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Chapter Text

The one time that he spoke with someone about being King Dice as a child, they didn’t even look up from their rifle scope as they crushed his dreams.:

“Girls aren’t Kings, stupid. Men are are Kings.”

He can’t recall half his childhood as well as he can recall that conversation.

-

He enjoyed the dresses, the makeup, the careful application of things to accentuate his eyes or his figure. He loved it.

He never had a problem with that. It was other people that he grew weary of.

-

“What’s wrong with being Queen, then?”

“Nothing, really.” Dice sighed, twenty years old and already extremely tired of it all. Her favorite playing partner chuckled at her, as he upped his ante. Sucker.

“Don’t like the dresses?

"No, they’re cute enough I suppose.”

“You know Queens ruled alone as well right? They didn’t need a husband.”

“Yeah. I just- there’s something about being King. I want to be King Dice.” She threw two cards into the discard pile, they overshot and hit the man’s drink.

“That’s it then” her partner shrugged, rescuing his drink from further assault. She pouted but listened to him. Souse and trouble-prone he may be, but he’s always had good advice. He continued after an irritating slurp of scotch.

“You just want to be king.” She knows, she’s been saying it for years now.“So become King, you’ll hit your stride then, I’ll bet anything on it.”

Dice looked down at her cards, tempted to scoff at such simplistic advice. But… he’s never steered her wrong. And she had him to thank for the job at the bar they work at now. A steady income is always nice to buy better cards and nicer clothes. And sharper knives.

“I’ll think about it. I have reservations about your bets you know, you’ve lost to me how many times now, Wheezy?” She smirked, laying out her cards.

Wheezy shrugged and let his hand scatter on the table between them, graceful as ever in his defeat to her.

“Yeah yeah, you’re the gamest in the bar King.”

Dice laughed, delighted.

Chapter Text

So she uses her next check to buy her first suit. A fine black thing she wears to their weekly poker night.

It costs so much, she barely makes rent that month and she has to tailor it herself, but it makes her shoulders wider, and the loose sleeves make it easier to hide things.

She looks in the mirror and smirks, standing proud and springing cards between two gloved hands. There is something relaxing in her finally, a tense coil unwinding her shoulders until she can almost slump.

“Lookit you!” Wheezy whistles in such a sleazy way that half the waitresses working the bar that night twitch instinctively with a frown at them. Then they see who it is and roll their eyes. Well used to ignoring any shouting, scuffles and death threats when Mr.Wheezy and Dice start up their weekly poker game.

Dice preens, allowing Wheezy to pat his padded shoulders, and raise judgmental eyebrows at the gold heart cufflinks. It was worth it.

“Well King?” he leers, blowing smoke away from Dice to keep his new suit from smelling like ashes. There were some new faces in the crowd, sneaking glances at their table.

Dice blinks slowly at the fresh meat, before a smile crawls up his face, a sneer really, showcasing some truly alarming canines. Wheezy feels a shiver of fear up his spine, at that terrifying competitive streak no longer being slyly hidden with distracting clothing or a closed lip-sticked smile.

But that fear has always been there, in the back of his mind, since a little slip of a girl beat him in poker, proceeded to tell him how she cheated and then bought him a drink with his winnings. It was a nice change from the usual thugs and lump heads that hung around to play cards with. He’s learned to be amused at how frightening his friend is, really.

Later on that night, Dice huffs out a breath.

“It’s easier to move in this as well too,” He muses aloud, carefully using his handkerchief to wipe the blood from his brass knuckles.

Wheezy is holding onto his suit jacket to keep it from getting wrinkled like the considerate person he likes to pretend he isn’t. Someone on the floor groans in pain but doesn’t get up when Dice tilts his head at the sound. Smart man.

“Hope to see you at the next poker game everybody!” He calls out as he makes his way to the front of the alley where they were jumped by their new friends.

“No one I have to help you drag to the doctors this time?” Wheezy asks, not turning to see the aftermath. Blood and violence makes him queasy. Dice notes the black velvet of his suit hides the blood stains pretty well.

“No, they were just kids anyway.” All of them were several times his age.

Wheezy despairs at someone who actually knows how to fight ever deciding to go after his friend. He’d be useless in a fight and Dice would probably either end up in the hospital or in a grave.

The thought makes him nauseous, and he flicks open his lighter and lights up, every exhale now accompanied by a plume of smoke. Dice notices, of course, and steers him to his place.

“Did you drink too much again?” He asks, voice thankfully free of any opinion on his sometimes over indulging. Wheezy collapses on the familiar couch, the terrible thought of Dice carking it, the gross sounds of pain and fighting, and the scotch in his stomach churning uneasily.

“I- maybe,” He hedges, taking the cool glass of water Dice hands him and cautiously sipping at it. He averts his eyes at the look in those poison green eyes.

He worries Dice sometimes too, he can tell. He’s a horrible friend really.

Something heavy landing on him jolts him out of his musings. It’s a towel and a change of clothes he’s left here after waking up on this couch too often.

“Go shower, you smell like a bar.”

“We work in a bar Dicey.”

“I said if you ever called me that again I’d put you out with my HEEL, Wheeze.”

“At least you’re not wearing those six inch pumps right now.”

Dice’s neighbor hits the wall until they both stop laughing like idiots at 4 in the morning.

-

Dice of course, makes a point of wearing some truly horrifying high heels with his suits for the next week. Just to make Wheezy sweat.

Chapter Text

“Birthday?” Dice parrots back, holding the box like one would a dangerous but amusing bomb.

“Yeah, isn’t it coming up? I gotcha a lil’ something. Not every day you turn 21 and are officially able to go into your own place of work.”

Dice’s fake ID pops up between his fingers, smiling fit to burst. “I don’t know what you mean, I’m as old as you are!”

“Oh fuck off,” He keeps smiling even as Wheezy tries to smother the man with his hand. He has to give it up as Dice easily, insultingly so, pries it off his face.

Damn the guy, Wheezy’s seen his morning regimen, no one should do that many pushups before the sun is up. But that’s besides the point.

“Yeah yeah, open it already.”

There’s a pause as those eerie eyes take him in. And then Dice opens the flat rectangular box. In it are several bow ties, high quality silk, or so the tailor told him.

“For your suits, I thought you’d like ‘em.” The last time Wheezy wore a bow, he’d been at his first job interview. God he feels old. He’s only nine years older than Dice though, which is fortunate as King acts older than both of them at times.

“I ..I don’t know how to tie one.” There’s a softness in him at that, as he picks one up to admire it in the light. It’s a bright red, and Wheezy may or may not be having a flashback to the last time he saw certain unsavory people threaten the bar for protection money while King Dice was in hearing range.

He shakes it off and they spend their break tying on different bows until Dice keeps a purple one on for the night. The other employees and bar regulars, now having known Dice for five years, are able to finally spring a successful surprise party as soon as they step back in from the break room where Wheezy was stalling him.

It’s a small cake, and a free drink for everyone, since they are all still working, but a round of “Happy Birthday” is sung/slurred/bellowed for a stunned Dice.

-

“Hey.”

It’s dark, and they’re in Dice’s apartment again, with Wheezy spending more of his time here than in his own home. He’s also almost completely sober, aside from the shot he had as they sang for Dice. It’s probably why he’s still awake.

“What?” he whispers back to Dice, whose been sitting on the opposite sofa in the dark for an hour now.

“I’m glad you’re my friend Wheeze.” is the whispered reply. Wheezy doesn’t look over to see if the other man is showing another emotion other than smugness. That seems like something he shouldn’t see.

“Me too, Dicey.”

There’s a sigh, “It’s just a shame I’m going to have to kill you because you keep calling me Dicey.”

A silence. Wheezy is trying to keep a straight face.

“Please make my headstone out of as much gold as you can Dicey.”

There’s a snort before a cushion pelts him square in the face.

Chapter Text

(So if say, a future demonic entity were to get him sloshed and then slyly ask how he met Dice, Wheezy would have start with the dress.

The dress is a purple thing with draping fabric and matching opera gloves. It curves around Dice’s torso with fiddly lace bits meant to draw the eye to the area where fabric and pale skin meet.

He spends five minutes describing it, and knocking backs three scotches. The Devil coughs pointedly and taps his fingers against the table as if to say ‘get on with it’.

Wheezy would turn to his Boss, and look him dead in the eyes with an expression a strange cross between amused and terrified.

“There were six knives and 4 packets of playing cards in that dress boss, but he was still the most dangerous thing in it, swear down.” Dice in a dress was a thing to behold, and not because of the novelty of it. Dice liked to dress well, no matter what he wore, and he wore finery like royalty.

Pretty dame, asking for to be dealt in with the bunch of meatheads and drunkards? Wheezy put himself right next to her of course. Kept her from being clustered on both sides, and her drink from being messed with. It was only right.

He was never a natural at cards, really. But there was only two things Wheezy did at a bar, and he had his scotch already. Working in one only gave him more time to spend around poker players. He knew how to at least win some more beer money.

Young lady cleaned them all out. Some left with cheerful tips of the hat at a good game. Others swore in her pretty face, placid smiling face unflinching. Wheezy’s bulk hunkered next her gave them pause though. They left too, til the only fool against her was Wheezy himself.

He was losing embarrassingly to that pretty dame, but damned if she wasn’t entertaining. All flash, drama and panache. Like they were highrollers in some hoity-toity casino and not in some random dive bar.

(“No 'ffense boss, hoity-toity casino an’ all.”

An amused “None taken.”)

At the end of it he was out 200 dollars and was red from laughing uproariously at her jokes as she dealt cards.

“A'ight lil’ missy. I’m cleaned out tonight.” Wheezy coughed, startlingly sober and lightheaded from laughing so hard.

“Don’t lil’ missy me. The name’s King Dice.” The young thing collected her cards and with a flourish made them disappear from her quick fingers into what Wheezy would later learn be one of the many secret pockets in her clothes.

He quieted down to chuckles, wiping the tears of mirth away with one hand. “King ey? King of what?”

She stopped and looked at him before her nice little showmanship smile grew into something wide and intense.

“Games. Any game. I’ll win, no matter what.”

He nods at her hands, “With magic like that, I’ll believe it.”

She huffs, “I don’t need to cheat to win, although that’s fun as well.”

“Show me how you did it then, Kingy.”

After a beat she signals the waitress and gets him a bottle of scotch with his own money. She doesn’t meet his eyes and rolls off her fancy opera gloves. Her nails are painted a neat purple and there are faint scars and nicks scattered across her skin.

“Settle down then, I’ll show you how to hide coins in your fingers.”

They stay there, drinking and flicking quarters at each other until the bar staff gently usher them out at 3 in the morning.

He swayed alarmingly at first, but was used to the drunken gait so much scotch gave him. If anything, he’d gotten less drunk than usual thanks to the distraction of trying to hold quarters in strange ways. Half the time he dropped it but the other half he managed to disappear it well enough.

“Let me walk you home Dice,” He hiccups into his hand at the end, offering his other arm to her all proper-like. His mam would’ve been proud.

She raises one perfect eyebrow, her smokey eyes looking him up and down before she puts one surprisingly strong arm around his and hauls him along.

“I feel like I should walk you home, Wheeze. Where’s your place?”

He’s about to decline, no one should see the mess his place is in right now, when they’re interrupted by a small group of familiar faces in the dim night.

So they thought they’d take a young lil’ thing for all she’s got, and then get back in her good favor by buying her drinks for the rest of the night. Not a bad ploy, if slightly shady. But all in good fun, flirting and such.

Except. They didn’t get a young lil’ thing. They got Dice. That pissed them off, but it was just poker.

And then they saw her buy that souse, Wheezy, some grade A scotch. And they (mistakenly) realized they’ve been had. No wonder she had won every hand, she’d been cheating the whole time with her buddy.

Well, they wanted their money back, and weren’t deterred by Wheezy’s bulk when a couple of them got their friends.

(He stops then, and the Devil, leaning forward in his seat, reluctantly entranced by the story, says, “Well?”

Wheeze reaches over for the tonic water and fills his glass, as if the mere mention of Dice and violence was enough to quell his thirst for alcohol completely.)

He step forward, trying to diffuse the situation, maybe give them some money to go away, this is completely ridiculous guys- when he forgets he’s arm in arm with Dice.

He remembers right quick when she hauls him back before one of the guys can push him. She uses those quick hands that had managed to pluck four aces out of thin air earlier that night and she yanks- twirls and the first guy is on the ground before he can scream, arm dislocated and dazed.

There’s a tense silence before she looks at the rest and reaches into an innocuous fold of fabric and pulls out a-

It’s a knife. A big knife.

No, it’s a machete.

“Holy shite.” Wheezy can hear himself mutter in the stunned silence, only broken by the stifled moaning of the first guy.

(At this part the Devil starts laughing, a bit disbelieving at first but then, full out guffaws.

Wheezy can sympathize, he had that same reaction.)

“Who wants to play?” This is said with the most chilling smile in the washed out dark of the empty street. The only thing glinting brighter than her eyes was the shine on the honest-to-god machete in her hands. It feels like they’ve been transported into one of those horror stories that always end with “ and no one ever saw them again.”

Of course they run. Wheezy would run if he was sober enough, to be honest. They do take their buddy with them, though, so at least they do have some camaraderie to speak of.

There’s quiet as Wheezy tries to makes sense of this terrifying creature his drinking buddy has just become before its broken by Dice turning to him wide-eyed.

“I think I’m drunk, Wheeze.”

They stare at each other for a bit before everything just gets to be too much and they burst into drunken giggles.

“WHERE DID YOU EVEN PULL THAT FROM?” He half-shouts between his giggles, heart pounding from adrenalin and fear.

“WERE YOU GOING TO -HAHAHA- ACTUALLY TALK THEM INTO NOT HURTING YOU??” Her makeup is smudged from the tears of laughing too hard. She hauls his arm over her shoulder and gets them out of there before those guys realize what happened and come back.

They do eventually weave over to Dice’s place,a small but tidy apartment near the bar. He’s set on her broken in couch that just manages to fit him and waves away the glass of water she pushes at him until she narrows her eyes at him.

Sipping meekly, he watches her divest her dress of cards, dice, poker chips and six knives, not counting the machete. The final thing is a pair of brass knuckles that glint warmly in the lamplight of her living room.

Wheezy is kind of afraid to ask if she’s ever killed a man.

“Get to sleeping,” She huffs at him eying her knives and she shuffles off to hunt down some aspirin in her cabinets. “You don’t want to show up to work tomorrow hung over.”

