After he had called The Lace and was approved for pickup, he waited out by the hangar, leaning against a wall. He looked up as Jimmy opened the kitchen door and walked towards him with a wave.

  “Hey, man, you good?” Jimmy looked uncomfortable. “I didn’t mean to lay into you in there.” He stood with his hands in the pockets of his pants, offering a shrug.

  Kurt looked at his childhood friend for a moment, before walking over and wrapping his arms around Jimmy. The embrace was brief, and when Kurt let go, Jimmy looked at him in confusion. “I’m back, Jimmy. I’m back and I’m not going anywhere this time. Tonight we’re gonna get Kitty back, too.” Kurt looked more concerned than happy but offered a smile anyway.

  Jimmy smiled as well but took a step back. “Yeah. Yeah, we will.”

  The helicopter made its approach then, kicking up dead leaves as it slowly settled onto the air strip. Looking back at his friend, Kurt waved a hand. “I need to correct all of this. I’m gonna go do some shopping, and the next time we meet up I’ll be back to fighting strength.” A firm expression settled itself onto his face. “You won’t be carrying me anymore.”

  Jimmy shook his head and waved, a small smile at the corner of his mouth. “I never was, friend.”

  The helicopter was luxurious inside. Four leather seats faced each other with plenty of legroom. Kurt seated himself facing the cockpit and pulled the door shut behind him. The pilot played with some controls, giving the appearance of competence before asking for a destination.

  Kurt thought for a moment, scowling to himself. “Actually, take me across the lake to the airport, please.” Leaning forward as the helicopter began to smoothly lift off, he smiled out the window. “Can you call in a pickup for The Lace headquarters?”

  “I’ll check for authorization.” The pilot spoke casually over his shoulder, eyes glued to the windshield. “Authorization confirmed. HQ coming in for a landing now.” He pointed ahead, drawing Kurt’s attention to the large, black plane descending from the clouds above them. The short trip ended with the helicopter landing near the end of a runway, as the Lace’s Stronghold taxied towards them.

  As the massive aircraft approached him, Kurt noticed a series of gun barrels tucked beneath the wings on either side. “Huh. Those are new.”

  Crane was waiting for him as the ramp lowered, a stern look on her face. “How can we be of assistance, Mr. Kurtis?”

  Moving past her up the ramp, he gave her a deferential nod. “An excellent question.”

  She turned to follow him as the ramp lifted and the plane began to taxi again for takeoff. They sat in fold-down seats in the cargo hold, strapped in place until the big red light overhead changed to green. Standing and moving through the cargo hold, Kurt took a closer look around. Several crates were strapped in the hold, and at least one large vehicle was in place beneath a tarp. Still, most of the hold was closed off behind walls.

  “I was hoping to speak with The Lace quartermaster.” Kurt looked at Crane, hands behind his back. “We do have one, I assume?”

  Waving a hand without concern, Crane moved towards the stairs. “Of course we do.” She pointed beyond the tarp-covered vehicle. “Back there. Ask for Leo.” With that, she ignored Kurt and climbed the stairs.

  Moving back past the various crates and storage, Kurt discovered the wall was incomplete. A door-sized opening was tucked away into a corner behind the stairs. Walking through it, Kurt was surprised to see an armory behind what appeared to be gunnery stations for the weapons he had seen on his way in. A tall man stood next to an open crate, spectacles on the bridge of his nose as he looked between the crate and a clipboard. He was lithe but powerful-looking, muscles obvious beneath his tan-colored, long-sleeved, V-neck shirt. He smiled politely at Kurt.

  “Leo?” Kurt peered past him to the crate, seeing bundles of ammunition tucked into straw packing.

  The man touched his spectacles to adjust them. “Now you . . . I think I will enjoy equipping.”

  “Crane sent me?” Hesitantly, Kurt stepped forward and offered his hand.

  Leo looked down at Kurt’s hand, a flicker of a smile playing across his features. “Yes of course she did. Leo, at your service.” He grasped Kurt’s hand in a firm but brief handshake. “Crane tells me you have somewhat . . . unconventional tactics.”

