Kurt took a deep breath and worked on calming his nerves. “That was rough.”

  “Yeah, man, competitive side can be pretty nasty. Told you tonight would be painful.” Jimmy had gone back to swiping at his phone, probably looking for new matches. “Hey, you wanna go do a death race? Those are kinda fun.”

  “How’s it pay?” Kurt was not particularly interested. He had seen the kind of players those races were populated with and was under no illusions about his driving ability.

  “Hundred K for a win. That’s with thirty racers, though and I don’t win often.” Jimmy squinted, one side of his face scrunching up. “I usually get fifteen to forty K?”

  “No thanks. We need to make some real money, and this piecemeal crap won’t cut it.” Kurt resumed browsing the modes, looking up when Jimmy snickered under his breath. “What?”

  His friend shook his head wider. “We could always try the Fox and the Hounds.” Jimmy paused, giving a helpless shrug. “I’m pretty sure that’s the single biggest potential payout in competitive mode. Beats the pants off most heists, actually.”

  Kurt glared at him. “You’re being obtuse. Why do you seem to think it’s a bad idea?”

  Jimmy nodded, snorting a laugh. “’Cause it is. I know you, you’re gonna wanna play Fox, and that’s just . . . I mean, two people have won Fox in three years. It’s signing up for a beating.” Jimmy rubbed an eye absently. “The people who play Hound play it hard too, man. These guys are dedicated, they form entire guilds around this game mode. There’s a lot of people who play this game just to play Hound. Lotta scrubs in there, too, but . . .” Jimmy trailed off. He shrugged, still not looking up from his phone.

  “Well I do like a challenge.” Kurt shrugged while inputting ‘fox and hounds’ into the game mode search bar. A result came back to him immediately with a single game. Four hundred and thirty-two people had signed up for Hound, and the solitary Fox space still sat open. He blinked, swiping to read more specifics.

  The Fox and the Hounds game mode was at its core a Running Man contest, based loosely on Stephen King’s famous novel. Each Hound player had to pay in a million dollars in game cash to play, and the Fox played for free, with a massive bonus to skill EXP gain — an extra 100% of the normal rate. Enticement was needed to lure people to play Fox.

  The game was played in a full-size copy of the city, without its normal player population, NPCs, or any form of the heat mechanic from the immersive side. The Fox was given a five mile head start from their spawn point, but their dot on the map was permanently visible to all Hounds until they came within a hundred yards of the Fox. At that close range, the map rules returned to normal, with whatever noise the Fox made making them visible on the Hound’s map. Phone communication was limited to NPCs — players were not allowed to communicate remotely.

  Full immersive side benefits were active for the Fox and Hounds both, with whatever gear, skills, and vehicles they had at their disposal available for use with all of their standard rules and risks of loss. The goal for the Hounds was to hunt down and kill the Fox as quickly as possible. The Fox needed to stay alive as long as possible, by whatever means necessary.

  If the Fox lasted the entire hour, they won the whole pot paid in by the Hounds. If the Fox died, whichever Hound or Hound team killed the Fox was given the pot, but it was automatically and evenly split between players if they acted together in any way. This was an encouragement to form teams, but Jimmy explained it meant the different Hounds crews and guilds just killed each other on sight more often than not. Once a player died, they were out of the game and ineligible for a cut. The Fox was awarded a cut of the pot at the fifteen, thirty, and forty-five minute mark. Ten percent of the pot for fifteen minutes survived, twenty-five percent for thirty minutes, and fifty percent for forty-five minutes.

  Hounds were severely penalized for any action that directly aided a Fox, aside from killing one another; immediately forfeiting any claim to the pot and permanently flagging on the map as a traitor, a glowing red dot announcing their allegiance to all the other Hounds. Jimmy told Kurt about several attempts to win Fox by stacking the deck against the Hounds, but the numbers just weren’t sustainable. Too many turncoat Hounds were needed to have any viable chance of winning, and any instances of rogue Hounds turning traitor ended with the other Hounds teaming up and ripping them apart.