“It wouldn’t be the first time,” he mutters, closing his eyes and leaning back on the borrowed pillow. The blanket smells like strong detergent and some flowery soap. It’s surprisingly soothing.

Hearing her shuffle in again, he sees she’s changed into sleeping pants and a shirt a bit too big for her. He doesn’t waste breath asking if she’s alright with a strange drunk man sleeping on her couch while she’s alone (one, he would never and two she could probably slit the throat of anyone who dared to take advantage of her hospitality).

He takes the aspirin, knocking back the chalky taste with the last of the water and dares not say anything when she goes to get him another glass.

“You shouldn’t do that.” She speaks up suddenly, and then chugs back an entire glass of water herself, to avoid clarifying.

Do what? Drink too much? He’s heard that before.

“No,” Shoot, did he say that out loud? “Show up like that at your job I mean.” She huffs and throws herself on her other sofa. She’s playing with the brass knuckles absentmindedly, swinging it back and forth. He thinks he sees a spade and a heart engraved on one.

“I lost my job this morning. Well, I say lost, but it’s just-” she makes a dramatic thoughtless gesture, and Wheezy comes back a step closer to sobriety when he realizes how young she really is. Was she even old enough to be at a bar?

He’s also kind of terrified to ask about what she used to do. There’s not many jobs where one is required to carry multiple weapons, and she doesn’t strike him as a copper.

“I can put in a good word for you at the bar.” He says before he can really think about it. He’s just- really pathetic. One night with company and he’s already clinging to them.

She’s stopped playing with the brass knuckles and eyes him for a moment, completely still. She looks like a strange bird, the markings on the side of her head like an exotic pattern on a dangerous creature in the dim light. Sun’ll be up soon, he thinks blearily.

“Hm.”

She leaves him to sleep drunkenly. He remembers the whole thing clearly in the morning as he’s vomiting in her toilet, and almost flushes himself down out of pure embarrassment.

Dice is there, dressed in a neat skirt and blouse, when he’s done trying get rid of the smell of shame. He looks at her bemusedly, the lack of heavy makeup and sultry dress making her look nearly a decade younger.

“Are you even old enough to be in a bar?”

“My ID says I am.” She says brightly.

He shrugs, “Good enough I guess.”

(“So how old is he really?” The Devil muses.

Wheezy shrugs like he did years ago, lighting up his head and puffing out some smoke rings while the Devil threw out guesses between them.

“He’s old enough to be a consenting adult. Like he’s been even before he signed over his soul to you,” He cuts to the heart of the matter, well aware his new boss slammed a bottle of his favorite scotch in front between them to get some dirt on his new manager.

He’s also lost that drunkard’s drawl, not dumb enough to get drunk with the actual Devil after something. He wasn’t born a sucker.

The Devil pauses, face settling into something neutral as he leans back and considers the only man Dice wanted as an assistant manager. So, not as dumb as he looked.

There’s a dangerous air to the head tilt his boss does as he squints at him with one hellfire eye. It reminds him viscerally of Dice in the dark, gold glinting on his knuckles. But he’s had years to get used to that fear, so he continues to puff calmly as his boss probably thinks about how to scatter his atoms without unduly angering his right hand man.

If he was a lesser person, Dice saving his hindquarters so often might give him a complex. But, he guesses, that’s what friends do for each other.)

Chapter Text

They’ve only know each other for two years before Dice opens her door to see her friend on her stoop, eye-swelling up and bloodied. He’s favoring his right side and she can see a trail of little bloody drops leading to her place.

“H-hey, I. I need to ask for a favor.” He sounds like he’s been crying, and Dice doesn’t realize she’s losing it until the door frame protests squeakily at her tight grip. She opens her mouth but nothing he needs to hear right now will come out of it, so the polite thing to do would be to say nothing.

She closes it again and gently ushers him in, barely listening on his weak excuses and self-depreciating mutters about having to ask too much from her.

She cuts him off by nearly upending a glass of water in his face and he shakily laughs at the strange tradition. He sips at it while she goes for her…other medicine bag.

“Sorry,there were some guys, and well- you know that girl I went out with last week?”

She hums for him to go on, while she starts cleaning up a cut that looks like it was made with an amateur shiv. It’s going to need stitches, she’ll probably need to knock him out for that so she’ll do it after he gives her names and a location.

“Well” he mutters, “Turns out when I asked if she had a boyfriend, she forgot to mention the gang leader girlfriend.”

Dice frowned, that was a Rude thing to do. Especially, since she’d had to use every trick she knew to get Wheezy to buck up the courage to ask her out.

She knew she should have done more surveillance on her. Now she had a heartbroken and beat up best friend.

“Wheezy.” He quieted at her tone, good. He was a quick one. She grabs the bottle of hydrogen peroxide. “This is going to sting.” There were small cuts that she needed to disinfect, as well as the large gash that still bled sluggishly. This was going to get loud.

He breathed in and held it before looking up at the ceiling.

“Okay do i-” He cut himself off with a yelp. Luckily he stayed still enough for her. Unluckily, his head accidentally set one of her couch cushions on fire.

After, throwing it out and airing the apartment to get rid of the smoke, he was in a spare set of clothes he’d left there last week. She’d cleaned away all the blood and the bruises were starting to set in an ugly purple. One eye covered with ice to try to lower the swelling. The other had a stream of tears quietly running down his face.

She ignored it. He’d told her it was the polite thing to do. But she does squeeze his hand. He squeezes back.

“Nothing is broken, but you’re not going into work for a week. You’ll stay here, I’ll bring some of your stuff later.”

He didn’t say anything but quietly asked for a glass of scotch. She had no alcohol in her apartment, not being a big drinker herself. He knew this.

Instead she hands him a small glass of something an alarming shade of yellow. That gives him pause. He opens his mouth, to reject it probably but she lets the suture needle glint in the light.

“I need to give you stitches, four at least.”

He knocks it back like a seasoned drunkard, she pushes any concerns for his liver for later, when he’s well enough to actually buy some alcohol to drown his insecurities and sorrows in.

He’s knocked out within minutes and she gets to work.

-

It’s past midnight when she finishes sewing him up and wrapping everything in bandages so that it doesn’t stain her couch. He’s still out and probably will be for a while. She gets rid of the ice before it does his skin more harm than good and carefully wipes the dried tears off.

Dice rifles through his jacket, finding a crumpled theater stub, some loose change and his house keys. Those she takes.

She goes and changes into some work appropriate clothes and finds another blanket to pile on Wheezy while he sleeps. It’s the middle of November and it’s only going to get colder.

While searching her closet for her coat, the good one that hides the most knives and blood, she muses on her friend.

He probably almost talked himself out of bothering her so late at night. He seems embarrassed to ask of anything of her due to her age, even though he doesn’t know her age exactly. It might be better to tell him how old she actually is, if only to set his mind at ease.

But she does have to do something about his drinking. It’ll kill his liver one of these days.

She wraps clean bandages around her hands, before putting on the brass knuckles. The Dockside Delinquents huh? What a stupid name. Let’s see how they deal with King Dice.

-

When she wakes up, it’s past noon, and her house smells delicious. She takes her blankets with her like a strange cape, unwilling to let go of the warmth. She doesn’t have a dining table proper and just uses her breakfast nook to eat, which is where plates are waiting.

He’s making pancakes. There’s little breakfast sausages with fluffy eggs keeping warm in another pan and something baking in the oven that smells like cinnamon. She kind of oozes into her seat and slumps over the table, humming sleepily. She’s out of shape.

“I was going to take it to you,” He explains nonsensically. She makes a noise and steals a strip of cooling bacon. It’s crunchy and delicious. “Breakfast in bed.”

“You shouldn’t eat in bed. It leaves crumbs.”

He finally looks at her, his eye less swollen and bloodshot since last night but still puffy and bruised. He’s still limping but the movements aren’t too hindered. He also has a face someone with stitches should not be giving to their surgeon.

“You can’t scramble eggs but you keep your house scarily clean? There’s no dust under anything.”

She says nothing and crunches another bacon strip while holding his incredulous gaze. He scoffs and turns back to the pancakes. He’s wearing the frilly pink apron one of her elderly neighbors gave to her when she moved into this place. Where did he find it?

There’s honey, in a fancy glass jar that reads “Honeybottom Brand”. Did he go grocery shopping? Dice frowns, that probably wasn’t good for his stitches.

He plates them and heats up some milk on the stove while she steadily eats her stack of pancakes. While she’s quietly demolishing her scrambled eggs, he swirls in a dollop of honey into a mug of warm milk and offers it to her. Dice clutches it for warmth even as something pings her instinct. Only because it’s Wheezy does she let him gently grab her free hand.

Dice can’t remember the last time she ate something someone else cooked for her.

It’s nice. Tastes better than her food.

He’s looking at her bruised knuckles. Bandages only do so much. She feels strange, like putting on an old dress only to find it doesn’t fit right anymore. But it’s her that doesn’t fit right anymore.

The honey milk washes away the tang of blood at the back of her throat.

“Dockside Delinquents is a stupid name.”

Wheezy says nothing, but he pats her hand gently like some weirdo and fixes his own cup of honey milk. It might be the first thing she’s seen him drink that wasn’t alcohol or water.

He suddenly says, “Really sweet things cut the craving for alcohol sometimes, when I let my thoughts get the best of me and I end up on your couch.”

Dice says nothing but she clinks her mug with his. She gets it.

Chapter Text

“You just need to rest.” She says calmly, while carefully using a butchers knife to make little chunks out of the meat she bought for stew. Satisfyingly, he winces every time it thunks on the cutting board.

He’s been trying to clean her house and feed her every couple of hours, and it’s slowly driving her spare. No one has been this much in her space and it’s…different.

She can start a conversation with someone whenever she feels like now. And she always has an audience for the tricks she practices and the ones she’s trying to perfect. Or to bring her water when she’s doing her morning exercises.

There’s times she just wants to lay around and read, or nap, but she can feel him being…awkward. Too conspicuous of where his hands are, he treats it like he’s in some posh rich person’s house, and not the place he sleeps off his drunken nights. It’s starting to grate.

He feels like he needs to make conversation and the only topics that come to mind are the ones that they are both avoiding, or inane things that she could care less about like the weather.

“But…”

CHOP.

“And stop buying me things, it’s irritating.”

“You said you lost your black coat, and it’s getting colde-”

CHOP.

“You making me dinner is enough.” He looks like he means to go on and she’s already chopped all of the meat. Time to head this off.

“Before you made me pancakes, I’d been eating soups and stews for two months.” Dice says, while scraping the meat into the bubbling stock and vegetables. She spies Wheezy’s horrified face from under her lashes. It was true. The only things she could make were sandwiches and stews. One was quick and the other lasted her for a whole week. It was boring at times but she just needed it to keep her going.

“How are you still alive?”

Dice shrugs. The pot bubbles.

Silence again, but at least this time he’s leaving her to it and it feels more like them working side by side in the bar during busy hours. Dice feels her shoulders loosen and she stirs the pot every so often.

When she clicks off the stove, he’s already got two bowls at hand. She pours in some stew and they wash it down with pop she bought after work. It’s almost sickeningly sweet.

As they eat he seems to finish his think and says between spoonfuls, “I can show you how to make pancakes. And other stuff you should probably know how to make to survive.”

She frowns at him. “Will you teach me how to bake those cinnamon things?”

Wheezy frowns back, “Scones? Yeah, sure.”

Dice sets down her spoon and quickly pokes a spot she knew for certain was bruised heavily. It takes a little bit but he bites out a plaintive “ow.”. It was satisfyingly delayed. He was healing up nicely in time for work next week.

“Deal.”

-

Dice was almost frighteningly focused. She only had to be shown once or twice and she would work on it until it was mastered and then move on. Like a little robot who julienned carrots with alarming speed.

Wheezy wondered why she didn’t simply buy a cookbook or ask her elderly neighbors that clucked over her. Literally in Mrs. Waverly’s case. Did she know she could? Or was it latent mental sabotage? It could be either one in her case really. Sometimes she seems surprised she’s still alive and there, he can tell. She blinks and looks at everything and touches it if she can, even him.

She burns one batch slightly, due to forgetting to keep an eye on them but they do eat scones afterwards before she has to head into her bar shift.

He worries.

What if the gang sends in some more people and find her walking alone? If there is indeed any of the gang left. He found her black coat, dripping blood in the bathtub and pretended to be curled up in the sofa with a headache while she furtively tried to wash it. He refuses to think about it.

His young friend is a frightening person. But also one who can now julienne carrots, flip pancakes and make scones, so maybe she’s getting better.

And then she comes in on the last day of his stay in her house, clutching a flyer. He manages not to rip it prying it out of her stiff hands. In big showy voice he reads aloud:

“The Devil’s Casino. Huh, didn’t know that was a thing.”

She has a blank look on her face, he can hear the little cogs in that cube head working full-speed. He gets her a cup of water that she takes and looks at blankly. Yeah, this is getting eerie.

Blinking slowly at the glass suddenly in her hand, Dice mutters to herself as if by rote: “Hydration is important. Six to eight glasses of water are recommended for optimal performance.”

Wheezy frowns at her, his worry ratcheting up even as she chugs down the glass.

This seemed like something he should pretend he didn’t see or hear. Like the coat. Oh god the coat.

Dice finally sits down heavily and sets her bag down, he’s well used to ignoring the suspicious clinking of metal against metal every time she does it. She seems to snap out of it and stiffens up like a live wire.

“Wheezy! Do you think- do you-!” He’s never heard her raise her voice even the slightest bit, or stutter. It’s pretty hilarious. He tries to cover his smile with a nonchalant hand propping his chin up.

“Do you think the Devil’s Casino has the best players? In the land!?”

“I imagine so, even if not the best, then world renown for sure, to get a job there.”

She makes a little noise like a kettle at full blast. He’s holding back chuckles that make his ribs ache but she might punch his shoulder or something if he laughs out loud.

“I’m going to fight them, Wheeze. Imma fight all'a them.”

That brings his mirth down several levels, it sounds dangerous. Then again… Dice was pretty dangerous herself.

“King Dice, the gamest in the land.” He tries it out for size and is gratified by her manic giggling behind her hands.

That’s right, she had some serious chompers on her. He takes her hands away from her face, and grins back at her, “Smile wide sweetheart, that’s what Kings do.”

Yeesh, were people suppose to have canines that sharp?

Chapter Text

So what he may have forgotten to tell Wheezy, was that he wasn’t just going to challenge the Casino employees. But that he was going to sell his soul to the Devil to do have a fair chance to do it.

