I woke with a jolt, a memory from what felt like a lifetime ago still fresh in my mind. I looked out the window to see the sun rising over the harbor. I blinked my eyes against the water glare and groggily made my way to the shower. What are the odds you nail the perfect temperature every time and the apartment has amazing water pressure? Really high if you're willing to abuse reality a little to make it so. After a luxurious shower I made my way into the living room and kitchen area to see Barry had left a note on the fridge.
“
Odd,
Got called in on a consult for the harbor side reactor. Have fun at your fancy summit.
-Barry.
“
I opened the fridge and found he had drunk the last of the orange juice and put the empty bottle back in the fridge.
“ Heathen” I muttered. Probably was still half asleep when he left. I settled for grabbing a snack on the way. Since it was a saturday and I was in no rush I took the pedestrian footbridge to a group of food stands and restaurants near the entertainment district.
That was, likely, the single best thing about the city. The districts were mostly split along business, recreation, and housing. Restaurants, Bars, and grocery stores went in the residential blocks and just restaurants and bars in the other two.
There was an unwritten but very enforced rule. No supers were to fuck with the residential zones and only permitted to run low collateral gigs in the entertainment district. Most stuck to narcotics and entertainment of the darker flavors.
Those that violated these rules normally found themselves dead. The League was of the opinion that targeting civilians alone brought on too much scrutiny. The Hall meanwhile was of the opinion that those whose motives were the suffering of innocents simply needed to be put down.
I ate my donner from a german street food vendor I liked and slowly made my way to the metro station that would take me to the most affluent entertainment district.
That ride took me to the Vinchenzo casino and luxury resort. A towering edifice with a Marble facedé of a Roman style building. It was the premier location for high rollers to lose their money. The summit would take place over the next week, starting the boring part on monday. I had two full days of relaxation and gambling. I even had a room reserved if I didn’t feel like heading home. I walked into the lobby and up to the host stand. The board looking attendant gave me a once over as I approached. I was wearing khakis and a polo with a comfortable pair of loafers, so not underdressed but not looking like someone important.
“ Can I help you sir?” the brunette in the hotel's blue uniform asked.
“Yes, I’m here to check in. The name on the reservation should be for Odysseus Wells.”
She typed away at the terminal and I noted that the early spring air was warm, but this lobby was near frigid.
The exact moment my profile from past visits loaded was marked by her eyebrows hitting her hairline. Not thirty seconds later a well dressed man in a more formal version of the uniform walked out of a door on a beeline towards us.
“ Mr. Wells! It’s so nice to have you back with us. May I show you to your suite? We took the liberty of upgrading you from the standard rooms reserved for the summit.”
I guessed if I had ever interacted with this particular manager before. I had and his name was DeVaun.
“ Thank you DeVaun, I would appreciate that.”
Now it was his turn for his eyebrows to raise. The managers at the Vinchenzo didn’t wear name tags because they had to work with some of the worlds biggest egos. Having easy to identify personal information was a less than wise practice when someone you don’t wait on hand and foot hard enough for can casually destroy your career. The hotel also had a rule about no tipping when not on the casino floor. The idea was the customer should never feel or see cash leaving their hands. Chips were fine though, that’s why the little plastic circles were invented. To abstract the customer from just how hard they were being robbed.
The suit was nice. It's probably most people’s idea of the height of luxury but I'm more of a homebody by nature. The jacuzzi was nice but I'd be enacting a biocide regimen on it before I entered. I’d see how the bacteria in the dark damp spaces react to UVa and UVb waves at enough lumens to roast a turkey.
“ Did you have any bags sir?”
“ No, I might have someone go for them later. So if they could be sent up to the room at that time I’d appreciate it.”
“Very good sir. We are always happy to serve you. Do you plan on visiting the high stakes poker table this evening?”
“ I think I will. In fact if you wouldn’t mind charging the buy in and 50,000 to my account and have the chips ready for me. I’ll be there shortly after the floor opens.”
“Very doable sir, in fact the resort insists on covering your buy in for the night.”
“ Thank you, if you don’t mind, I'm going to freshen up and check that my subordinates have found their way here. Though there is one more thing you could do, The Settler family reservation, their entire stay is on me, all inclusive.”
“ I’ll get right on it sir. Did you want to set a limit for the casino?”
“ No, that won’t be required.”
