We lay like that for about two hours, peacefully watching clouds drift by in silence, before a noisy racket split the air like a thunder crack. We both jumped, freezing for a second while our brains processed the noise, before Ali finally turned to roll her eyes at me in an expression of unmitigated disgust. “Is that cat party?” I grinned back at her fishing out my phone to silence the horrible song clip from one of my favorite animated comedy shows.

I tapped the screen accepting the call without glancing at the call display before flippantly saying “Whazza?” My father had spent years trying to get me to answer a phone with proper etiquette so of course I went out of my way to pick up the line in new and obnoxious ways whenever possible. This week was “Whazza” last week had been “Speak for Sunder”. It may have been immature but it made me grin every time my dad called and I got to literally hear his teeth grind through the phone. Since I’m an adult he cant really do anything about it, and admitting it bothers him would make him look weak for losing his cool, so I get to listen to him fight the urge to choke me to death and reassert a small measure of control in my life. It’s the little things.

I heard whoever was on the line pause for a second before hesitantly responding “Umm…Ethan?” I heard Shawns voice over the line sounding confused and unsure. He probably wasn’t sure he called the right number, since we had never spoken on the phone and I’d only given him my number recently. Hearing the normally confident and eloquent Shawn sputter in confusion made me smile, but I took pity on the poor guy.

I chuckled as I answered “Yeah Shawn, it’s me, I’m just at the park with Ali, we were grinding some skills, whats up?” I made sure not to show any of the annoyance I felt at his interruption, firstly because Shawn was a nice guy and didn’t deserve the attitude, and secondly because he might misunderstand what Ali and I had been doing. A lot of people didn’t get that we were just friends and the last thing I needed was for Erin to catch wind of someone jumping to conclusions. My sister was a force of nature and I shuddered to think about what she might do to make sure her two favorite people were free to pursue a relationship.

I swear I heard Shawn actually shake his head to clear it before responding “Right, sorry, I was looking into some places in town for skill grinding. I found an underground casino for highsiders and figured if any place would have Luck based skills itd be there. I was heading to check it out, want to meet me there?” I had to admit to being a bit surprised by that, Shawn and I didn’t know each other too well, so I hadn’t thought he would go out of his way to help me out.

I grinned over at Ali before saying “A casino? That would be an awesome place to get some new skills for me.” Her eyes perked up as she looked over and grinned at me. Not only would that be a great place to grind skills we might be able to win some spending money. Granted maybe not, these people were probably all higher level than us, but most of them were probably no higher than level fifteen so they wouldn’t be able to grind any higher than that, and that shouldn’t be too lopsided. “We would love to head over, just give us the address and we’ll head out now.”

The drive over only seemed to take a few minutes, despite having quite a distance to travel my excitement bubbling to the surface made the trip seem to fly by. The building we pulled up to was…nondescript. Not nondescript as in generic, but rather I was actually unable to describe it. I knew the address and as such knew we were at the building, but when I( wasn’t looking at it I couldn’t remember anything about the place.

After five minutes of trying various methods of breaking whatever ignore me bullshit was on the building (unfocusing my eyes, using my peripheral vision, turning around really fast to try to catch it by surprise) I finally decide that the migraine I had developed and the constant mocking from Ali for looking like an idiot wasn’t worth the payoff of actually managing to accomplish my goal and sulkily stopped trying, leaning back against a brick wall of a nearby building and stoically waiting for Shawn. It should be noted that I definitely wasn’t pouting, no matter what Ali said.

I sat there for about five minutes like that, staring dramatically off into the middle distance and occasionally glancing over peripherally to see how Ali was reacting to my calm and obviously badass demeanor. She caught the glance as I flicked my eyes over and rolled her own. I was about to ask what she was scoffing at when I heard someone clear their throat. I looked over and saw Shawn standing next to us, looking a bit confused and mildly annoyed. I was guessing he had been there for a while.