It seems like the most straightforward way. He wants his reputation to be ironclad, and his title to be unwinnable until they’ve paid the price he had. Also, if the Devil holds his soul contract, then he’s automatically off open season for any Tom, Dick or Harry who wants his head.

It’d be nice to live without the crushing paranoia he’s had for the past ten years after his “retirement”.

So that leads him to here, in his new white shoes and slacks, all carefully padded so nothing clinks and all ten decks are well hidden within the finely tailored suit. Lucky purple bow tie in place and all. Waiting.

In the Devil’s Casino. For his appointment.

He sits still enough that wandering denizens of hell, do a double take at the sight of him. He’s kept the full force on his smile on the skeleton across from him for the past half hour and hasn’t batted one perfectly lined eyelid.

The skeleton shifts the slightest bit and he can feel his smile turn mean, thankful Wheezy isn’t here to try to save the hapless victim-

“Sir? Your appointment?”

He looks at the skeleton secretary. He nods to her and pretends not to notice the rattling of the skeleton in the other waiting chair. It’s Polite not to call attention to other’s fear responses.

“Thank you, I’ll make my own way up, don’t trouble yourself.”

“Oh!” The skeleton flutters before smiling and waving at him. He doesn’t know if skeletons can do anything else but smile, really. Well, he hums as he enters the ornate elevator that will take him to the owner, he knows they also shake in fear like everyone else.

What a fun trip it’s been so far.

-

“You…made an appointment.” The Devil repeats incredulously. The Devil was…fuzzier than Dice was led to believe. The horns are cool though. So is the trident propped up behind his ornate desk.

“Yes. I didn’t want to trouble you unduly. So it seemed like the thing to do.” King Dice feels like Wheezy would be proud of him at this moment. Not the selling the soul bit oh no- he’s going to be furious about that. But look at him, being a law abiding member of society and all that jazz. Making appointments and being an adult. Someday he might even go to a doctor instead of stitching up his own wounds. Wild.

He might be a touch too giddy. But lifelong dreams and all that.

The Devil rubs a clawed hand over his face. The cigar in his mouth puffing wildly. “This is so weird.” he can hear him mutter. Inhaling loudly the Devil looks back up and tries to explain:

“Usually, people burst in dramatically, or summon me, or play in the casino and then we make a deal.”

Dice blinks two perfectly lined eyes.“Well, I didn’t want to get a leg up on the competition beforehand. It’s not sporting.”

The Devil is temporarily distracted. This whole situation was throwing him off. Time to get back to familiar ground.

“So what do you want in exchange for your immortal soul?”

The lights in the office flicker omniously, there’s a darkening in the colors of the room, like something Dice couldn’t see was weighing everything down.

Dice places his terms in front of The Devil. The dramatic lighting cuts short and The Devil grumbles loudly, “Don’t tell me you’re a lawyer.”

Biting back an undignified laugh, Dice shakes his head.

The Devil reads the paper, and looks back up with a raised eyebrow. “You don’t just want me to make you king of all games or something?”

King Dice smiles. It seems like he’ll never stop having to say it to people. “I’m already King. I just want to prove it once and for all.”

“You might not even get the title kid, and then you’d have sold your soul for nothing.”

“Are all the casino employees the best in their field or not?” King Dice asks sharply, leaning forward.

The Devil frowns at his taunting, “They are.” He growls.

“Then that’s all that matters to me. Winning. It’s not a game if there’s no risk.” He doesn’t remember standing up to try to loom over someone who probably invented looming. “A chance. That’s all I need. And I’m willing to pay my soul for it.”

He hold his gloved hand out for a shake. “Deal?”

The Devil shoots out an unnaturally strong hand to grip his in a handshake that feels like liquid fire.

“Deal.”

-

He and his small luggage are taken to a guest suite that looks like a bigger nicer version of his own apartment. Sans the tipsy hothead on his sofa.

He hopes the bar is doing well. He’s never been away so long before.

A knock on his door moves him from his absent gazing out the window into what is most certainly Hell. He opens the door to a beautiful elegant woman who inclines her head at him. “King Dice?”

“Ma'am.” He bows slightly and lets her in.

“You are the one who wishes to challenge?” She perches daintily on the pure white sofa. Dice is kind of afraid he’ll stain the sofa if he so much as breathes near it.

“Yes, you must be Pirouletta. It is an honor to meet you.”

She smiles and arranges her checkered skirt, “You have manners, how… refreshing.”

They make chit-chat. The exact kind that grates on his nerves but he’s still giddy from everything so he serves her tea and finds some cookies to plate up. While they nibble on snacks she gives him his ‘schedule’ for the upcoming week.

“You’ll fight each of us everyday this week. Pip and Dot always fight together so 8 challengers in 7 days. It’s the only way we can continue to run the Casino while this is going on and bring in a good crowd. You understand.”

Dice nods, and before he can stop it, laughs out of sheer excitement. Pirouletta pauses in the act of bringing her cup up to sip.

“What a lovely smile, dear. I hope you survive the week.”

-

The first fight takes place in the Casino, strangely enough. There’s a pool table that the Devil shrinks them for, so that every curious casino goer could see the fight. Dice looks down at himself, now the size of a hand, and feels something welling up in his throat.

Looking up at the Devil, who’s lounging at the other end of the table amongst cheering demons, ghosts and skeletons he wonders if it’s fear.

When he sees his opponent squaring up, Mangosteen, now many many times smaller and only a head (presumably his arms would get in the way?) he feels his heart racing and smiles.

“A good day for a swell battle!” He hears over the noise of everything. “You’re UP!”

Then he laughs, an eerie sound that seems to cut through the crowd’s cheers. He doesn’t pay attention to how the crowd quiets at that for a bit, everyone strangely unsettled. The Devil keeps his grin in place, eyes focused on the white-suited challenger.

Finally, minutes later and with Mangosteen worryingly vomiting up what seems to be his guts, Dice realizes what he’s been feeling.

Excitement.

-

Wheezy sighs at finally reaching Inkwell Hell. He’s dusty, tired and still vaguely nauseous from the boatride but dammit he’s going to watch his best friend beat the Devil’s Casino no matter what.

It’s emptier than he thought it’d be.

He makes his way to the bar, something soothingly familiar. A short man in a server uniform is on a stool, standing to try to see over what seems to be a crowd but sounds like a boxing match. The lady nods at him and quirks a brow at his suitcase.

“What’ll ya have darlin’?”

“A glass of water ma'am.”

There’s a guy as big as he is who frowns at him, “You a teetotaler or somethin’?” Wheezy laughs at that.

“Naw, just celebrating something. Do you know where I could find someone called King Dice?”

As the man sets his drink down in front of him, the gal jabs one finely painted nail to the middle of the screaming crowd.

Wheezy sighs into his water, “Figures” he mutters before he knocks it back.

-

He makes his way through the crowd, thankful of his bulk. He didn’t have Dice’s pointy elbows or his willingness to use them to make a path.

He ends up in what seems to be a domino table. Except, there’s a grinding wall of spikes on one end of a conveyor belt. That his friend is running on.

He rubs his eyes.

Dice is…like five inches tall. What the hell…

On the other side of the conveyor belt are two dominoes swinging with the meanest grins he’s ever seen. Dice is dodging strange winged creatures and seems to be shooting…cards.

Oh god I hope he’s not using the deck with the sharp edges.

He’d seen Dice slice a block of wood in half with one well flicked card, it was kind of horrifying.

The two swinging split open and spit out a bright pink many sided die. Ooo, bad move.

Dice bounces himself off the spike wall and just…punches the dice back at them. Wheezy is pretty sure his brass knuckles are under those suspicious gloves now that he thinks about it.

A loud bell announces the end of the match, the vicious lower domino kicks the upper one in an impressive show of flexibility and rage. But Wheezy only has eyes for the tiny white-suited figure of his friend.

Without thinking he reaches in and picks up the small Dice. Dice whirls around with one of those terrifying sneers, still panting from presumably running nonstop the whole battle. But he perks up right quick when he sees Wheezy.

“WHEEZE!” His voice is TINY. Wheezy is going to die because he cooed at Dice and got his fool self murdered. “HOW ARE YOU HERE??”

He seems to be unaware he’s shouting, although that might be the only way to get heard over this crowd. Dice collapses back on his open palm as Wheezy raises him up to eye-level.

“I couldn’t miss this. You’ve only been talking about it for the past eight years Dice.”

Out of nowhere Dice grows a couple of feet and Wheezy is left holding him up until he fills out completely. Luckily, he’s as bafflingly light as ever.

Dice thanks him but Wheezy catches the annoyed flicker of an eye towards a corner. He casually glances that way and sees what could only be the casino owner.

The Devil.

He’s …fuzzier than Wheezy thought he’d be. He’s also got one of those terrifying smiles in their direction.

Distracted with that, Dice steals his handkerchief from the inside of his coat, to pat at the sweat on his face before it stains his clothes. Wheezy tries to put that unsettling yellow and red stare out of his mind.

“You’re out of shape.”

“Shut up.” Dice beams. Jeez, he’s positively giddy, Wheezy hasn’t seen him be this chipper since the last time someone challenged him to darts. He’s grabbed and dragged back to the bar to escape the pressing crowd that’s slow to disperse.

“Wheezy, these are Ms.Martini, Mr.Whisky and Mr.Scotch.” He introduces the three. Wheezy takes off his hat and shakes hands with everybody, kissing the back of Ms. Martini’s hand to her delight.

“It’s a pleasure to meet you all.”

They make polite small talk while Dice drains three cups of water in rapid succession. They kind of watch him incredulously, but Wheezy has long grown used to Dice’s ability to just…not need to breath for a long time.

“Three matches left my dear, how are you feeling?”

A beautiful lady in a roulette checkered dress glides towards them, she’s got a sly smile on and Wheezy can barely keep her gaze. She moves like a dancer, he thinks.

“I’m feeling good. Ah, Pirouletta this is my good friend, Mr. Wheezy.”

“It’s an honor to meet you ma'am.” Wow, he’s never felt so grubby in his life. He forgot to shave this morning. Oh god, this is terrible-

“Another gentleman I see,” She hold out her hand and curtsies shallowly as he places a kiss on the air above her knuckles. Dice is smiling widely at him, canines dangerously glinting in the casino light. He’s never going to live this down, he knows.

“Will you be staying to support your friend, Mr.Wheezy?”

“Ah yes, I wouldn’t miss it for the world.” He puts an arm around Dice’s shoulders, squeezing lightly. He thinks he can feel Dice vibrating in place.

“Will you be requiring a guest room? I can make sure you’re accommodated.” Was she the manager? She seemed like an important person if she could do something like that.

“Well, I-”

“He’ll be staying with me.” Dice interrupts, green eyes pale and smile still in place. Wheezy has half a mind to object out of fear of declining anything to the lady’s face, but that was basically what he’d been hoping for as well.

Pirouetta raises one fine eyebrow and inclines her head with a smile. “Very well. I’ll see you tomorrow then, King Dice. Mr.Wheezy.”

She glides off and Wheezy is left feeling his cheeks redden. He looks down to see Dice’s judging eyebrow. “Shut your gob. Take us to your rooms.”

They waved to the bartenders, who had been busy filling out orders as patrons trickled back to all corners of the casino.

-

Wheezy stares. “It’s…”

“Big, I know. I keep feeling like someone is hiding in it, it’s so big.”

He’s set his dusty suitcase by the door, looking at the fancy white walls and white carpeting in trepidation. Then he sees the sofa.

“I’m kind of scared to go near it.”

Dice laughs, carefully stripping off his suit and vest. Despite his words, he seems already used to the opulence of the room enough to mess it up with hangers everywhere and what seems to be three different decks splayed across the dining table.

“There’s a table. How’s it feel to be so fancy?” He ribs.

Dice snorts while unbuttoning his shirt. Everything is white except for the bow tie he’d bought Dice as a present. He makes his way over, suit jacket in hand to help Dice with his binder.

There’s some slight bruising, and Dice probably hadn’t been breathing well by the end of all that running with it on. Wheezy makes a protesting noise but Dice flaps his hand at him. “It’s fine, those were just some hits that Chips Bettigan got in yesterday.”

“Leave it off for a while,” Dice opens his mouth, but Wheezy cuts him off, “I know- I know. Ruins the lines of your suits and all that. Just for tonight then. Give your ribs some rest.”

Dice laughs and shoots off an insouciant “Yes, mother.”. Wheezy slaps his ass in retaliation like some nickering horse at the races and has to duck the spray of harmless cards. He’s never forgotten that poor block of wood.

“So, how long can you stay?” Dice asks, folding his pants up neatly and meandering towards the bathroom in nothing but his boxers and sock garters. He looks like some strange advert for menswear.

Wheezy shrugs, even though the other can’t see, wandering the strange suite,“As long as it takes you to finish, I guess. I got two weeks off.”

“Nice!” comes out muffled from the open bathroom. Steam is coming out from the fancy glass shower. There’s a hot tub next to it. Wheezy is kind of insanely curious about it, but ducks back out and checks the next room. It’s the bedroom.

Where the living room is all white, the bedroom is done in tasteful shades of black. The bed could fit five people comfortably and has what are probably silk sheets. It is of course, scarily neat and looks unlived in. Dice’s work.

He goes back and is entranced by the fiery depths of hell out of the big windows until a freshly showered Dice throws a plush black towel at him.

“Go shower, you smell like a bar.”

“Piss off.”

Cackling, Dice dodges his halfhearted swipe and goes to the shiny black phone to order dinner for them both.

A while later he hears Wheezy shout from the bathroom, “There’s fancy shaving cream in here!”

Dice snorts and shouts back, “It’s to keep my mustache nice and groomed!”

There’s a laugh before the clinking of bottles. “I’m going to use it!”

“It’s too late, Pirouletta saw you with that scruff.” Dice sing-songs back, rifling through Wheezy’s stuff for a change of clothes he forgot to take with him. “She won’t recognize you otherwise!”

There’s a pause and then Wheezy sticks his head out of the bathroom, chin and cheeks lathered up with shaving cream. He points the straight razor at him. “You think you’re funny, Dicey, but you’re not.”

“I think I’m hilarious.”

They’re interrupted by a soft knocking and Dice goes to take the platters from the server while Wheezy finishes beautifying.

-

After the fancy dinner, Wheezy will just call everything in this place fancy, they avoid the couch and decide to lounge around the bed. It’s not as nerve wracking.