  The game’s AI monitored the match and ensured that the Fox played in good faith by not allowing any Hounds to kill them with the intention of feeding them the win. That resulted in instant forfeiture and a heavy reputation penalty for any players involved in it.

  “If I can make it just fifteen minutes, that’s a fifty-million-dollar payout. That’s worth it even if we don’t win,” Kurt continued pressing his case.

  His eyes rising at that, Jimmy glanced over, clearly not convinced it was a good idea. “Pretty big ‘if’. A five mile head start won’t mean very much with what you’re gonna be facing. And even if we joined, we could only help you a little bit before — fuck’s sake, dude, you already signed up for Fox.” Jimmy shook his head and sat back with a laugh.

  Kurt grinned at him. “You’re still gonna help, though, right?”

  Jimmy snorted back. “Well, yeah. I’ll see if Gadot can join us.” He paused to check the game’s page. “Oh, we’ve got twenty minutes. Plenty of time.”

  He started swiping through the chat on the game modes page. “Right now, these guys are all just cheering that they got a Fox and talking about how they can’t wait to kill you. You should pay attention to this chat, by the way. Half of these idiots’ll just give away their strategies, or brag about vehicles.”

  A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

  Kurt pulled up the chat and was immediately accosted by the froth and vitriol of his soon-to-be opponents. He felt his nerves fraying as he saw the count of the Hounds rise steadily, a new name ticking onto the list every few minutes. “How many are going to be against me?”

  “It caps at five hundred.” Jimmy smiled. “Oh, don’t worry, most of them will be trying to kill each other . . . at first.” He shook his head, amused at Kurt’s new plight. “But if you make it past the fifteen minute mark, you’ll be shocked how fast they team up to make sure you don’t get to that next milepost.”

  Shifting in his seat, Kurt became nervous. “I’d better log over and make sure I’m ready.”

  “Yeah, you’re not. Gadot says you’re a jackass, but that she’ll be on to help when it’s time.” Jimmy waved a hand at him dismissively, chuckling at Gadot’s response.

  Kurt shrugged, unable to refute the claim, and logged back over to the immersive side. Once there, he immediately pulled up The Lace on his contacts and called them.

  “Yes?” As usual, the voice was terse, short-spoken, and to the point.

  “I need Leo, please.” Kurt hung up when he received a positive answer to his request and waited impatiently on the couch, watching his timer tick away.

  Leo arrived, wheeling a thick, double-wide suitcase behind him. He gave Kurt a warm smile, before sitting on the coffee table opposite him and cocking his head to the side. “How can I be of assistance, Mr. Kurtis?”

  “Hey, Leo. I need some new ammo. I’m about to go up against some heavy hitters.” Kurt was feeling more confident. Gearing up before a fight always helped calm his nerves. “Specifically, I need some better armor piercing rounds for my magnum, something to upgrade my hollow points, and some incendiaries for my 9mm, along with another drum magazine and holder like this one.”

  “Hmm. I may have . . .” Leo drifted off, turning to his case and pulling open one part of it, revealing a rack of ammunition boxes. He sifted through them for a moment, before setting two boxes of shells on the table in front of Kurt. “For armor piercing, the best I can offer currently is steel core — a step up from what you have now.” He moved his hand over the other ammo box. “This is the incendiary.” Laying out the drum magazine and holder, he nodded.

  “That works, thanks.” Kurt quickly changed the ammunition in his magnum’s holder, before adding rounds to his new drum magazine and placing the holder for it on the opposite side of his belt from the one full of Ratshot.

  “An upgrade for hollow point ammunition?” Leo looked at him questioningly, one hand in the ammunition drawer of his suitcase. When Kurt nodded his approval, Leo brought out a new box. “These are fragmentation rounds. They should serve as a viable upgrade for your current ammunition, and do not suffer the same armor penalty.”