  Kurt smiled at that, shrugging slightly. “I don’t really like getting shot. Guess that makes me a stealth player. Disguise sometimes?”

  Leo prodded the holster dangling at Kurt’s armpit. “And yet you carry a magnum. That other one looks like an automatic.” He placed his arms behind his back and adopted a thoughtful pose. “I would posit that your style is more about the kind of confrontation you choose to participate in.” He moved to a nearby crate, opening the lid and lifting out a large, black automatic rifle. “Some people are direct. Their intentions are obvious.” Placing the rifle back carefully, he closed the crate and moved to another. “Others . . . not so much. It does not remove the lethality of the person in question.” Leo produced a compact, black pistol with a blocky, silver slide and short barrel, placing it on the top of the crate in front of Kurt.

  He wasted no time in scanning it.

  Walther PK380

  Pistol. Sidearm. Weapon drops upon death only if equipped in the Primary/Secondary slot.

  Caliber: .380 ACP

  Rate of Fire: Semi-Automatic.

  Capacity: 8 Round Magazine.

  “Oh, I like that.” Kurt picked up the gun and hefted it. “Light, too. Accurate?”

  Leo gave him that small smile again. “At short range? More so than you.” He turned and dug through the crate a bit more. “Highly customizable as well. I feel it’s an item you could really . . . grow into.”

  “Is there a range where I can try it out?” Kurt aimed down the short length of the barrel.

  Stepping forward and gently reclaiming the firearm, Leo looked over his spectacles at Kurt. “On board a high-altitude airplane? Not as such, no. I’d be happy to assist you with the purchase of some accessories, though.”

  Kurt gave him a nod, peering into the crate at his side. Pointing at several items, he cheerfully went about the process of shopping. “I’ll need a suppressor, a flashlight, some .380 subsonic hollow points, 9mm +P, rounds for the magnum, and what do you have for consumables?”

  Leo dutifully collected the items as requested. He slipped the small suppressor into place on the Walther but stopped as his hand hovered over an assortment of flashlight options. “I’m afraid I cannot provide the .380 specialty ammunition. Perhaps once you have become more familiar with that class of firearm.” He paused, pointing at the lights under his hand. “Would you care for a combat light? Perhaps something a bit less overt. I have an LED laser combo you might enjoy?”

  His eyebrows raising in interest, Kurt looked back at the flashlights. “I’ll take the combo for this one, a laser might come in handy.” He watched in satisfaction as Leo clicked the small item into place just under the barrel of the Walther. “What’s the difference between a regular flashlight and the combat version?”

  “The combat flashlight has multiple settings, including strobe, which can be very handy for engaging opponents in a darkened area,” Leo said while modifying Kurt’s new firearm in steady motions. “It also has an IR setting which, coupled with IR goggles, can be a powerful tool for a stealthy person not unlike yourself.”

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  “I’ll take two.” Kurt felt upbeat, setting his Glock and Coonan down on the crate nearby.

  Leo swiftly set to work modifying each pistol in turn. With only a short glance up, he looked at Kurt over his spectacles. “That armor is in need of repair.”

  Kurt quickly undid the zipper under his armpit and shrugged out of it. “Oh yeah, thanks. I actually was hoping for some modifications to that as well?”

  “Mm-hm.” Leo lifted one of the weapons and tested the various settings on the flashlight, nodding in satisfaction and setting it down on the table. “What did you have in mind?”

  “What are my options?” Kurt holstered his newly upgraded pistols, his holsters molding to the new modifications.

  Looking at him over his spectacles again, Leo adopted a relaxed posture, leaning against one of the crates. “Tell me what you would like the armor to do, and I’ll let you know what we have available that would be appropriate.”

  Kurt began to tick off wish list items on his fingers. “Okay, I want it to be stronger. I’d like it to last longer, but it’s really important that it still looks like a normal suit vest so I can use it with disguises.” He looked up at the ceiling before nodding. “I think that’s it.”

  “Very well. I can replace some of the internal materials with higher quality variants and reinforce the stitch work, but I would recommend not investing in any plating as that would increase its bulk and make it more obvious.” Leo lifted the tattered vest in one hand, looking it over with an analytical eye.