“Black hides the bloodstains best, didn’t you say that?” Wheezy mumbles sleepily, victorious after gathering half the pillows around him to keep them from Dice’s pillow thieving ways. There comes a sleepy affirmative from the other side of the bed, where Dice is curled up almost into a ball. They’ve made strange nests out of the exaggerated amount of pillows on the bed.

Who would ever use so many pillows?

They’ve shared a bed before, but it was Dice’s small one. It was either curl up together or fall off. Dice didn’t make much noise but woke up on a hair trigger and came up swinging. This huge bed would hopefully keep Wheezy out of punching range.

That was the last thought he had before he dozed off all the way.   

Chapter Text

The next match had Wheezy standing uneasily next to a lounging Devil. He swore he could hear unearthly chanting at the edge of his hearing every so often, emanating from his left, where the man was sat in a gold and red throne. Creepy.

His attention was caught by a small sound of pain coming from Dice. He was fighting the magician, Hopus Pocus. One of the swirling rabbit skulls had clipped him and exploded. It left an ashy mark on his white suit and despite the trepidation Wheezy felt at a solid hit, he laughed at the outraged look on Dice’s face.

His arm was probably smarting right now, but he bet anything it was the marring of his suit that had Dice in a tizzy.

The small Dice looked up annoyed at the suit balloons that threatened to clip him as they fell, and threw a suspiciously glinting card up, popping the one directly above him. He slapped his palms together and a glowing pink die appeared between his fingers. Oh no. Not the smoke bomb.

There was the clinking of a dice spinning and hitting the floor between the two combatants before the arena was plunged into a smoke cloud. Wheezy waved away the smoke from his face, squinting to see two darkened smudges moving in the smoke. There were the sounds of more of those skulls exploding but nothing from Dice, which was typical. Then he saw Dice shoot up, jumping off something, another round of skulls?, to bring him back down precisely where Hopus was.

There was a pang of sympathy for the rabbit. Dice got really mad when his suits were messed with.

The knockout bell rang as soon as Dice started to use Hopus’ bow tie as his own garrotte. Wheezy covered his face in second-hand embarrassment. The Devil chuckled next to him.

“Vicious little thing isn’t he?”

Wheezy was startled, he’d forgotten the man was there holy shit, but he loyally lied, “Well, not- not when you get to know him!”

The arena was clear of smoke by now so Wheezy could see Dice hopping up and down to get his attention. He obligingly picked him up and let him stand on his palm as he stared down the Devil with something Wheezy could only describe as nonverbal polite demand.

With a snap of his fingers, (claws???), Dice was once again tall. Relatively speaking- Wheezy had him beat by quite a few inches. He was patting at his suit jacket with a frown, Wheezy wiping away the soot ignored on his face.

“It’s fine, let’s go look at that arm.”

“My arm? I don’t care, I need to get this to a dry cleaner.”

Wheezy looked up at the ceiling, wishing for more patience to deal with this…this blockhead.

Dice twitched and squinted at him. “You just thought the word blockhead didn’t you?”

“No.” Wheezy lied.

“You have that face- don’t lie-” Dice started, but was cut off by the Devil that they’d both ignored. That was probably a terribly survival instinct.

“We got people here for that,” his voice was amused even as he continued lounging carelessly. “Someone will get it and return it back to you tomorrow. You’ll want to look your best for Phear Lap.”

Dice eyed him and slowly stopped patting at his arm. He smoothly tucked that arm into his chest and bowed over it. Singed arm suspiciously still at his side.

“Thank you, sir.”

They were waved off shortly afterward and made themselves scarce to patch up Dice for his next match. There was a package of medicinal bath salts waiting for them in the suite when they got back. It was signed, “Pirouetta”.

“Bless that woman.” Wheezy muttered as Dice struggled out of his clothes with one arm gingerly held stiff. After helping him with that, Wheezy firmly steered Dice towards the steaming hot tub and dumped half the salts in. The water came up to his shoulders and while Dice hissed at the heat reaching the ugly bruise and welting burns on his arm he slowly relaxed back into it and soaked.

When Wheezy checked went back outside, he saw the suit was indeed gone.

-

“I can breath better now, what is this stuff?” Dice frowned down at the water, curiously poking his own ribs.

“I don’t know but it smells like creme de menthe.” Wheezy admitted, looking through the first aid kit for burn ointment and bandages. He missed the look Dice shot him, which was for the best.

After drying off and wrapping up the arm, Dice huddled in a soft thick bathrobe at the breakfast bar and watched Wheezy make some kind of seared meat and rice plate. It made the suite smell delicious.

“Are you sure you can’t just take the next match on without the binder? Your ribs are just getting worse.” Wheezy complained.

Dice frowned, He knew he was straining them, especially since he’d forgotten to take it off the first couple of days here. A dumb move that was hindering him now. How irritating.

“The weight will throw off my balance.” He explained. It wasn’t much weight but he’d been doing all his exercises and workouts with a binder for so long, he could feel the difference when he removes it.

“Shit.” Wheezy mutters. “You can’t afford to lag with the stuff these guys throw at you.”

Dice’s arm still twinged slightly but it wasn’t as bad as they originally thought, the burns felt more like a bad sunburn and the bruise was a familiar strain.

“It’ll be fine, don’t worry.” Dice assures him, doing some gentle stretches as Wheezy’s plating up some food for them. The unimpressed look the man gives him is totally unfair.

-

The suit was there, freshly pressed and almost blinding white even amongst the white sofa. Dice hummed, impressed. Wheezy rolled his eyes. Dice and his thing about cleanliness.

After a light breakfast of fruits they made their way down to the next fight. Dice lit up at the sight of a single seat aeroplane.

Slapping his arm lightly in excitement, Dice muttered,“You’ll love this. I get to fly a plane!”

“Jesus wept, I’m genuinely scared now.” Wheezy muttered back. Dice huffed and took off his jacket.

“Yeah yeah. Here, hold onto this for me will ya?” Wheezy did as he was told, feeling like some valet as everyone watched Dice make his way to the plane. He caught the edges of the cockpit and vaulted himself up in an impressive display of flexibility and abdominal muscles.

It probably seriously stung his hurt arm. His face didn’t show it. What a little-

“His arm is better then?” A voice cut through the murmurs around him. It was Pirouetta. Wheezy resisted the urge to check that his face wasn’t as scruffy as the first time they met.

“Yes. Thank you, by the way. For the salts.” He hoped he wasn’t stuttering. This was possibly even more nerve wracking than spending yesterday standing next to the Devil.

She smiles at him, the dry humor in her face never faltering even as the Devil himself stepped between them to reach the throne that had appeared besides Wheezy sometime between Dice leaving and Pirouetta’s greeting.

Wheezy can feel his collar heating up out of nerves, now firmly bookended by the Casino owner and manager. Oh boy…

“Ready?” The Devil growled out, over the roar of the crowd. It seems even bigger than the previous ones. Wheezy wonders if there is anyone who won’t hear about King after this. There’s a voice that booms, “Ready? IT’S ON.”

The arena this time is set above a race track. Phear Lap is a spry old timer with a lime green visor and exploding presents that force Dice to do some risky maneuvers to avoid getting hit. There’s riders streaming below them both that takes potshots at Dice’s plane every so often.

It’s getting to about the middle of the match when Dice seems to just lose it and starts fumbling one-handedly at his bow tie. He frees the purple cloth and-

“Is he…” Wheezy squints, incredulous,“Tying the controls together?” He is, isn’t he. Oh no.

Pirouetta and the Devil lean forward at this, and raise a synchronized eyebrow when Dice jumps out of the cockpit and balances on the wings of the cruising plane. It seems to give even Phear a pause with the sheer lunacy of the move.

Dice shuffles a suspiciously familiar deck and with a nonchalance that should not be possible that high up and at that cruising speed, springs the deck from one hand to the other.

Everyone can hear the faint, smug, “Pick a card! Any card.” That he tells Phear.

Wheezy would put his head in his hands in sheer exasperation if he could take his eyes from the scene happening in the air. Everyone is similarly hushed. Oh good, no one is really used to the ridiculousness that King Dice at full blast tends to bring.

Almost reluctantly, Phear shoot another gift at him, and when it explodes into gold gleaming horseshoes, Dice-

Dice moves.

He’s almost blurred with the sheer speed of it. Eight cards are quickly flung with unerring accuracy away from Dice. Wheezy knows if they were actual metal horseshoes, they’d be cut clean through.

Phear Lap jerks awkwardly in the air, to Wheezy’s confusion. He’s dodging something, but what-

Dice hadn’t stopped at eight cards, of course, and was aiming for Phear himself with the lethally sharp deck. He hadn’t stopped smiling.

His eyes are glowing a cold mint green, leaving behind a faint color trail as he tilts his plane by shifting his weight. Dice is charging the sharp cards with magic. That’s never good.

A royal flush strikes Phear Lap’s aircraft head on which knocks it off course. He skids on the ground, leaving a dark grey dust cloud that highlights the stark white of Dice’s suited figure. He does an irritating little hop to bring his legs back together and drops into the cockpit to land the plane.

Wheezy kind of wants to throttle him for this harebrained stunt, but he feels like that all the time when Dice does this.

Not that he rides many aeroplanes, thank God, but any chance to show off and flex his skills, he’s quick to take. ‘I’m getting rusty, Wheeze.’ 'I can feel my muscles turning to flab Wheeze.’ Bah.

“He’s certainly something, your man Dice.” The Devil hums. Wheeze laughs weakly. That seemed to sum up King Dice quite well. Pirouetta and her boss exchange a quick glance that sets his teeth on edge. There’s something there that he doesn’t like.

When Dice makes his way over to them, smiling tightly at the kind but unwanted pats and congratulatory thumps on his shoulders. No wonder though, he hasn’t retied his bow tie and the collar of his shirt is windswept and rakish. He looks like a handsome devil-may-care flyboy.

He almost bounces up to Wheezy, and does nothing except beam up at him until the older man puts one hand over that expression and grumbles, “Fine, that was a pretty cool trick, don’t look so smug.”

There are some muffled titters coming from his hand and he keeps it there to spare the people around them the horror of a maniacally cackling Dice. No one needs to hear that.

-

Later on, Wheezy lights up and carefully puts his hot hands on Dice’s spine to ease the muscle strain the binder leaves. One more opponent left, though, so Wheezy doesn’t bother Dice about the idiocy of leaving it on for too long this night.

“Pirouetta and her boss are up to something.” He mentions. Sometimes Dice has a sixth sense for these things, but other times the nuances of social mores fly by him. It’s hit or miss.

“I know.” He sighs, stretching under Wheezy’s hands, stopping when his ribs gently protest. He pauses and does it again. “But I think she’s fond of me, so hopefully it’s not my impending demise.”

“Please don’t talk about death threats so nonchalantly.” Wheezy complains. Dice laughs quietly.

There’s comfortable silence as they try to minimize the ache in Dice’s ribs.

This time they curl up together, Dice greedily soaking in all the heat Wheezy gives off. They drowse until Wheezy murmurs to him, “Do you know what you’re gonna do for Pirouetta?”

“Smoke and mirrors.” Dice mumbles back, before dropping off.

Chapter Text

Pirouetta wears a deadly looking dress a brilliant gold with matching ballet flats. When it flairs open as she twirls it straightens out to a dangerously sharp edge and the roulette design spits out white spheres that make Dice wince if clipped with one, they’re so heavy.

The first twirl across the arena she makes almost has Dice getting acquainted with the razor edge as he tries to duck left or right only to have her whip out her long legs and corral him back in her path.

Every move she makes is incredibly graceful and even more deadly, and some part of Dice admires the skill enviously. Dice’s Card Sharps deck chip away minimal amounts of her gleaming armored dress, and his smoke bombs would be useless if she can reach him no matter what.

It’s during one of the falling spheres that he makes the mistake of looking up to check there are none right above him when she launches into another pirouette early and catches him off-guard.

She twirls once, twice and by the time Dice thinks to look back at her she’s gathered enough speed that the foot that catches him right in the chest throws him clear across the arena.

The spice of Wheezy’s smoke reaches him as he tries to expand his diaphragm to inhale some air. The binder isn’t helping. The lack of air starts off a small timer in the back of his mind, but he’s used to ignoring that too. He pushes off the wall into a tumble that gives him some space.

Pirouetta’s foot crashes into the space he was at mere seconds ago. It breaks the floor in an alarming manner. He’s momentarily blinded by the spasm of pain in his chest, the lack of oxygen in his system and the smell of a panicking, smoking Wheezy.

Calm. Stay calm. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale.

He’s breathing carefully but freely and as she starts spinning towards him again, Dice clenches his teeth in a smile. He hops forward and seems to turn around but instead he twirls his body into itself and disappears.

Pirouetta blinks and casts her gaze about, quickly.

He shoots up behind her, those dangerous sharp edged cards between his fingers. Dice starts peppering the ground with them, in zig zags, in lines, in random patterns that only he seems to track. Always disappearing when she gets anywhere near him.

It seems like a distraction tactic, until the first time she missteps and nearly cuts her toes off on the card embedded halfway in the ground.

She hops back and begins to spin in place, lifting her hurt foot to make him keep his distance. He pops back in from the ground out of her lunging range and has the cheek to wink at her before he slaps his hands together and pulls them apart to an ominously glowing pink die.

She has enough time to think: Oh no, not the smoke bomb- before the arena and her sight is completely obscured.

She’s pinned.

Pirouetta has to slow down and in that couple of second before she can start another pirouette, she feels a hard impact against the back of her knees and when they crumple forward, an arm curls dangerously around her throat and pulls her down.

She smiles and closes her eyes, even before she can feel the sharp edge of an ace against her unprotected throat.

“I win.”

Another arm cradles her back so she’s doesn’t even hit the ground. He really is a fine gentleman.

-

He might have alarmed some of the spectators when he started smoking, Wheezy thought, eying the large space given to him as he tries to slow down his heart rate. The back of his throat burns with flames as he sees Dice all but crumple against the wall.

Shit. The binder.

He’s up seconds later of course, but that could mean anything from bruised ribs to a collapsed lung knowing Dice’s pain tolerance.

The crowd goes wild at his little disappearing stunt. All Wheezy can feel is slightly sick with worry. He doesn’t get clipped again, though sometimes it was cutting it close.

And then Wheezy understands what he’s doing. Cutting the twirling dancer off at the knees. Metaphorically speaking.

