| What Are The Odds? |
[Dec. 12th, 2007|01:12 am] |
After more than eight years, getting hit still hurt.
Rhiannon wiped her lip.
She should've gone on a regular patrol, maybe hit a graveyard or two, and broken her body back in easily. But this whole 'vampires on wheels' thing had been bothering her for weeks. A half hour before sunset, the slayer walked to the industrialized area where railroad tracks intersected and trains dropped cargo or picked up new cars before heading out of town. It didn't take long to find a car giving shelter to a couple of vamps during the daylight hours.
Her plan was simple enough on paper. Give the metal door a tug, flood the car with sunlight, and go from there.
Sneaking up was utterly impossible. She did a tight-wire on the side of the car and found the handle. But as soon as she inched the door, it let out a scrape that practically turned her ears inside out. Sound amplification guaranteed that the occupants were feeling it, too. Hearing a chorus of angry snarls, Rhiannon grunted and yanked on the door as hard as she could.
At halfway, she heard the first demon explode in a cloud of dust. But then pulling got harder. Suddenly she was in a tug of war for control of the door. Then a vamp got ballsy. Sunlight or not, it reached around and grabbed the slayer's throat and tugged her inside. The door slammed shut behind her.
First everything was orange, light cast by the burning vampire. Then he was dust and the car went black. A fist hit her in the mouth. So much for simple on paper.
His idea, on paper, was perfect. Pound on the back door of the Chinese restaurant, flood the goon with his charm, and go from there.
Faking his way into the poker game was pretty much impossible. High stakes meant high security. You needed guts, you needed a password. You needed a bankroll (which he had, courtesy of the last paycheck cashed from the Witching Hour). One out of three.
Whistler walked the tightrope when the six-foot bruiser answered the door. He stuffed a few dollars into the breast pocket, hoping to impress, but the grunt from the front-line security indicated the hatted man was unwelcome.
It was either brass balls or a death wish that found Whistler's foot thrust into the entrance and then hands against the solid metal door where he engaged in a tug of war. The scrape of metal against concrete reverberated along the alley as the Whistler versus Goliath battle rode on.
He didn't see the extra pair of hands that grabbed him by the lapels, and lifted him six inches off the ground before yanking him inside. The door slammed shut behind him...
Rhiannon didn't know if she was bleeding or not.
Blindly, she tucked into a ball and kicked her feet. "Huh!" The left leg struck dead air. The right, a soft spot in somebody's middle section. She felt the way her heel pushed in far and her toe met resistance. Gut, right below the ribcage. The train car vibrated when the vamp hit the floor. She took the chance to whip to her haunches and feel for her surroundings. Trash. Empty cans. Tangled rags. She squinted and picked out the glow of eyes. Yellow, three pairs.
A rumble came from behind her, quiet and low so that she felt it in her chest. Make that four.
Don't think. Move.
The slayer spun and swept her leg.
His feet dangled just off the ground. Whistler supressed the urge to swing his legs. He might connect with the private security's knees but then what? He wasn't a fighter. Freeze him? Then he'd have to deal with the rest of the crowd. He could feel their eyes on him. Four at the table.
Don't panic.
"Password," it spoke. The eyes were yellow. Whistler should've realized. Someone with that kind of strength... He pressed his hands against the vampire's chest and pushed back, hoping to dislodge himself. The move was a colossal failure.
"Uh. Railcar," the hatted man replied. He took a breath as fangs peeked out from receding lips.
Dammit.
Whistler went for the shins anyway. There was a small crack and a groan of pain as the thing let go of him. He turned to face the group, still deciding between fight or flight. He took a good look at the table. Cards had been dealt, but there was no money in play. The room vibrated. It wasn't just an after-hours poker game.
They were playing for magicks. And not the white kind. That couldn't go unchallenged. "Deal me in."
Her ankle hooked around a leg. The vampire came down hard on its back, but not before bashing its head on the wall. Rhiannon didn't see the skull fragments scatter, but she did hear the crack. The vamp didn't dust, but its body was dead weight on the floor. An obstacle, two feet to be tripped over if she wandered that way again.