  Kurt grabbed the box and shook out a shell. The round looked like it had several smaller bullets in its tip, set into its sharpened point like gemstones. He scanned them to find a significant damage increase, and happily purchased enough to fill what was left of his special ammunition inventory. When he finished his ammo shopping, he had a thousand rounds of his new steel core ammo, a thousand rounds of 9mm fragmentation, and a thousand rounds of incendiary to go along with the Ratshot he always carried.

  He began to get himself equipped, pulling the straps on his freshly repaired armor tight and applying various weaponry and consumables to their holders and holsters. Once that was done, Kurt stood up with a deep breath and swiped to log back into the lobby where Jimmy and Gadot were waiting for him.

  “Just in time. You better make it half an hour, or we’re both out a million for nothing.” Jimmy didn’t sound angry, just mildly annoyed, speaking without looking up from his phone.

  “Well I’ll try, I guess.” Kurt shrugged at his friends, a look of consternation on his face. “Go team?”

  “Somebody wins Fox once a year, and we’re overdue. He might pull it off.” Gadot glanced at her wrist as their game notification came in. She gave Kurt a small smile, her eyebrows peaked in a mostly hopeless expression. “Kurt’s style is . . . unusual. You never know.”

  “Thanks.” His face screwed up slightly as he swiped to the blinking game invite, his thumb hovering over the accept button. “You guys are kinda dicks.”

  Jimmy barked a laugh, pulling up his own invite. “You’re in good company, then.” With that, he pressed his thumb to the air above his wrist and vanished. Gadot followed.

  Kurt took a deep breath and hit ‘accept’ on his own invite. The lobby faded out as his senses shut down momentarily, providing a brief but panic-inducing glimpse at a void without sight or sound. His sense of hearing loaded in first, the rattling hum of rotors giving him an idea of where he would be starting his latest misadventure.

  Eyes opening on the cargo hold of a large helicopter, Kurt looked around, his gaze settling on the AI representative seated across from him. Her head was still tilted to the left of his eyeline, expression slack. He became aware that he was wearing a parachute and leaned forward to alleviate the pressure it put on his back.

  “Welcome to The Fox and the Hounds, Mr. Kurtis. The game will begin in two minutes.” She shifted in her seat, turning to face the window behind Kurt. “The rules for Fox are simple: survive any way you can. This is a five-hundred-versus-one mode, and the longer you stay alive, the more your reward will be at the conclusion of the match. Do you have any questions?”

  Kurt raised an eyebrow. “Sure. How do I win?”

  A ghost of a smile flickered across her lips, and she faced him directly for a brief moment. “Aggression, fortitude, luck. Most of all, cunning.” A red light blinked overhead, and a grinding noise reverberated through his feet from the creased floor. He looked down nervously. The length of the cargo hold was split down the middle by what appeared to be a door. He understood what was about to happen and clutched at his parachute straps. “The game begins in thirty seconds. This Representative is required to take a picture of you for the Hounds.” She had gone back to her automaton impression.

  “Sure thing. One sec,” he answered. Kurt reached into his large inner jacket pocket, producing his white wolf mask, and strapped it in place before standing up and crossing his arms with his head cocked to one side. “Okay, ready.”

  The AI representative raised a hand-held phone and pressed its screen, causing a flash of light to engulf the cabin. “Thank you, Mr. Kurtis.”

  He shook his head. “Damn, you’re creepy. Why don’t you do something horrifying next, just for fun? Maybe dump me from a helicopter at high altitude?”

  Kurt looked at his phone, seeing a couple of new additions to the main screen. At the top there was now a prominently displayed clock, counting down from thirty seconds. Next to it was an enemy player icon — a little red man with a gun next to the label 500/500. His timer reached ten seconds, and a holographic display of the numbers lifted from his phone, counting down with loud chimes. The floor beneath him made a loud clunking sound at three seconds, and Kurt’s chair began folding into the wall, forcing him to stand. He looked at the AI representative, seated on her wall-mounted chair with a safety belt securing her in place. She met his gaze briefly. “Good luck.”

  Kurt’s timer hit zero and the floor fell away beneath him, dropping him into the clouds above the city.