When Pirouetta almost slices her foot off on one of those cards, Wheezy thinks maybe it wasn’t as metaphorical as he thought. And then the smoke die comes out. He heaves a sigh and slumps against the table in relief.

A Dice you couldn’t track was one that always won. Always.

“You’re lookin’ pretty fired up their chief.” Rasps a voice next to him and Wheezy freezes his muscles so he doesn’t jump in fright. The Devil waggles an unlit cigar at him and he pushes the panicky fire into his hands to light it for him.

It sits uneasily with him that when everyone hears Pirouetta’s yield, all the Devil does is smile even wider.

He does huff a laugh at the position their in when the smoke clears. Like two dancers, if one ignored the way a sharp edge rested against Pirouetta’s throat in a gentle threat. The crowd goes wild.

King Dice always entertained.

-

If Wheezy was a ruder- or braver- person, he’d bodily pick up Dice right after the Devil did his whole “crowning the king of games” schtick and haul him to the nearest doctor to get his ribs checked out.

Even when there’s an honest to goodness crown involved in the proceedings, King Dice does nothing but bemusedly put it on his head and nod at the cheering crowd.

He doesn’t bow. Wheezy puffs a nervous breath, it comes out thick and grey. He’s burning up and he hasn’t even lit himself yet. Dice wouldn’t bow if his ribs were paining him right?

And then finally all that pomp and circumstance are over with, the crowd chatting and excited about seeing a crowning, can you believe it-

Dice is heading straight for him, brows furrowed and shoulders unnaturally stiff. It looks like nerves, but he’s seen Dice nervous. Right before he reaches him, a dark furred arm reaches around Dice’s shoulders and stops him cold. Wheezy wastes no time in going to Dice instead, stepping in just as the Devil was brightly explaining something.

“-you got your chance King. Now I have a bit of a job offer for you. Feel free to think it over, but remember who holds your soul now, ey?”

Dice is smiling tightly and looking to the side like the fresco on the far wall was the most fascinating thing he’s ever come across.

Wheezy can feel his eyelid twitch.

“WHAT did he just say Dice?”

Flames lick out of his mouth and drip to the floor, setting the marble aflame. He stomps it out without looking away from a sweating Dice.

“I may have forgotten to mention a few things Whee…ze.” The odd hitch in his breath heads off Wheezy’s rage. That doesn’t sound good at all. He turns to a highly entertained looking Devil. Smiles through the raging hellfire his mouth’s become and says, as polite as you please:

“Will you excuse us for a small bit?”

He grabs Dice by the shoulders and carefully steers him towards the men’s restrooms. He pays no attention to the frowning Casino owner they leave behind.

-

“I can’t believe you! If you had a neck I’d be wringing it right now!”

“Hey you’re going to rip my suit, Wheeze. And you hate violence.”

“Damn, the suit Dicey. And between you selling your soul and violence, GUESS WHICH ONE I HATE MORE.”

There was a weak cough before- “Shit my jacket. Dammit!”

“I’m going to rip this off of you I swear-” Panicking, Wheezy scrunches the fabric of Dice’s vest and shirt and undershirt in two handfuls, pretty sure he can’t even feel Dice breathing anymore.

Out of nowhere a clawed grey hand grips his in a painful hold. Forcing him to let go of Dice or deal with a broken wrist.

The Devil shows up in the gleaming brightness of the Casino’s bathroom. He’s frowning something fierce and is looking between a stunned Dice and Wheezy.

“This better not be what it looks like fellas.”

That poison yellow gaze lands on him as he says this and Wheezy suddenly realizes, incredulously, that he thinks Wheezy was taking permissions. He almost laughs in an ugly panic. He hasn’t felt Dice breathe out for a solid two minutes now.

Dice makes a weird squeaky noise that calls their attention back to him and flips the knife suddenly in his hand around and rather angrily cuts through all of the layers he’s wearing and the binder underneath all that.

His ribs are a horrid black and purple, evidence of Pirouetta’s kick, lined with an ugly vivid red line where the binder dug into his skin.

Wheezy swears, and goes to prop up a near hyperventilating Dice. He grabs his friend’s stupid six sided face and catches those bleary green eyes.

“Calm. Stay calm. Inhale. Exhale. Inhale. Exhale. Y'good Dicey? C'mon man, breath!”

Dice does, coughing and wincing with every jolt to his ribs. Wheezy puts his hand over his chest, afraid to do more than lightly feel for any obvious breaks. They need to ice it quick.

Dice mumbles something and Wheezy rolls his eyes, already knowing what’s coming.

“I can’t believe you made me ruin my fucking suit, Wheezy. I’m going to destroy you.” He lists to the side even as he makes his threats. Wheezy would shake him if he wasn’t so out of it right now.

“No binder. For a long while. It might be as long as it takes you to explain to me what you were thinking when you sold your soul, without telling me.”

Dice groans and burrows his face in Wheezy’s jacket, maybe to stop being half naked in the presence of the Devil, but more likely to try to muffle the sound of Wheezy berating him.

The older man realizes their third party was suspiciously quiet and looked up to see him turned away to give Dice some privacy. He shrugged off his jacket and covered Dice with it before clearing his throat.

Dice toed the remainder of his fine suit sadly, clearly delirious with pain to be pouting like a child. Wheezy was left holding him up with one hand and covering his face with the other as the Devil turned and raised a pointed brow at them.

How embarrassing. He might never be able to look the Devil in the eye again.

“Well…” the Devil starts, at a loss, looking between the man he’s trying to make his new manager and the man he thought was some controlling boyfriend he’d have to deal with.

“Well.”

That summed it up pretty well.

-

While Dice lies prone on the sofa with cold towels on his chest and doing breathing exercises, Wheezy upends the entirety of the medicinal salts Pirouetta gifted Dice into the steaming hot tub.

He shucks off his clothes and takes a quick shower before wrapping a towel around his hips and going out to the sitting room to haul a suspiciously quiet Dice into the hot tub.

The salts sting at his eyes and it scorches his skin in frankly worrying ways, but Dice slumps in relief, so there must be some numbing agent in it. They sit in the hot tub in silence for a while, Wheezy absently hoping the staff won’t get mad he took a towel into the tub.

He’s not made for this fancy-shmancy shit.

But Dice seems to be settling in well.

Dice won’t be coming into work with him anymore.

The Devil himself offered him a job at this very Casino. He might not want Dice to have to commute so far. Wheezy might have to actually get used to sleeping in his own house again.

The thought makes him long for the blurry haze scotch gives him.

A spray of bubbles hit his face and makes him sputter in surprise. Dice had been busy spraying all the different ornate bubble bath soaps into the tub and swirling them into a thick layer of foam.

“You’re thinking bad thoughts.” Dice quietly reminds him. He thins his lips and tries to focus on the heavy smell of roses to banish away the need for a drink.

He blows all his air out in an exasperated sigh and can’t summon up the panic and anger from earlier. He just looks at Dice and says: “Your soul? Really?”

Dice shrugs jerkily, probably forgetting his bruised ribs, the blockhead. He’s playing with the foam like he’s never seen it before. He probably hasn’t.

“You know how I -uh. Quit my job? Back when we first met.” he starts, not looking up. That wasn’t what Wheezy remembers but Dice was even more vague and ominous back then. He nods.

Dice looks up, “That job…isn’t something someone retires from. Not really. You’re either in, or you’re dead.”

Welp. That confirmed all of Wheezy’s worst fears.

“It’s been ten years though, and no one’s tried anything, so maybe they’re-” Dice makes a high amused sound. Wheezy scowls at him.

Clearing his throat, Dice throws out a casual, “I was very good at what I did, Wheezy.”

That. That’s actually horrifying to think about. How many times had Dice almost been taken out without Wheezy knowing about it?

“So…you sold your soul to get them off your back?”

“Hm. No one bothers to go after those with a contract. They’re protected by-” Dice pointedly looks down. Ah yes. The Devil did make a good deterrent for anyone coming after Dice he supposed.

How positively…devious.

Of course, Dice thought of it.

“…and maybe, I wanted to retire. For good.” Dice murmurs quietly. Wheezy lazily swirls the bubbles and steaming water as Dice gathers his thoughts.

“Some people could do it you know,” Dice continues a while later,“Do what I do and then come home, wash off the blood and kiss their children goodnight. Sleep. Wake up. Repeat. I-”

He stops and scoots across the ridiculously huge hot tub to him and pokes at the old faded scar on his ribs from when he was a younger idiot in love with a gal who didn’t mention the gang leader girlfriend.

Dice took his keys and came back with bruised knuckles and smelling like blood. Barely 18 and could already go toe to toe with twenty or so adults who had access to guns and no qualms against using it. Very good at what he did, indeed.

He was lucky he wasn’t shot and left to die in a gutter somewhere, Wheezy knows. Dice probably knew it then too. He still isn’t sure if the rumors of the Dockside Delinquents deciding to move overnight to a new island to harass were true or not.

But there was something strange about Dice the next day. Like he wasn’t really there. Warm food and drink helped. So did the impromptu cooking lessons. If that’s how he felt after just one night, Wheezy doesn’t want to think about how Dice dealt with it before they met.

Like deciding to get a fake ID and get drunk in a strange bar before robbing a bunch of no-good drunks blind in poker wearing only a purple dress with a goddamn machete strapped to his leg.

Actually, he has a pretty good idea of how Dice coped with it before he stopped.

“I wore the white suit for a reason you know.” Dice settles down at his side, so both of them are looking at the opposite wall, instead of having to face the other. “I promised myself I’d prove my title without any blood. Black hides the blood better, yeah?”

Despite all his violent talk at times, Dice hasn’t sent anyone to the doctor’s in a long while. No more beating up hapless suckers in an alley at 2 in the morning after work. No more leaving at night and coming back with a bloodied coat.

He’s really made something of himself, his Dice.

He carefully gives his friend a one armed hug at that. “Shit, you’re becoming an almost upstanding citizen now Dicey.”

“Me? You’ve been manager of the bar for two whole years now. And you haven’t had a hangover in five.” Dice splashed him. Ugh, compliments. Sincerecompliments. King Dice played a dirty game. Wheezy crammed a handful of bubbles into his stupid face.

-

“So you’re gonna take the job?” Wheezy asked, carefully putting some numbing cream on Dice’s chest. They’ve built up pillows on both sides of him to minimize the chance of him turning over in his sleep. He shrugs and winces at the strain. Idiot.

“Probably. Depends on the terms. And the position. If he wants a thug I’m outta here before he can say the M word.”

Wheezy snorted, “And you’re sure it’s not your thing about winning?”

“I do not have a thing about winning. Shut up.”

“Someone is better than you at darts and you nearly bite my hand and then break a bar chair trying to show them up.”

“NOPE. I DON’T REMEMBER THAT AT ALL.” He’s almost shouting over Wheezy’s chuckles.

“Anyone has to mention a challenge and you have to be the one to win it. Face it.” He screws the lid to the ointment and wipes his hands on a towel. “You have a thing about winning.”

He doesn’t take the wet towel thrown at him personally because Dice totally has a thing about winning.

/The Devil’s Terms

“Hm.” Dice frowns down at the contract. It’s surprisingly fair. Or so nefarious he can’t even begin to suspect a plot against him. “This assistant manager clause. I have free reign over who I choose?”

“Yep. It’s to keep you free to keep a personal eye on the casino floor. ”

The Devil is counting money, and it either brings him great joy or his default expression is smiling because he hasn’t stopped since Dice came in to discuss the job offer this morning.

Either way, Dice can respect someone with sharper teeth than his. And their determination to flash them at every possible hour of the day.

“To keep an eye out for trouble? Or to make sure that the casino makes more money than it’s losing?” The Devil guffaws, and notes something down on a ledger before facing him.

“Both. It’s my casino, but there’s still people that won’t let that stop them from causing trouble. I don’t got all the time in the day to deal with them personally. It’ll be your job to to keep it down over there and make sure the property damage is minimal.”

Dice’s hooded eyes meet his before he asks, calmly as you please,“Do you want them alive and breathing?”

“If you can, they are customers after all. Can’t take their money if they’re dead.” The Devil mused. Dice nodded sharply.

“Of course. Please keep in mind that you’ve hired me on as a manager and not a mercenary of some sort.”

“Is that a clause you want in your contract?” Dice could already tell the Devil sounded amused a great deal of the time. It was kind of irritating to be honest.

“Please.”

The words- his words appeared at the bottom in a new clause. “Hired on as a manager, NOT as a mercenary of some sort.” Hilarious. He had a funny sense of humor for the root of all evil.

Dice signed.

“I’ll give you two weeks to get your stuff and get settled in. Pirouletta will show you the ropes. I’m going to make a wild assumption and say you’re going to con your friend into signing on assistant manager as well ey?”

Dice barely nods before a second fresh scroll appeared next him. This was going to be a Thing wasn’t it?

“Have him sign that. Tell him he can keep his soul and everything.”

King Dice quirks a smile at that.

“If that’s everything?” Amused and annoyed. His new boss is a fount of varying emotions. Dice stands to go but stops and faces those strange yellow eyes.

“Thank you, for yesterday. In the bathroom.”

The Devil leans on one hand and deadpans, “You mean for coming to the wrong conclusion, physically threatening your friend and seeing you starkers?”

Dice idly wonders if a knife to the throat would do anything to the Devil. Probably not.

“No. Your appearance reminded me I had knives at my disposal.” The Devil flicks his gaze down to Dice’s resting hand. He’d never be able to spot his knives, but it was a cute attempt.

“Speaking of which.”

He starts collecting the spare contract, “The next time you lay a hand on Wheezy with the intent to hurt him, will be the last time you have hands.” He smiles brightly at the amused look on that dark face.

“See you in two weeks, Boss.”

-

Wheezy looks up from the contract with a strange look on his face. Dice is carefully folding his precious suits back into his luggage. He’s in some simple slacks and a loose button down that won’t irritate his bandages.

“Dice…”

“Hmm?” Dice says distractedly, counting his packets of cards.

“Is this how much you’ll be making as well?”

“Well, yeah.” Dice answers, “A bit more but yeah.”

There’s a quiet. Dice frowns up at Wheezy to see what’s the matter now.

He’s got that thinking face on. It’s not the sad one that drives him to drink too much, so Dice leaves him be.

They’re almost ready when Wheezy finally finishes percolating and snags his sleeve as Dice is making his way to the kitchen for a glass of water.

“Hey, remember that surgery you said you’d never be able to afford?”

Dice looks blankly down at him, not being able to recall ever needing a visit to a surgeon. Then he glances down at the still tender skin of his chest.