There were fingers in her hair then, ripping a few out by the roots and dragging her around on the floor. "Let go!" She kicked her heels and fought like a cat. Her fingertips cut swaths down her attacker's face and neck. Little chunks filled up her nailbeds. She was disoriented, no longer knowing where the door was-
There's no way out now.
- or which way she was pointing. Rhiannon felt hands on her legs, multiple pairs. Things escalated into a dirty fight, the slayer thrashing about, freeing one hand and lobbing a punch, or a leg and throwing a kick, only to trade off limbs and go again, like some wild animal being set upon by prey. When she saw yellow eyes coming in for a taste, Rhiannon broke off the crucifix around her throat and stuck it in the socket. Screeching and steaming, the vampire let go.
Two against one. These were winning odds. "My turn?"
There was no way out of this event. The Agent was committed; he came looking for a high-stakes game and to (hopefully) double his severance so that he could fix up his trailer before Christmas, and now he was about to engage a group of minor sorcerors looking to plump up the Magical Dexterity on their character sheets to plus five.
A hand grabbed at his ankle. Whistler looked down to see Bonzo attempt to keep the half-demon from entering further. (It helped to assign the help a name, he reasoned, should he actually survive the night and tell the story later.)
"Let him in. He can play the next hand." The oldest gentleman at the far right of the table waved for Whistler to sit. He was asian, impeccably groomed with flowing white hair. (You shall be called Cain.) To his left was a greasy-haired, middle-aged man (Norman), and to the far side were twins (Zsa Zsa and Eva).
The Agent shook off the vampire by twisting his foot free, and accidentally stepping on the guard's foot. Whistler felt his every movement being tracked, as if he were prey.
The four turned their attention back to their cards, a quick discard and pick-up by the twins, while the duo stood pat. Cain easily won with three nines. Zsa Zsa and Eva attempted to protest, that he counted cards but to no avail. The rules had been set the moment they sat down, and the ladies' magicks were forefeit. As were their lives.
Cain reshuffled the cards. Whistler swallowed. Suddenly he wasn't sure the odds were in his favor. "My turn then," he whispered. The Agent slipped off his coat and dropped his hat onto his knee. He cracked his knuckles in a display of machismo.
Whistler wondered if the Powers sent him here. And if he could pull a rabbit from his hat.
He was offered the now vacant chairs, but dragged over his own. "Call me superstitious," the Agent joked, "but I prefer a fresh start." Before Cain asked, Whistler provided a brief light show to the room. He held up his palm over the table. Crimson and ochre strands streamed from his fingertips, crawled along the digits until they combined in the center of his hand and merged. Energy as fire burned bright, before being snuffed out as he closed his hand.
The cards were dealt across the table, but he refused to pick them up. Norman cocked a greasy eyebrow. Cain took two cards, Norman one.
Whistler stood pat.
The Slayer's fist pounded the face hovering above hers. He let go. Rhiannon kicked the other vampire off and scrambled away in search of a wall she could follow. Outstretched and groping, her fingers sought and found the cold wall and trailed along it while her feet tripped noisily in debris. But, unwounded and with eyes better suited to the dark, the fourth was right behind her. He jumped on her back and his knees dug painfully into her ribcage. After a brief struggle, Rhiannon used her feet to climb the wall in front of her and shove off. Backwards the two tumbled and collided with the opposite side of the car. It rattled.
The door.
It slipped a bit on its track, and a narrow slit of sunset light burst into the rectangular car. It was fiery in color, crimson and ochre. For an instant, Rhiannon could see the messy evidence of the nest in exquisite detail: the garbage, an unconscious vampire in the corner, another one steaming away while he tried to pry Jesus out of his head, and a third bearing down on her fast with a freshly broken nose. But the sunlight was snuffed out as quickly as if someone flipped a switch. Must've dipped behind the horizon.
