quickly, the rest of the Goons won’t realize they’ve been hit until their vault crew respawns after fifteen seconds. We use that time to get out through the basement and escape via the subway tunnels we came in from. Easy run.”

  Browsing through various pictures and files of information on the bank and the planned heist, Kurt began shaking his head. “Too many ‘what if’s here, Gadot. How do we know when to hit the vault crew? Too early and we have to finish cutting into the vault, too late and we have to fight the whole army in the lobby to get to them.”

  She pursed her lips and scowled. “The Goons are predictable within reason. Once they make entry, they leave the bank no more than twenty five minutes later. On average lately, it’s been eighteen minutes from entry. My plan has us taking out the vault crew at the sixteen-minute mark, that should be ideal.”

  “I have a really bad idea.” Kurt scratched his chin, staring at a picture. “This guy is the bank manager, right?”

  Gadot pulled up her own heist planning file, browsing until she found the picture Kurt was talking about. “Him? Yeah, they get the inner vault door key from him. Without it, they would have to cut through the security cage inside the vault as well as the vault door.”

  Shaking his head, Jimmy started laughing. “You aren’t kidding. This is a bad idea.”

  Looking between the two of them, Gadot held her hands out in confusion. “What’s your idea?”

  Kurt chewed on his lower lip for a moment. “So, what if I entered the bank early and took the manager’s place?” He swiped through a couple more images, looking at the vault details. “It says the manager has an extra penalty if killed. I’m betting they keep him alive the whole time. And look, the key is on a huge ring of other keys. It makes sense to just bring him with them into the vault. Once they bag the cash, I take them out and we make a run for it.”

  With eyebrows raised, Gadot nodded. “That is actually better. You up to it, though?”

  Jimmy laughed again. “This is his thing, don’t even worry. When we played Brescia Online together he was constantly pulling off disguise shenanigans.”

  With a wry smile, Kurt closed his heist setup file and looked at his friends. “I just spent two years pretending I cared about my education, I’m sure I can pull this off. I do feel like asking why you picked us, though.”

  She looked at the table for a long moment. “I don’t really make friends. Especially not in the Life. I mean, I love the game and all, I just . . . I can’t trust anyone in there.” Looking up at Kurt, she softened her gaze. “When I killed Jimmy, you backed me up. You kept backing me up, even after I left you in the offices, and then again on the roof.” She paused, turning to Jimmy. “And you dove into a full blown four bar to help us, when all you had was a starter pistol and a hearse. Add to that the fact that it actually worked, and you’re either very brave, or very stupid.”

  Leaning back in his chair, Jimmy flashed her a smile. “Can’t it be both?”

  Gadot smiled back at Jimmy, looking away briefly before facing them both again. “Anyway, you guys are different. I need help to do this, and I don’t know anybody else who I think might actually be able to pull it off.”

  They sat in silence for a moment, before Gadot stood up and pushed her chair in. “Heist is in three hours. You guys good to go?”

  Kurt scrambled to stand. “No! I have a ton of prep to do, and no idea if I can actually do it yet.”

  “Ha! Well, get logged in and find out. I have some prep work to do myself. Jimmy, I’ll need your help to cut into the basement, so we’ll meet up about an hour before they hit the place.” She paused as she approached the gate. “I’ll be in town until we get the job finished. I’m staying in a hotel nearby. If we need to meet again, this seems like a good place. See you boys in the Life!”

  With that she was gone, leaving Kurt to wonder what they had gotten into, while Jimmy smiled wistfully.