  “Awesome, thank you.” Kurt couldn’t help but smile at so many upgrades.

  “As to consumable items, we stock a wide range of tactical grenades and ECM devices, as well as general utility items. This way.” Leo turned and gestured to a series of smaller crates further back in the hold.

  Kurt was pleased when he finished shopping, running through the list in his head as he moved towards the parachutes. He had purchased a new hidden holder for a package of micro flares that fit around his ankle. It allowed covert storage for four pencil-sized flares, as well as four equally small ‘smoke sticks’, which each produced enough tactical smoke to fill a medium-sized room. In a waistband that tucked items into the small of his back, he carried three short-fuse flashbang grenades, held in place by Velcro straps. Their pins were attached to the material, so once ripped free he would have two seconds to get them in place before detonation. He set up a standing order with The Lace quartermaster to have replacements for all his equipment shipped to his safehouse, just in case.

  A new and improved holster for each weapon was also a pleasing part of his new arsenal. His rear waistband holster now held only the Walther, his highly recognizable Maxim 9 having been shipped to his safehouse. He had a magazine holder strapped in place directly next to the waistband holster that carried two magazines of standard .380 ammunition. A new double underarm holster included two magazine wells for each handgun strapped snug to his chest. On his left, the Glock was nestled in place beside two extended magazines of +P, though he had it loaded with a standard-length magazine to avoid a bulge if he wore a suit jacket. The Coonan was tucked under his right armpit, with a magazine of .357 armor piercing rounds in one slot, and a magazine of hollow points for the other. A single clip on his belt held his 50 round drum magazine filled with Ratshot, for ease in tire puncturing.

  Patting his arsenal with pleasure, Kurt stepped up and strapped himself into a parachute before slipping a pair of goggles over his eyes. He hit the button to open the small door in the ramp. Bracing himself against the sudden wind whipping around the cargo bay, he leaned forward and took a few deep breaths. On the third exhale he stepped forward, and actually managed to summon the willpower to let himself fall.

  Remembering what had happened last time, Kurt was a bit more specific about his landing zone, ensuring he was near a way out before coming to the ground. He landed and unclipped the parachute, leaving it where it fell. Then he stepped quickly into the nearest subway entrance. The NPCs around him didn’t seem to care much that he was wearing a simple black t-shirt with guns strapped to him in plain view. They moved out of his way and averted their gaze, but none of them screamed or reached for phones.

  Sparing a glance at his map, Kurt leaned against a wall in the passenger waiting zone. His safehouse was near but would take a couple of minutes to arrive. He frowned in thought as he looked at the upgrade button attached to his safehouse’s page. Perhaps it was impulsive, but he felt he could spare the money, and held his thumb to the button, confirming his purchase for two and a half million in clean cash. The upgrade window informed him he now had storage room for twenty outfits, five suits of armor, twenty firearms, and five million in dirty cash.

  He noticed the difference in his safehouse immediately, as the train pulled into the station. The windows were solid black, no planks covering them, and the door was altered somewhat as well. When he approached, he noticed the lack of a key or card slot in the door. In lieu of those, a simple black panel was set in the recess alongside the door. Kurt stepped up and pressed his open palm into it, confident of what it was. The panel lit up as it scanned his hand, a blue light sweeping back and forth once before the door slid open, smooth and quiet.

  The floor in front of him caught his notice immediately, a swirl of crimson embedded into each onyx tile. The wall directly across from him was smooth metal but painted in a similar color scheme as the floor, curving gently upward to form an arch in the ceiling of the car. He stepped inside, allowing the door to close, as ball-shaped lamps embedded in the ceiling flicked on, gentle light splashing across the rest of his safehouse. Overall, it seemed to have a nightclub theme. The seating had been replaced with leather-wrapped booths facing each other, and there was a tiny bar at the short wall to the rear of the car. Kurt was pleased to discover a brass-piped coffee machine behind the bar and swung open the small wooden door to make himself a cup.