“ Very well sir. If you’ll excuse me I’ll go handle those tasks.”
“Thank you.”
I closed the door and laid across the bed. I shot Irene a text.
“
Your stay is on me, drinks and chips included. See you Monday and let me know if anything pops up.
“
That taken care of, I pursued the suite's full bar. I wonder if I could get a proper bartender here. I went ahead and swept the rooms for bugs (the creepy crawly type) and bugs (the electronic type). Then I focused an ungodly amount of UV light through the Jacuzzi, the tub, and every soft fabric in the rooms, carpet included. The suite was now sanitized to my satisfaction. I went downstairs to see what there was to fill my time until the floor opened. I strolled down to the lobby where there looked to be a chess exhibition match with supers with abilities that aided in the sport.
This narrative has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. If you see it on Amazon, please report it.
Super intelligence, super speed, and wildcard abilities involving games or competition were all showcased.
The speedsters tended to wash out first. The extra time they get from their accelerated cognition and clocking speeds is entirely negated when they face a different speedster. The wild cards tend to be dominant or basically normal people. It’s really hard to beat someone when they can cause you to experience blind spots in strategy or make themselves smarter than their opponent. Others that sway fate or chance didn’t really work for chess, outside more favorable bracket placement. Those differed from probability manipulators because the first was mysticism and the second usually only applied to very specific circumstances.
Intelligence spoke for itself and it showed. The “brainiacs” as the collective group of supers with enhanced intelligence were called, tended to congregate towards chess. It made them feel validated in a world where some people can pick up and throw buildings.
One with an oversized head was taking on Twenty different opponents. He flipped the table when a wild card caught him in fool's mate and had to be restrained as his head shrunk and his muscles grew. He went a shade of red that couldn’t have been good for him and threw the people holding him down across the room. A hotel bouncer charged in and tackled him to the floor. The bouncer in question seemed to be a run of the mill “rock skin”. There were a wide array of supers who could turn their bodies into inorganic substances, normally paired with strength and durability enhancements.
I walked on and towards the pool area. There was an outdoor cabana serving drinks and a stage with a band playing.
The standard rows of recliners for sunbathers were mostly abandoned this early in the day and the pool only had a few families splashing around. I decided to take a seat in the shaded seating area by the cabana and read while enjoying the weather.
———————————————————
I ended up eating lunch and sitting there for much of the day, after a quick early dinner in one of the hotels restaurants it was poker time. Normally a probability manipulator in a casino ends one way. I employed a set of rules to minimize the odds I was caught.
Rule one;I avoided playing against the house as often as possible. Shady as it was, the staff simply didn’t watch the games where the house didn’t have as much to lose as closely.
Rule two: be upfront about my electrokinesis and make a show of avoiding games that could be swayed, essentially electronic or metallic games.
Lastly rule three: only play games where skill factors in. If I was going to cheat I needed it to be believable. The best way to hide my hands on the scales was to play games where the same results can be achieved by being good at that game.
I made my way to the high stakes poker table and took a seat that had a place holder with my name.
“ Mr. Wells, how nice to see you again. please count your chips and let me know when to deal you in.” the woman standing in the dealer's spot said to me. The resort didn’t say it out loud but there was a standing policy that no guests were allowed to deal. There was also a team of professionals hired and sponsored by the hotel whose job was to siphon wealth from the whale tables. I spotted the plant immediately, the sharply dressed and serious faced black woman to my three o’clock. Now I just had to make sure she got her pound of flesh and I was good.
Also around the table clockwise were: an overweight hispanic man in a western style shirt, jeans, and a large cowboy hat; An older white woman with graying hair in a black dress, I recognized her as the CEO of a rival tech group so I gave her a brief nod; A well dressed young man with a nervous look on his face and sweat on his brow; The dealers nook with the dealer in it; the plant; an empty seat; and the indian or pakistani man to my immediate right. Then I looked over the sweaty boys shoulder and locked eyes with the most gorgeous woman I’d ever seen. She had straight black hair in a neat bob framing a tan freckled face. Her eyes were a vibrant shade of green, to the degree that they had to have some sort of power involved. She had a tall but curvy frame that narrowed around the waist and stomach. My brain started malfunctioning and I struggled desperately to keep myself from making horny monkey sounds. Years of experience and discipline let me slide my gaze past her and keep my fool mouth shut. My fathers words rang in my mind. ‘It’s hard to look and sound like a dumbass with your mouth shut.’ he’d said those sage words after a thoughtless reply to one of mom’s questions had him seeking shelter in the garage. I pantomimed counting my chips, they were all there and I'd known that before I'd even sat down. I used the time instead to bring my breathing under control and get my mind off of her and onto the game.
