Ain't Talkin'

The Old Hen was a true hive of deceit. The house always won, and not because it was in the cards. The casino used muscle, trickery and swift dealers to ensure they always came out ahead, as if the luck of the draw wasn’t always enough.

It was set out against the south edge of Parmiskus in an old warehouse building. Strongmen in tailored suits walked between the gambling tables flexing their arms and looking down at the patrons through dark glasses and through the clouded smoke of cheap cigars.

Roche sidled along the outside walls of the casino, hat pulled low, an unlit smoke hanging from his lips. His hands were deep in his pockets, fingering the holes cut into the lining where he could reach through and had access to the revolvers crossed over his hips.

It was first thing in the morning, only the palest bit of sky eked over the horizon to the east where the sun had barely begun to rise. Most of the city was sound asleep still. In this hole at the bottom of civilization, only the real carrion birds were still awake.

There had been no guard at the front door when Roche found the place, only a smattering of still-drunk gamblers filing out for the evening, their monies and senses frittered away over the night before.

Barely a score of patrons remained, scattered across the tables sparsely, trading crumpled bills and plastic coins for cards and sipping at smudged glasses of amber bourbon.

Roche scanned the remaining gamblers for a likely suspect.

A sweaty pear of a man in suspenders with a cheap prostitute under either arm at one table, a pair of off duty district sheriffs, a mother with a sleeping child in a basket beside her chair, and an elderly gentleman in a striped jacket that was more patches than original cloth.

Across the room was a pair of men. They were dressed in finer clothing than the remainder of the gamblers. They wore wide-brimmed hats with dark glasses, sipping at glasses and smoking. The dealer was a sharp-dressed young man with a prim haircut.

Roche found his way to the bar, settled and ordered himself a whiskey. He watched them play at their cards, sipping at his drink when it seemed appropriate but never swallowing.

They played at cards for an hour, and then longer. Outside the Old Hen the sun turned to risen and daylight slipped over the barren landscape of Polkun County. Somewhere a bird began to sing, and from under the front door, a slow beam of yellow inched through the cracks, the only place in the buildings exterior where light penetrated. Still, Roche watched, the level of his drink never lowering.

Another hour went by before the two men at the gambling table tossed down their cards.

The instant they stood Roche knew he had found them dead. The Corporation soldier on the left fingered inside his coat as he stood. He peeled a deck of cards held together with a band from the inside of his pocket and filched them loose. He began playing at a game of solitaire with the cards as he walked. This was a man who was seldom without cards in his hand, and somehow Roche had an inkling that the deck in his palms was only fifty one cards.

The two settled with the dealer and made for the front door, pushing their glasses up higher on their noses and pulling their hats lower over their eyes.

Roche set his drink on the bar, bit down on his cigarette and lit it, turned and followed the pair outside into the winking dawn of Parmiskus, when another day in the post-Catastrophic world had begun.