Plan B. Who needs sunlight?
Still locked in a vampire's hold, Rhiannon threw back her skull. When it hit, a shot of adrenaline went through her. Maybe it was the head rush. It didn't really matter. Suddenly, Rhiannon was having a very good time. She jumped up and wrapped her legs around the oncoming vampire's neck. Crack. Just like knuckles popping.
She hopped down and pulled her stake. "Ready to fold?"
The agent didn't know the meaning of quit.
Cain sat impassively in the corner. Norman, however. The primary rule of any fight, Whistler knew, wasn't to pay attention to your own moves, but to watch your opponent. Everyone had a tell. In a fight it was usually a telegraphed punch or sweeping kick. In poker, it was usually more subtle.
Norman's came from his nose. He sniffled, retrieving a handkerchief to dab his nose. Not something he'd done during the last hand. His chances of winning faded like the setting sun.
Whistler flipped over each card in turn. He paired up eights. Cain produced trip kings. Norman, as the Agent suspected, missed his inside straight.
His husk was carried off by the bodyguard.
Time for a new plan. "Let's make this more interesting," Whistler offered his opponent. "What say we draw one card. Winner take all."
Cain nodded, and began to shuffle. "No," the Agent stopped him. "Not with that deck." He pulled out a fresh , shrink-wrapped pack, tossed it to the white-haired gentleman. "Unbroken seal. Even odds."
"A man after my own heart," Cain laughed. He pulled at the small yellow strip, removed the cellophane. He cracked open the pack and shook out the deck of cards. He turned over the Joker, which then winked at him.
In an instant, green etheral tendrils snaked outward from the card and wrapped themselves around the man. He struggled vainly to resist, only to be held tighter until the magicks were sucked dry.
The vampire threw a punch. Rhiannon caught it. "I didn't think so."
Her stake drove through layers of dry-rotted clothes, skin, and muscle to find his heart. Like they occasionally did, the vamp tried to grab the stake and pull it out, as if by doing so, he could take it all back. The Slayer tugged her weapon away to watch. Dust exploded outward, leaving the outline of a skeleton to disappear a split-second behind. "I'm never getting tired of that," she said.
Behind her, there were loose ends to tie up. Rhiannon went deeper into the shadows and dealt with the unconscious one first. Having a shattered skull wouldn't mean shit to a vampire, other than possibly making it a lot more dumb. Then she tracked the smell of burning flesh into the darkest corner, where a vampire cowered in agony. Rhiannon had to crouch and look hard to see it, but most of the eye socket had been eaten away by the metal cross. Steam was still rolling out.
Rhiannon propped her weapon under her chin. She slapped its hand out of the way. "Hold still." Bracing her palm against its forehead, she grabbed onto the cross with her fingers. A hard twist popped it free. The vampire sagged in relief. Rhiannon pocketed the trinket, said, "Thanks," and finished him off.
Outside, the sky was dark blue and a train whistle blew on its way out of town. Rhiannon dropped onto the edge of the rail car and let her feet dangle free. She pulled out her cigarettes and surveyed the damage. Two were broken. Three were intact. Lighting one of them, she sucked in the taste of tobacco and then studied the filter. There wasn't any red on it. Looked as if her lip hadn't bled after all. "Winner take all," the brunette said, and peacefully smoked until her cigarette's end.
Cain expected death; it was the terms of the bet. And in an earlier time, Whistler would have granted it. But he'd been down that path twice now, and was determined to be a better man. The sorcerer cried tears of joy and loss to learn he would live, but as a shell of his former self.
Whistler reinserted the Joker into the deck, balanced the pack between fingers as he took the hat off of his knee and put it back on his head.
It never got old.
He slowly exited the restaurant, holding his nose as he walked down the alley. The Agent picked out the soft pack of his Lucky Sevens, grateful for the three left. He rolled the zippo and set the tobacco stick alight. Unconsciously he touched his bottom lip.
"Winner takes it all," he whispered to no one, and walked off to find a diner serving waffles. |
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