Hell this was hard, too hard. Wait a damn second, I did a guess mapping of my mind, hormones, and general body chemistry. Sure enough horny teenage boy levels of nonsense were afoot. I got mind bent, fuck that nonsense. I schooled my bodies chemistry back into line and built a small working that would keep me to a normal limbedo.
That done, I risked a second look. No sudden urge to pronounce my undying love or lift a heavy weight later and I was confident I’d neutralized whatever I'd been hit with. I looked with new eyes and came to the same conclusion, this was in fact the single most gorgeous woman I’d ever seen. She looked to be in her mid twenties, a few years older than her companion, and I couldn’t tell if she was even wearing makeup. I guessed and confirmed she was wearing makeup, but a very minimal application of such. I looked over the cards on the table and discover we were playing a variant with no table cards and five in the hand. The young man won the current hand with a fairly chunky pot and I nodded to the dealer.
“ Just a reminder the minimum bet is five hundred.” She looked at me when she said that. I decided to play it light handed, mindfuck had me on edge. I revived a pair of sevens and jack all else with the first three cards dealt. I guessed at the hands of the others at the table and discovered the fat man had a strait in the making but the sweaty boy had a flush nearly complete that would beat it. When my time came I raised once and watched. The dealer felt the fourth card and the two big contenders got the next cards they needed. One more Round of bets and I was seeing a pattern. The fat man and the boy as I was calling them both got the last card to complete their hands. I still had a pair of sevens. When my time came around I raised one more time to not look suspicious. The fat man went all in and the boy did as well. Everyone else folded immediately after. When the two big betters showed their hands the fat man gained a crestfallen look and waddled away from the table. The boy didn’t look happy, he started sweating harder. The dealer and the plant exchanged looks. Fuck my beeding heart i’m going to have to clean this kid out to stop him from getting caught. The next hand I made sure he didn’t have shit. I gave the plant the winning hand and the Indian ,as I had determined through a light chat while the dealer shuffled and moved the winnings, a good hand to contest it. I also gave myself nothing to work with and the CEO a hand that would make her stay in until she lost her money.
This round followed a similar pattern but with no one going all in.The odd thing was the boy looked relieved. I guessed what was going on and came up blank. That meant one thing, there definitely was a probability manipulator. I could force my way through that kind of block but it would pit my power against theirs and risk alerting them from the exhaustion it would inflict.
This round I had myself win on an average hand and gave the kid a believable but mediocre hand. A few more rounds and the dealer gave a subtle headshake to a camera mounted behind me. I looked at the beauty again and she looked pissed. It dawned on me that the boy might just be a patsy.
If that was the case he was either a young idiot who was talked into the plan and didn’t want to be caught, or he didn’t know what she was doing but was clever enough to see how it looked.
After a few more costly losses the boy and the CEO fled the table. The beauty, however; chose to pull up a seat next to me and leaned in.
“ My date has fled, and I'm not yet ready to go. Would you mind if I watched over your shoulder for a bit Mr. Wells.” She had a light Italian accent and smelled lightly of perfume.
I had to turn my head to an awkward angle to look at her and speak but the discomfort helped keep me focused.
“ I’d be happy to keep you company, but it will cost you.” I teased.
“ Oh? what will the privilege cost?”
“ Only that you tell me your name.”
“Sophia, Sophia Rossi.”
Fuck. It could be pure coincidence she had the same name as the daughter of the crime family that owned the resort but I wasn’t even going to dignify that by checking.
The Indian had a good head for cards but I quickly found his tells and knew his hand. I cleaned him out slowly but surely by splitting his money between the plant and I until he took the money he had left and bailed. I let the Plant do most of the work and used his departure to excuse my own. I tossed a big chip to the dealer and another to the waitress who had diligently kept us in drinks. As I stood I offered my arm to Sophia, because acting as anything but a gentleman with her was a good way to have a very bad time. She took it and we strolled away from the table. When we got decently far enough away I lowed the odds we would be understood if overheard to zero.
“I belive we should talk” We said at the same time.