Oh.

OH!

“OH!” He breathes out. Not having to remember to take it off every day? Hell yes.

Wheezy huffs out a laugh. “We can go see the doc back home to check things out first. Maybe then I won’t have to worry about you forgetting to take it off and end up in another bathroom with the Devil.”

Dice sighs. He’s never gonna let this go is he.

Wheezy signs.

Chapter Text

After all the harrowing Casino fights and the loss of all the Inkwell Island soul contracts, Dice pauses only briefly before coming into the Devil’s Office. He’s a straightforward kind of guy, when he’s not rigging everything he can in his favor. Dithering in front of a door because he lost horribly isn’t his style.

The man himself is in there, ice pack on his head and a horn missing and the most pissed off Dice has seen.

His fur is matted around his eyes. Did those cups make him cry?

“YOU.”

“Yes, boss?” Dice replies brightly, determined to not lose his own frayed temper over being beaten up terribly like some common civilian.

“Worthless lackey, why do I keep you around if you’re not going to stop a couple of snot nosed brats from making off with whatever they want?” Ouch. But admittedly deserved .

Dice opened his mouth, already thinking of ways to spin this, even while being aware of his chipped head and unimpressive black eyes. His boss cuts him off, on a roll.

“I know what you can do Dice” The Devil’s tone changes, something dark and knowing that makes his hackles rise, “What I want to know is why you didn’t do everything in your power to stop them? Is this what you wanted? For the casino to become a laughingstock and-”

The knife that sprouts centimeters from the Devil’s pointed ear chimes dully as it vibrates from the force. It’s stuck fast through the layers of wood and cloth. The Devil can see his own angry red eyes in it’s metal.

“Be very careful Boss.” Dice quietly says in the sudden silence, hand still outstretched. “About what you say when you’re letting your temper get the best of you.”

The Devil feels his fury banking at a wave of wariness. He might not be up to another fight so soon, especially with someone as dangerous as his manager.

Dice, with a blank expression, reaches slowly into his suit and pull out a familiar creased paper. He sets it gently, terribly terribly gently, on the desk between them.

It’s his contract.

Gut churning, the Devil will never admit he near jumped out of his skin as Dice slams one gloved hand besides it.

“If it pleases you Boss, I would like to remind you that my contract clearly statesthat you hired a manager, NOT a mercenary "OF SOME KIND”.“

What used to be a passing joke between the two of them is now tarred with the contempt dripping from Dice as he near shouts the last bit.

The Devil has never heard King Dice raise his voice.

They stare each other down and Dice huffs and turns on his heel, shoulders stiff and contract left behind on the mahogany surface. Before he reaches the door the Devil speaks up behind him, voice quiet and tired.

"Are you quitting?”

“I dunno. Am I fired?” Dice shoots back. He doesn’t bother to slam the door, point made.

-

Outside he’s met with the wide eyes of the casino employees. He rolls his eyes and quietly commands: “To the staff lounge room with you all, there’s a meeting.”

They all disperse quickly, everyone silent and straining to hear any more noises from the imposing door to the Devil’s office.

There’s nothing.

-

“You all have the week off. Rest, and heal up. You’ll get a bonus not to worry.” He mentions when he sees Mangosteen open his mouth. “Hazard pay if nothing else.”

He’ll make sure of it, even if he’s booted from his job.

“As for the souls… I wouldn’t put it past those two brothers to come back up in a rage if we make anymore deals in the casino. But…” He smiles slyly, “Plenty o’ people come round to make legitimate deals with the Devil for their souls. That’s not something they can have a say in, I wager.”

They’re quiet and everyone is conspiciously NOT mentioning whatever they may have heard of him losing his temper. They’re all quite decent coworkers really, compared to others he’s had in the past.

He might miss them.

“What about the Big Boss, Mr. King Dice?” Chips finally pipes up, blunt and willing to say what everyone else is wondering. Dice very pointedly does not frown.

“He’s…taking a break too I suppose. I’ll check back up on him after this, to make sure.” He idly glances at Pirouetta, the previous manager and closest to the Devil himself. She inclines her head at him.

It either means that yes, he should check up on his boss or yes, she will lay some lovely flowers on his grave. It’s always fifty-fifty with her.

“-and Chips. It’s just Dice now.”

The silence got even more oppressive. Oh dear, that wasn’t what he was going for. He shakes his shoulders out to soften his rigid stance and smiles ruefully.

“They sold their souls, and they beat all the Casino employees, myself and the Devil. That means my title is theirs now.” It stung more than he thought it would, saying it outloud.

Nearly half his life’s accomplishment, gone in the wind.

Chips is picking at the lasso he keeps at his hip, worrying the frayed strands and not looking up as he mutters.

“That’s gonna be mighty strange. Ain’t callin’ no two bit bums off the street Kings though.” Pip and Dot make assenting noises.

Dice feels Wheezy’s absense keenly at this moment.

“Don’t worry boss,” Hopus cackles, it’s really the only way he talks, “You’ll always be the king of my ‘eart!”

They all break into hooting and hollering and raucous laughter and Dice actually guffaws at their ridiculousness. The tension fractures at that and they all begin chatting with the same ease as the day before.

Pirouetta comes up to him, a tellingly reserved air about her. “Wheezy won’t be joining us today?”

It’s said casually, but her eyes lock onto his and Dice feels his shoulders straighten back up.

“Yes.” He answers finally, not allowing himself to look away. “I got some apologies to make first though.”

Pirouetta nods sharply at him and he feels like he dodged a bullet. Before she swans off, he gently catches her elbow.

“You wouldn’t happen to know where I can get some cinnamon would you?”

She smiles.

-

He does stop back at the Boss’s office. It’s empty and dark. One of the imps that hangs around tells him the Devil’s gone to ground back to Hell.

Where mortals like Dice can’t tread. Typical.

Oh well. He’ll give him a week before Dice storms the Underworld after his wayward employer.

He’s got some apology breakfast to make.

-

“Hey.”

Wheezy startles at the sudden voice in his suite where previously he thought he was alone. Dice sidles up to him and sits besides him on the sofa. He doesn’t turn to look from where he’s cradling the little beat up cigar demons in his lap.

He’d never been one of the casino fighters before. Always the one to stand back and watch Dice make mincemeat out of anyone who thought they could win back their contract. Always the one to help patch everything and everybody up.

The little guys were the Devil’s, but Wheezy took care of them, kept their little flames flickering and swept the ashes they left everywhere.

It was easier than he thought to fight. Even young ones like those cups. The adrenaline pumping made his reservations about violence wick away and he found it so easy to spit out the fire he’s held back since he knew what those flames could do as a child.

That frightened him more than anything.

“So. You might be right about the winning thing.”

He turned slightly, to show he was listening.

Dice looked at him, not allowing himself to obfuscate or hem and haw around his apology.

“ ’m sorry, Wheeze. I shouldn’t have kicked you because I got mad at someone else.” He huffs out a breath. Does it make Wheezy a terrible person that he enjoys the pained grimace on his friend’s face? Probably. But it does make him feel better.

“I won’t do it again.”

“Won’t you?” Wheezy quietly asked. Finally turning to see Dice, serious and beat up.

“I’ll show you. I won’t.”

Wheezy presses their shoulders together. “Alright.”

“Alright?”

“Yeah. You look ridiculous by the way, have you iced your face?”

Dice pulled a face, “I had to go throw a knife at our Boss this morning, ain’t had time.”

“What?!”

Dice waves him off, “Don’t worry it didn’t even scratch him.”

Wheezy is well out of his funk now, jolted into familiar exasperated worry. Whywas his friend such a blockhead?

Dice squinted suspiciously at him, and opened his mouth to call out Wheezy on the blockhead comment he could probably feel when they were interrupted by a knock.

Mangosteen popped his head in, hilariously too big to fit in entirely in the doorway without ducking. “We’ve got the stuff boss.”

Dice jumped up and made his way to Wheezy’s kitchen, Wheezy incredulously as the entirety of the casino staff paraded into his suite carrying a bevy of delicious smelling dishes to the dining table.

“What is all this?”

“Breakfast,” Dice exclaimed, way too satisfied for someone still missing a tooth, and started rolling up his sleeves.

Wheezy had to give in when Pirouetta stopped at his side and raised a single eyebrow.

Breakfast sounded good.

-

“I was always afraid you know,” He tells Dice, in the aftermath of breakfast. They’re washing dishes while everyone else seems reluctant to leave, lounging around his living room and exclaiming on the goings on of Hell out the window.

“Of what?” Dice questions, both of them slowly getting used to one another again in the wake of their not-fight.

Wheezy shrugs. “Someone coming after you while I was there. Me not being able to do anything about it really.”

He really wasn’t prepared for one of his worst fears coming true in the most spectacular fashion. He had to watch some upstarts beat up his friend and know there was nothing at all he could do.

He just. Wasn’t enough.

He wonders if Dice lives with this fear, all the time. Fear of his past catching up to him, clever deal with the Devil or no.

Dice stops and looks down at the cup he’s scrubbing. Idly turning it this way and that.

“I think,” he starts slowly,“That you might be the only one to want to have my back when they do come for me.”

He looks up, the lighting making his face seem haunted,“Thank you.”

Wheezy doesn’t know if Dice realizes he always says “when” and not “if” while referring to his past. Like it was inevitable and the Devil himself could only stall it despite everything.

That was too much for Wheezy to think about right now.

“Well,” He clears his throat and everyone else’s conversation filters in between them once again. “At least this whole mess is over with now, ey?”

Dice laughs and lets the cup sink down into warm soapy water.

-

The first hitman finds him the next morning.

Chapter Text

He’s on the Casino floor early, chandeliers turned on and game machines off, going over possible renovations with the headman of construction. If they’re going to close for the week they might as well start on any big changes they’ve been meaning to make.

“Yes, exactly 666 stars.” The headman raises one silently judging eyebrow, Dice waves him off, “He’ll get a kick out of it trust me.”

He shrugs and writes that down as well, and Dice is about to start on the floor, perhaps a deeper red, when all the hairs on his arms stand up at attention.

Without finesse he tackles the imp to the ground and rolls them behind Mangosteen’s favorite pool table. There’s the familiar thunk of bullets hitting marble floor that Dice hates himself for finding comforting.

Looking at the wide eyed imp in his grasp he quietly orders him to discorporate himself back down to Hell.

The puff of smoke left behind gives away his position and he grits his teeth as a bullet grazes his shoulder as he moves to another table for cover.

There’s a soft chuckling and Dice is relieved he doesn’t know them. Not personally.

“So it’s true. The Die has gotten slow in her dotage.”

Screw the relief, now Dice is pissed.

He pops up and flings a royal flush at the glint of metal his eyes register. The sniper rifle takes the hit, each of them sinking in deep enough to render the gun useless. The hitman throws it down in disgust.

“It’s King Dice, now.” he stresses with an unfriendly smile.

“The same King Dice who lost to two children? That one?” The hitman mocks back, reaching into his buttoned trenchcoat and palming a dangerous looking handgun.

Dice grits his teeth.

Years ago, he woudln’t have gotten one shot off. Dice would have ignored the taunts used the imp as a sacrifice to get closer and slit the fool’s throat who dared to come after him.

He’s gotten soft. And they both know it.

Assassination fights aren’t really fights.

They’re reflex and quick deadly movements. The fact that the assassin is still breathing, even after failing his first shot, means Dice isn’t an assassin anymore. Not in the instinctual level when it counts.

He grips this knowledge with pride and doesn’t wince when a bullet nearly strikes home as he dodges. Shit, they’re going to make a mess of things and just add on the repairs.

He teleports right behind the hitman and nearly gets his head punched off for his troubles. But he grapples his gun away from him and goes back to cover.

As expected, another shot rings off to his left and he curses, ‘How many guns does he have?’. Dice inhales sharply and whirls out, ready to shoot back when he sees an empty floor.

The rustle of clothes behind him is all he registers before the deafening blast of gunshots pop off. Dice refuses to close his eyes in the face of death.

But-

There’s nothing.

He only has a half second to wonder if the hitman missed before he sees what blocked the bullet.

It’s a poker chip.

The bullet is scrunched into a lump of metal against it’s white middle. Dice and the hitman stare at it wide-eyed.

“What the fu-URK!” The lasso that ruthlessly catches him by the neck and yanks him to the side cuts off the hitman.

“Now, now. The King don’t like that sort o’ language on the casino floor, don'tcha know?” comes Chips Bettigan’s familiar drawl, one hand yanking the rope back to him, the other twirling a smoking pistol back into it’s holster on his thigh.

The hitman is slowly choking as he’s dragged across the floor, and Dice is petty enough to leave him to Chips' nonexistant mercy.

“Heyo boss!” Chips grins, placing one custom tooled size seven boot on the hitman’s neck. An unspoken threat. “What should I do with this 'un?”

Dice stares for too long, joints watery and muscles shocky with adrenaline still pumping through him. It’s over?

He breathes out slowly, and straightens up as Pirouetta’s voice drifts from the door.

“Send him downstairs, the imps will have fun with him.”

Chips nods and belying his slim stature, easy hefts up the hitman, not removing the hangman’s noose the slightest bit.

Something touches his shoulder and he’s flinching and only Pirouetta’s familiarity is what saves her from a card to the throat. She doesn’t blink and continues patting at his dusty suit.

The scratch on his shoulder is bleeding quite a bit. Shit.

“We may have a problem.” He admits.

It’s already gotten around, word of the Devil Casino’s defeat at the hands of two children. That name won’t protect him anymore.

He might not be able to stay here, anyway.

Chapter Text

“How long has he been at it?” Wheezy murmurs as he walks up to a sedately watching Pirouetta.

“Hours now. I’m waiting for him to fall off from exhaustion at this rate.” She admits, not looking away from the strangely arresting sight of Dice swinging from chandelier to chandelier. 

There was a pile of crushed bugs at her feet. Dice had near ran himself ragged searching for them all and Pirouetta herself was a bit uneasy with knowing someone had been able to so easily spy on them.

That was hours ago though, and it was nearing early morning. Still, Dice wouldn’t rest. His normally pristine shirt and vest were sweated through and he had to be sore from the earlier fight and his frenzied workout.

Not to mention the bullet graze.

Wheezy whistled up sharply and that did make Dice pause at least, hanging by his knees from a rafter a good twenty feet up.

“I won’t stop. I can’t- they-.” Dice called down, voice tired but tense still. Wheezy frowned but waved towards an incoming Martini who toted a full tray of chilled water.