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I cleared my own throat and stood up, abandoning my posturing. A lot of people who met me were under the impression that I was arrogant or stuckup, so I went out of my way to occasionally act ridiculous about it, either people got it and rolled their eyes, or they bought the act and thought I was a pompous idiot, either way it was usually pretty amusing for me. I glanced over at our waiting friend “Sorry Shawn, didn’t see you there, I was messing with Ali. I’m assuming this is the place?”

I was graced with yet another eyeroll as my magic nerd friend acknowledged my childish antics. “What gave it away? Was it the splitting headache you probably have? Or the building that doesn’t seem to actually be there?” He snickered at my wince, having obviously assumed I would try to pierce the spell on this place. “But yes, obviously this is the place. This is premier casino for highsiders in the country. Apparently theres a slightly higher end one in London, run by actual Dragons, but domestically most of the highsider gambling comes through this place.”

I filed that dragon comment away for later. “Ok, well good to know, should be a good place to pickup some new skills. Do we have to worry about high level highsiders cleaning us out? My luck is high for my level but anyone over level ten is going to be able to grind up theirs substantially higher. Maybe I can offset that with any high end skills I get but Ali would be screwed.” The whole level system seemedf like it would kind of fuck over any semblance of fair gambling, and I was curious how that worked.

Shawn shook his head “Not an issue, the owner forcibly supressses the luck stats of anyone who comes in to their natural cap. A level one hundred gambling specialist could have the same luck as a level twenty warrior, depending on what his luck stat was originally. The guy is an actual demigod, a natural born son of Dionysus.”

The smaller man actually looked nervous, which didn’t seem right, Shawn always struck me as being to curious for a well developed sense of self preservation. “That’s why Theo isnt with us, he loves places like this, but his family warned him away from the place, the big guy can doesn’t have much love for his family apparently. Regardless of bloodline though if you see him be respectful. He could turn you into a pile of body glitter with a thought. That’s not a random example either, it’s happened. I hear some of the waitresses actually wear the stuff. Apparently wearing glitter made from a guy that’s harrassed you is a status symbol. It’s like war paint or something.”

Suddenly I got what the uncertain looks were about “Well that’s…terrifying. So we just have to be on our best behaivior then. Be polite if we meet the3 man in charge” I turned mockingly to glare at my oldest friend “Which mean no hitting on the waitresses, Ali!” I managed to keep a straight face for about thirty seconds before busting up luaghing at the venomous glare she was shooting my way. While Ali was bisexual she wasn’t the type to hit on anyone. She didn’t need to, when you look like her people tend to do the work for you. I on the other hand was somewhat well known in the family for charming waitstaff out of their undergarments, which ali of course knew full well. I grinned at her and looked back to Shawn “So what is this guys name anyway?”

Shawn winced “Everyone just calls him Big Rumpus” I started snickering at that but he cut me off with a glare “Don’t. Apparently the last guy who made fun of his name…well nobody is really sure what happened to him, somehow everyone in the casino saw something different. But based on the general lines of what they all saw and what was left of the guy at the end of it, whatever it was was a pretty horrible way to die.”

I felt myself pale a bit at that, imagining some of the gruesome ways I might die in this place. “Got it, no commenting on the name, any other helpful notes?” Wherever Shawn had gotten his info he had clearly thought ahead enough to do some research, which given this demigods temper and my penchant for smartassery had probably saved one or all of our lives, provided I could somehow spontaneously develop the ability to keep my damn mouth shut.

Shawn just shook his head and withdrew three solid gold cards from his wallett. The cards each had a series of glass orbs in them, nine in total, of which only the first in three rows of three small orbs was lit with a glowing white mist. He passed them to us and grinned “Whatever you do, don’t lose your card.” I grinned back as I took mine, and Ali stepped up beside me taking hers, giving me a confident nod, we all looked over toward the casino, which was perfectly visible now, and set off on our first big adventure in this strange new world.