  Contentedly sipping his steaming beverage as the train gently swayed into motion, Kurt moved to explore the rest of his newly upgraded safehouse. Up front the car was dominated by two floor-to-ceiling, dark-wood armoires nestled into each corner with an open space in front of them. The armoire doors slid open on rails, displaying a full-body mannequin in each. At the push of a button, the mannequins cycled back into the depths of the armoires, vanishing behind a curtain that implied impossible depth to each storage unit.

  His cash storage area was suspiciously missing, a secondary seating lounge in its place. Upon closer inspection, he discovered a small square of metal encasing a black plastic screen on the wall behind one of the benches. Pressing his thumb to the plastic caused a light to scan the digit, before a metallic click sounded from beneath the bench. The panel there slid out, a long drawer extending on rails part way out into the walkway. He noticed his dirty cash already in place, filling only a small area of the drawer. A thumb press to the panel on the wall closed the safe again, and he nodded in appreciation of the storage compartment’s elegant simplicity.

  Kurt turned back with a smile, looking at the weapons storage. It was sunk into the wall, a heavy glass panel door on a rail allowing access. When he slid open the smoked glass, he was made painfully aware how limited his collection was, with only a few of the pistol pegs holding any spare weapons. He lovingly caressed his Maxim 9, hung at the top of the rack, thinking about when he might be able to use it again. “Ah, well. Someday.”

  Taking a sip of his coffee, Kurt happily plopped into a comfortable leather loveseat attached to the wall of the car across from the weapons storage. He pulled up his phone and sent a text to Jimmy and Gadot to explain that he was logging off for a while. He finished his cup of coffee and set it down on the seat beside him, watching as it fell to silver dust and faded away. Swiping to the ‘log off’ option on his phone, he closed his eyes and exited the game.

  His natural hearing clicked back into place, and he immediately regretted his timing. “He’s still in that game?” It was his mother’s voice, coming from the kitchen, where he presumed his father was getting a head start on dinner.

  Proving him correct, his father spoke next, the sound of the kitchen sink partially masking his words. “Yes, he is. He said something about helping Jimmy in there this weekend.”

  “Oh good, he can fall even further behind, then.” She sounded annoyed. He knew she meant well, but it was taxing how much she seemed to expect from him at times.

  Tuning out his parents’ argument, Kurt jacked back into the internet and stared at a blank search bar before using an immersion display to key in the words: “What should I do with my life?”

  The results were predictably less than helpful. A smattering of nonsensical gibberish designed to make people feel better about their impending mortality led the way. Phrases like ‘live laugh love’ were repeated in various permutations, no real meaning attached to any of them aside from the vague sense of contentment they seemed to offer. Waving what he thought of as nonsense, fluff, and inane babble away, he delved into career placement pages. Sifting through those was somewhat more helpful, but nothing really popped out at him as a solution.

  Past the more practical applications came a handful of deeper philosophical pages, dedicated to the concept of existence and what pursuits were thought of as meaningful throughout history. Again, no solution to his problem and nothing he would think of as an answer, potentially fascinating as the philosophy was.

  The search engine’s next suggestion was a conversation attached to a popular website that specialized in such topics. One could post almost anything, and others would come in to answer the questions. As he expected, the answers section was filled with more unhelpful nonsense. Suggestions for sexual preferences were mixed in with stories of emotionally fulfilling pet ownership, unprovoked vulgarities, and statements of purpose based in financial security. One particularly confusing tangent became obsessed with old flannel shirts and was plagued with several pictures of lumberjacks.

  Just as he was about to give up on the website, one of the threads attached to the question seemed to take it seriously. “If you feel lost in life, try making something. It doesn’t have to be anything grand. Maybe even just a meal. There is peace to be found in working with your hands, or your mind. Write a song, a poem, or paint a picture. Carve something out of wood, if you can afford it, or write a book. Even if what you create is terrible, there is undeniable contentment to be had in the act of creation. Improve yourself or the world around you, just a tiny bit.”

  Kurt made a quick decision and logged off entirely, removing the plug from the side of his head. He walked into the kitchen and saw his father’s back to him as he washed something in the sink. “Hey, Dad? Would you teach me how to cook?”