“I know. Hydration right?”

Something in the manager softened, obvious even to Pirouetta who had an inkling of this being more than it seemed. She still startled when Dice carelessly let go and fell with a whoop before twisting into nothing and appearing crouched once more before them.

“Every time-” Wheezy mutters, clutching Dice’s elbow to steer him towards a bemused Martini, “That gets me every single time.”

Dice chuckled and sips at the first glass, only to realize how parched he was and swiftly finished the last two glasses. Setting them back carefully, he blinked fast and tried to keep their gazes. Pirouetta feared he’d simply go back to doing something ridiculous like push ups on the ceiling.

He made to take a step forward and …wobbled.

“Thas…cheating. Martini- you-”, Dice staggered back and looked hilariously indignant to find himself in Wheezy’s arms.

“Traitorrr” Dice slurred, heavy lidded and harmlessly punching Wheezy in the shoulder, already half asleep. He quieted down and began snoring quietly within the minute.

Wheezy lifted him over his shoulder, raising an eyebrow at Martini. “That was fast.”

She shrugged one delicate shoulder, “If warm milk and honey doesn’t cut it, sedatives usually do the job. He’ll wake thirsty but not overly groggy.” She collects the empty glasses and flashes both of them a lazy smile before sashaying off.

“That woman is terrifying.” Wheezy admits, “and I’ve lived with Dice.”

“I’ve seen her destroy someone with a toothpick.”

“Her toothpick?”

“What do you think?”

“Huh.” Wheezy squints after the bartender, “Interesting.”

What was more interesting, Pirouetta mused, was how underhanded Wheezy was capable of being, well aware Martini wasn’t the one to know Dice’s weak spot. Not for the first time, she found herself approving of it.

-

He slid Dice under his covers, pausing when man grumbled and turned to continue snoring on his side. Damn, the sedatives really put him under. Usually the slightest movement was enough to have Dice on edge and ready to flick a knife or a card at whatever moved.

Opening his own jacket, he was greeted by chirps from his inner pocket.

“Hey you two, stand guard over him will ya?” He whispered to the little Cigs and let them crawl out and curl up besides Dice.

They could raise a ruckus enough to wake Dice in case of-

Wheezy frowned, stepping back and sweeping the room, feeling the sickening lurch of paranoia hit him in what was once one of the safest places he knew.

Assassins and hitmen. Wheezy was only a manager, he wasn’t cut out for all this cloak and dagger garbage.

It didn’t mean he’d leave Dice to fend for himself, though.

‘On the contrary,’ Wheezy thought to himself, carefully closing the door shut behind him as he was faced with the Tipsy Troop awaiting orders.

“I’ve got a bit of an errand for you three to run, if you’re willing…”

-

Dice woke up.

There was a Cig nesting on his face. He plucked it off and relented when it gave a sad chirp, tucking it under his arm where a second one was curled up and emitting a soft low purr.

“I’m going to destroy him,” Dice commented casually, scratching under it’s chin, it lazily shut it’s eyes in pleasure, uncaring to the threats aimed at their beloved owner.

He looked over to his nightstand to see a full pitcher of water and an innocuous note in Wheezy’s cramped neat hand. “Not poisoned. Promise!” was the cheery note.

Damn him, Dice believed him. He didn’t bother with the glass and hurried to rinse the aftertaste of a forced restful sleep out of his mouth. It could haven been more sedative, or even a poison. But Wheezy said it was fine so Dice will drink it.

He doesn’t care to examine why that is.

-

He’s out and about now, prowling around the city as the rest of the staff had had enough of his paranoid hovering. He’d rather save face and wander the town searching for leads than deal with Pirouetta’s judging look.

For the most part everything seemed fine, aside from certain ex-debtors looking at his black eyes and smirking something fierce that made Dice twitch for his knives but-

But then Porkrind makes an offhand remark about the uptick in tourists. Despite the Casino’s closure. Dice’s skin crawls with the sudden awareness of being caged in by an unknown number of hostiles.

He won’t tell the shopkeeper anymore than a flat “huh” and places his weekly order without any more casual conversation. Porkrind says nothing either but his silence is telling in various ways. Dice leaves a tip and carefully takes the single bag in hand. The rest will be delivered later to the Casino proper.

“You have a policy of non-interference.” He comments. The man grunts, already turning and going back to taking inventory or restocking or whatever it is one did when there was someone you didn’t want in your shop talking to you.

“Don’t go changing that this coming week Porkrind. D'ya hear?”

The man paused and then pointedly continued.

“I hear.”

-

On his way back he sees the stream of casual tourists at the docks or the carnival or just milling about at the beach. Every flash, every movement had Dice patting himself for a sharp edge to keep on hand.

It was bad enough that the rowdiest one of his deck, Hearts, had tired of it and just perched on his shoulder in a pointed show of exasperation at his paranoia.

It was justified when the little card tapped his shoulder twice when passing a dim alley near the junkyard. He made as if to walk past it but teleported to the very back, eyes alert at the unsuspecting throngs of people going about their business.

No playing about, he reminded himself, and brandishes three knives. Ready.

“Come out assassin, or die slowly.” he called out, banking on his reflexes to avoid anything lethal shot his way. The sound of two footsteps above him had him shooting two out and readying another volley when a sharp “Hey!” had him stop.

It was the little brats. On the rooftops. 

Well. Lucky for them they dodge like no one’s business.

“How long have you been following me?”

Cup head scoffed,“Who said that we’re following- ”

“Since Porkrind’s” Murman baldly said, grinning even through the elbow jab Cuphead threw his way.

Dice stopped and considered them. They were good. Even with their familiar faces they managed to hide away from him. As much as he hated it, he could see the potential in them for a pair of excellent killers.

“Feeling restless are we?” Dice casually probed, snapping away the rest of his knives just to see their eyes widen. They trotted closer, unwillingly fascinated.

“..no?” They slowly replied, not looking at him as if that would let them lie easier.

Children. They were children already with the same restless desire for adrenaline and violence that Dice could so easily twist and nurture for his own needs-

He could.

But he won’t.

He had to believe that made him different. That he was different now, better than when he was young and bloodied and hungry.

“Ya know,” Dice drawled, exchanging a smug glance with Hearts that had the two brothers puff up indignantly, “Most kids go out 'n have fun after winning their freedom.”

“What do you know?” Cuphead scoffed, shoulders hunched and frowning up a storm.

“It’s what I did when I was young.” Although his fun was fleecing drunks at cards.

Mugman squinted up at him, dangerously able to read between the lines. “Wait. Does that mean you-”

The crack of gunshot interrupted and Dice felt all the nerves and tension flood back into him as he waited for the cold sting of a bullet even as he threw a Sharp Card at the flash of a muzzle that gave away the assassin’s position.

Hearts was missing from his shoulder. One of the brothers shouted and Dice looked down to see her covering his lapel, a scrunched and twisted bullet that was probably aimed at his heart stopped cold.

“Reckless” Dice hissed out, scooping her up to check for damage. His magic had held strong and she was unscathed but if the bullet had been charged with magic…

“You and I will be having serious words when we get home young lady.” Dice scolded and slipped her inside his vest pocket despite her protesting wriggles.

“How touching.”

Dice froze and looked up. A silver minnow blocked the alley mouth, sniper rifle sliced clean through and Spades in hand, calmly dangling and awaiting orders.

“All these years and we finally find you here, masquerading as a King and playing civilian, Die.”

Dice felt his lip curl and already felt tired of repeating himself.

“I am a King. I thought I made it clean when I left, Minnie.” He could see the brothers charging up a bright orange attack behind their back and had to end it before it came to that. He palmed a die.

His old friend gazed coldly at him.

“Killing the Archbishop does not a king make, Die.”

“Really?” Dice strode closer, pointedly shoving past Cuphead as a warning. “It worked marvelously for me. Perhaps you’re doing it wrong?”

Assassin’s weren’t to let any feelings interfere. But Minnie seemed to have a bit of time with that. Dropping her rifle and pointedly squeezing Spades to stop Dice from coming closer. Her voice didn’t change, but Dice knew he’d struck a nerve.

“How dare you.” Spades was wincing in her grip now and Dice felt his nerves settle down like hackles smoothing back. Over the roaring in his ears he hears her spit out:

“The Queen is so cross, after all she did for you-” Her voice raised and she loosened her grip in her righteous fury.

Now.

Spades disappeared in a small puff of smoke, and Minnie jolted in surprise. She squeezed her hand around the nothing and was met instead with the sharp edges of a…

A pink die.

A split second later, smoke flooded the alley and while the brothers were coughing and trying to see what was happening, they became aware that the dark smudge in front of them that was King Dice was now gone.

In the smoke all they could hear were the sharp sounds of metal and muffled gunshots and finally-

Nothing.

The smoke dissipated, suspiciously right after there were no more sounds. Magic smoke?

The strange lady was crumpled at Dice’s feet, slices oozing blood but she was breathing still. There were knives embedded everywhere, but Dice merely glanced at it all before throwing the unconscious assassin over one shoulder.

“What- What was that?” Mugman finally burst out, voice loud in the silence after. Cuphead nodded furiously behind him, face set in that determined glare they wore all throughout their fights. Dice- Dice couldn’t deal with that and the current problem on his hands so he didn’t.

He teleported away.

Chapter Text

/Third Hit

Wheezy had handed him the cup of what Dice was perplexed to see was hot tea. For his nerves?

He had no nerves. He was unnervable.

"It's just chamomile. Promise. "

No nerves here.

The overly warm press of a shoulder had Dice reluctantly dragging his eyes up from the steaming cup. The fight he was in this afternoon didn't leave him with any injuries. Physical injuries at that.

But being called Duchess... it felt-

It felt like spitting in the face of all he'd worked for since leaving the Company. All that he's become, reduced to nothing in the face of old friends and outdated identities. That hurt more than he'd ever admit to.

The silence in Wheezy's suite was comforting and Dice soaked in the companionship not riddled with competition and favoritism and the casual callousness he and Minnie took in while growing up under the Queen's care.

Was there a time he'd ever felt so safe as a child? Dice can't recall.

Still...

"We grew up together." Dice whispered hoarsely out into the quiet. Gently rotating the cup, suddenly recalling the oddly cooperative brothers at the sight. Another problem for after all this was over and done with. Assuming he was still...

"We learned to shoot together and she was so happy she picked up long range rifles right away. Had a natural talent for it."

Wheezy sighed out and took the cup from his hands before Dice crushed it with his fretting motions. The latest assassin was enjoying solitude and being watched over by Phear Lap and his boys. Wheezy might have... dropped in a word on how her stay was to play out with the denizens down Below.

Various patrons and unfortunates had learned the hard way that leering and taunting the casino manager had consequences they'd never see coming.

(It led to suddenly losing more than they won, to being blacklisted, to bankruptcy and in one special case, a personal smiting by their boss himself. None of it, of course, implicated Wheezy in any way.)

"Sometimes I wonder if..." Dice started suddenly, after a long silence in which Wheezy held back a yawn. It was getting late but Dice didn't look like he'd rest easy. Or let Wheezy do so. He could sympathize, seeing as the mere thought of an assassin here, in their home, sets him on edge.

"I wonder if she hates me because I betrayed them all…or because I failed to take her with me when I left."

It made Wheezy's skin crawl sometimes. To think he'd lived such a starkly different life than Dice, half the stuff the kid said sounded like some cruel parody of a dime novel. The disparity was almost comical if it wasn't so horrifying to picture.

"Kip here tonight." Wheezy offers, already going to get bedding for the couch. The motions felt familiar, from long ago when Wheezy would occupy Dice's couch more often than not. Made it feel like the last couple of years never happened and Dice was still learning to be and Wheezy was learning to cope.

The cloying nostalgia dissipated quickly though, because despite the feeling at times, they were both older and more settled than they thought. Time was good for that at least.

And, no matter what Dice believed, Wheezy knew they weren't alone in this.

"Boss." Dice almost jumped at suddenly having Mangosteen at his side. The man could move quietly and had the heart-stopping tendency to appear without warning. He enjoyed it even, the sadistic ass.

"What is it?"

"Someone here to see you."

Dice blinked.

"Hey!" Like an impending migraine, two familiar cups popped out from behind Mango's legs. Dice felt his cheek spasm with the force of will required to not immediately start grinding his teeth.

"You two. How - no, stupid question- why are you here?"

Cuphead leaned closer with a grin that had Dice squinting back at him in reflex. Up to no good that one, he could tell. The boy opened the burlap sack and near shoved it into Dice, eager to show.

"You left all your fancy knives!"

The other one, who only gave Dice a fleeting ray of hope for some sort of mitigating force before he smiled the same sly smile as his brother and piped up.

"Mr. Wheezy up front said they were yers and told us to make sure you got 'em back safely!" Wheezy. Of course.

Who could have easily accepted the knives on his behalf and turned them away at the door? Who instead sent the nosy brothers straight to him with a curious mystery that they won't soon let go?

Wheezy.

"I'm going to wring his neck." Dice mutters under his breath, looking down at the two curious faces and a bag full of his best knives. Well, maybe some positivity would help. Maybe they'd be on their way as soon as he could push them towards the lobby.

Hours later, he has to admit, if only to himself, that self delusions were never his style and that thinking the two brothers would let it lie was a bit of a reach, even for him.

"Don't you two bums have other people to annoy into stabbing you?"

"No." Mugman replied with a smile, still fearlessly sitting on the bar stool besides him and swinging his short legs.

Cuphead was sipping on juice like the child he said he wasn't, "It's fun messing with you guys. You can't say anything about it. Cuz we'll kick your ass."

As much as he hated to admit it, Dice knew they had a point.How irritating, he inwardly grumbled to himself.

"Yeah, well. Just know the next time you face me you won't have such an easy time of it," He scoffed, eyes already back on the pile of forms and requests and notes that needed to be filled in order to get the Casino working back in order.

They'd been following him the entire day, stiffly at first but they'd grown chattier the longer he kept from picking them up by the scruff and booting them out. Part of him regrets this but the other part...

Simple pragmatism. He knows they can't abide leaving something be. He had been keeping an eye on them during the whole thing. Helping out everyone from barbers to little girls. It was slightly sickening but also reassuring.

Having backup was always nice. No matter that they might fight him as soon as help him. At least they wouldn't kill him slow. Blissfully nonlethal these two, even with their own skins on the line.

Damn Wheezy. Of course he'd finagle the two most unrelenting fighters on Inkwell to be something like bodyguards. If he still didn't want to gently strangle him, he'd even compliment the man.

"So what's up with all the bullet holes near the pool tables?" Cuphead casually threw in, eying him over the rim of his glass.

Dice didn't do something as obvious as making a noise, or a dramatic scratching of a pen through the summary of expenses for the new marble in the lobby. For one thing, this wasn't amateur hour for 'worst questions being asked at inappropriate times'.

(The honor of which went to his boss who had come upon him at around 4 in the morning, rumpled and wearing nothing but what was obviously Wheezy's bathrobe right outside Wheezy's suite and holding a tray full of assorted cheeses and had the temerity to ask, polite as you please: "Ooh, is that brie?")

Dice didn't do anything of the sort. But he really really wanted to.

"That's..." Dice slowly enunciated, "exactly zero of your business."

"Did you get your ass kicked again?" The glee in the horrible child's voice made Dice reconsider his stance on bloodshed near the glass counter tops.

"Cup!" Mugman reprimanded primly from his other side before shooting Dice a guileless 'I'm sorry about my brother he's still not allowed near civilization without supervision'.

Dice narrowed his eyes. Ah so there's the con they play when brute force doesn't pan out. Brash, blunt hot-headed brother to fluster or enrage, and the beleaguered sympathetic sibling to listen to all your problems.

How...interesting. Also not his problem. He neatly sidesteps it and just barges on.

"Do you two remember the…associate who cornered me yesterday?" He begins, staring unseeing at a drop of ink building up on the pen tip he's got hovering over his papers. Well aware of the sharpened attention on himself. It has his hackles raising, being in someone's cross hairs a strangely upsetting and childishly familiar feeling.

"You called her an assassin." Mugman pointed out. Irritating and observant, just his luck.

"Was she who you won your freedom from?" Cuphead probed. Dice didn't see them shift, but he felt distinctly trapped all the same with a brother on either side.

He gave a little mirthless laugh. "Not hardly. Merely a scout. We had one almost perforate us before that too." Poking over the anthill, to see how they'd react and if they could get some wounds in before the truly dangerous ones came upon them.

Dice was good. At one point, without hubris, he'd place good money on being the best. But that was years and years ago and he'd had time to relax, to dull down the hard edges and slot neatly against civilians, or whatever the Devil's Casino workers counted as.

The Company had probably only gotten more and more lethal.

"Is it another debtor?" Cuphead asked hesitantly. It was ridiculous to see one strong fighter turn into nothing more than a child with the slump of thin shoulders and a lack of loudmouth bravado.

Dice had been a child once too. He had been a fighter since he could aim his first handgun. He knew more than most, you could be both and sometimes even at the same time, but it wasn't something sustainable. Not for long.

"No. They were the ones to hold my contract before the Devil."

"You don't look like the kind of man who would lose his soul." Cuphead squinted at him shrewdly. 'Unlike me' went unsaid and politely pretended to be unheard.

"The Queen isn't someone who waits for you to lose to her. She takes." Dice commented, looking away from their stares. "She had me at her beck and call ever since I could remember. I managed to break away from her influence when I grew strong enough and then later made a deal with the Devil to keep her cronies from dragging me back."

Mugman's chair squeaked as he kicked out his feet and scuffed the bar to stop himself suddenly and frowned at Dice with more judgment than he'd take calmly from someone that barely reached his hip.

"You willingly gave the Devil your soul?" He sounded scandalized.

Dice sniffed at them and went back to his papers, "Must be nice to be that naive. I'm glad some of us still have that luxury."

Despite the mocking tone, Dice actually did mean it more sincerely than he'd ever let on. At times it was frustrating, seeing such normal lives living alongside his. But then they did things like keep him company and find him a job at a bar. A soft life allowed for the cultivation of soft kindness as well and Dice has been too heavily indebted to Wheezy to have anything but the fondest appreciation for it.

Even these two. Tricked into signing away their souls, run ragged and beaten up but good. They're still here though, chatting away like all that bad business was years ago instead of merely last week; all because Wheezy probably put on a brave face and made worrying comments about Dice's life expectancy and a tantalizing 'adventure'.

Soft. But it wasn't necessarily a bad thing.

He'd have to be tortured for much longer than these two would have the stomach for before he'd tell them that though.

Cuphead kicked his knee, much to his outrage, and in a flash, a Card was slapping his face. The kid flinched, probably still remembering the painful stings those cards left. Even without the magical charge, the Manager's Aces were strong little things that nearly had taken a finger off.

"Oh!" he blinked down at the scowling look directed at him, "It's the little Heart!"

Hearts laid upon the open palm only for a second, before flipping up and laying another full body smack to Cuphead's indignant look before Dice managed to corral her back.

"Stop that," He muttered, rolling his eyes at her mutinous little face. Honestly, he should have just cut up the entire deck once it gained sentience from overexposure to his magic.

"She's always spoiling for a fight isn't she?" Mugman leaned closer than Dice precisely wanted him to but was mollified by the withering look Hearts threw the boy's way.

"She's a pest. Always jumping into fights at the slightest provocation." Dice retorted, cradling Hearts in his hands via a makeshift cage of fingers. She didn't even give him the satisfaction of trying to wriggle away, the wretch.

Dice didn't catch the look the two brothers shot each other.

"Provocation to you, you mean." Cuphead added slyly, a new gleam entering his eyes that had Dice unconciously bringing Hearts closer to himself. Shooting them a narrow look, Dice bared his teeth at their curiosity.

"Don't encourage her. You saw how bad she is yesterday. She's damn lucky my magic was strong enough to stop the bullet."

Mistake.

They perked up at him bringing up the fight and Dice knew he'd already lost.

"So, how long have you been able to do that with knives?"

"Can you teleport other stuff? Or only, like, your cards?"

If he had an iota less of dignity, Dice would have buried his head into the half finished requisition forms in front of him.

"Well that was kinda pointless. Nothing happened." Cuphead said as they were heading back home in the dark blues of early night. Mugman kicked a rock that bounced off something and was swallowed by the shadows. He shrugged.

"I dunno. Didya see the monkey following us for a while back there? In the rafters."

"Oh yeah, the guy with the grappling hook right?" That guy was deadly with that thing. Not to mention those annoying cymbals of his...

Well. Not their problem anymore. In fact, it might be to their advantage this time.

"I think they might have caught another one while we were messing with Dice." Mugman hummed. His brother made a small sound of surprise at that, and then a louder one as they came upon the Carnival. There was more foot traffic than usual around these parts.

"Boys." The deep voice had them looking up and seeing Djimmi floating a ways away from the hubbub, pipe in hand and looking slightly worn.

"Hey! What's going on? There's so many people tonight!" Cuphead jumped up onto the bench besides him to at least stop craning his neck upwards.

Djimmi puffed out a faintly sweet smelling smoke before motioning towards a white and red splotch in the distance, a distinctive cackle marking where Beppi was entertaining a crowd. " 's been unseasonably busy this week. As soon as the Casino closed for repairs, the first boat afterwards had almost double the tourists."

The brothers shared a look at that. Could that have been part of…whoever was sending people after the Casino manager? Did…did they have something to do with it?

The genie looked from one pensive face to another and clenched his pipe between his teeth to reign in the frown.

"So..." he started, "something is going on."

Bon Bon owed him five gold.

Chapter Text

/Fourth Hit

Wheezy was snoring on his own couch, nose lighting up with every inhale and sleeping heavily enough that he didn't even twitch as Dice threw himself onto the floor besides him. Damn the man, he looked tired enough that Dice couldn't bring himself to prod him awake and complain about the two little menaces that he'd set loose.

He'd been out of sight most of the week, and Dice hadn't missed the Tipsy Troupe's conspicuous absence either. That meant he was definitely up to something. Odds are it's something to do with him .

Sighing and finally allowing himself to unbend the rigid line of his spine into something less painfully upright, Dice slumps into the sofa cushion and the soft rise and fall of Wheezy's belly.

Sometimes...

Sometimes Dice still feels like a kid. Stumbling around and punching things instead of learning to properly interact with them. Talking to no one but the drunk who took him in hand and had the criminal patience to explain what should have been common sense.

Will he ever stop needing Wheezy to watch his back?

What does it speak to the person Dice is that he hopes he never does?

"Yer less tense today." Wheezy's gravelly rasp nearly has Dice jolting away, if not for the sleep warm and heavy hand that sets itself clumsily on his head. "Good."

"Those two menaces left scuff marks on the bar. And my slacks." Dice complains without missing a beat. "The next time I see them I'm gonna do something I won't regret Wheeze, mark my words."

A rusty chuckle morphs into a heavy exhale as Wheezy slips back down to sleep.

Dice stays long enough to hear him begin to snore again before he levers himself back up and makes his way back out. Passing the kitchen table he spies dozens of creased letters and Wheezy's unmistakable neat hand. A stack of written notes lays innocently besides the hallway phone now relocated to the table.

Dice is besides them before he notices but stops himself from reaching out to the top folded missive. He clenches his fist and slowly withdraws it, glancing at his snoring lump of a friend.

Information is crucial. Life or death is often decided by the quality of the intel you've gathered on your targets. Your enemies. Your friends.

'If only the Queen could see me now' Dice thinks wryly, not for the first time, 'She'd skin me alive.' Or worse.

He makes his way back to his own rooms, curious about what his friend is up to. But equally sure that he'd be told in time.

Wheezy would make sure of it.

-

A long while back, before he got used to the layout of the Casino but after everyone loosened up and stopped reaching for their weapons when he came around, the Devil once walked with him on a routine inspection before opening time.

They were still uneasy with each other, Dice recalls. The Devil never faltering in what later Dice would learn was a suave, mysterious act to keep people from wondering just how much power the Devil had over puny, frail mortals. Dice himself, stayed stubbornly serious and unresponsive to any jabs thrown his way by his new boss.

At least he'd stopped skewering anything that popped up inches from his face. If only to avert the obnoxious peals of laughter from the Devil every time he did it.

"Do y'know why I told you not to kill anyone in the casino yet?" He'd asked out of the blue. Dice didn't miss a beat in replying.

"Because I'm-"

"'- a manager not a mercenary of some kind ' yeah yeah I get it wise-guy." It might have been disconcerting to hear his own voice being used to mock him but with the exaggerated face his boss was pulling, Dice had to bite his lip to prevent a snicker from escaping.

"Hmm?" Like some kind of bird of prey, the Devil didn't turn. He watched closely from the corner of his eye, seeing without drawing attention to what he was really focusing on. "Gotcha with that one didn't I? You got one screwy funny bone King."

Dice turned to him, mildly indignant. "I won't take that from someone who showed up to the senior bingo hall as a skeleton in a robe with a scythe boss."

Dice didn't know where he'd gotten the scythe from actually. Neither did Phear Lap, who was actually present for the aforementioned Bingo Hall Incident. No one was brave, or stupid enough, to ask Phear Lap's actual age but the only two who regularly enjoyed Bingo Nights was that old horse and their erstwhile boss.

Dot had scrunched her nose and declared them 'older than sin, both literally and figuratively' . Dice privately agreed.

His boss laughed, too loud and wicked like Dice hadn't heard before. The vaguely ominous aura dissipating instantly with the tinge of childish glee as the Devil bounced on the balls of his feet and proclaimed, "Those old codgers are tougher than that King. Trust me . No one more ruthless than that lot."

A faint disbelieving smile graced Dice's face at that, and he hummed with a carefully cultivated air of snobbish polite disbelief. Part of him hated how easy it came to him still. The other part knew it was worth it for the way his boss pulled the most offended look in response.

A beat or two passed in quiet before they both caught each other's eyes and gave it up to laugh hard enough to have them wiping their eyes and clutching stomachs.

"Ah, damn it." Another giggle broke loose before the Devil just gave it up and leaned against the banister overlooking the main floor. "What was I saying? I had a damned point to this King."

Knuckling way the wide grin, it always unsettled people, Dice dutifully reminded him. "No deaths in the Casino."

"Ah yeah, that. Well. You've obviously killed people before haven't you?"

A cold wash of icy trepidation was dumped down Dice's spine without a warning and whatever mirth he'd had was now well doused.

"I-"

"Don't bother. I can see it on you." His boss didn't straighten up, just turned his face so Dice could clearly see the pupil of one eye morph into an outline of a cube and then shrink into a skull and crossbones.

How...fascinating.

If it was literally anyone else, in any other situation, Dice would have unabashedly peered closer.

As it was, he flexed his hands, gloved and clean but no matter what he wore or how much he scrubbed, he could still feel the tackiness of old blood. Under his nails, in between his fingers, dried and flaking along his palm.

Yes, Dice has killed people. He's not really surprised someone with his boss' eyes could see that too.

"I don't care about mortal lives, even less about mortal crimes." The Devil pipes up, gone back to looking over to his gleaming empty casino. Pirouetta was conferring with Wheezy on something before the man went off to open the doors and welcome guests in. "The only thing worth my time is mortal souls. And who possesses them, you get me?"

"Yes, boss." Dice replied, numbly. His mouth was filled with a sour taste and he swears he could feel the sharp press of broken bones against his palms.

"Contrary to whatever cute ideas you all have about balancing your sins and virtues, it's not that clear cut." Dice blinked back a bit at that, interest caught.

"Really? How is it decided then?"

The Devil snorted, "It's nonsensical. My Goddamn bastard of a father could tell you."

Ah.

The Devil shot him a narrow look and Dice faintly wondered if there was something to Chimes' mutters of purported mind-reading.

"I hear the words 'daddy issues' pass through your lips Dice, and you'll be in Tartarus so fast your little head will spin, got it?"

"Boss," Dice put a hand over his heart and affected a hurt look, "I'm the very soul of obedience. I got it." As if. Wheezy was going to die laughing when he told him tonight.

Another moment to give him the hairy eyeball passed before his magnanimous and sometimes terrifying boss grunted and went back to watching the now bustling Casino floor with a discerning eye.

"What we want is quantity. Especially since all contracts come with an expiration date."

"Their death." Dice hummed, now beginning to get it. "Everyone's gotta make their deadline." A saying the now-deceased Archbishop used to mutter a lot. Usually before he sent Dice off to collect the heads of some poor bastard and their entire family line.

The mere memory of ending that man still makes him want to smile years later.

The Devil laughed, something almost surprised in it now. "You're a riot. And a sick, sick man." He turned around, now propping his elbows to lounge properly and face his manager.

"A dead mortal has a fifty-fifty chance of being mine. A live one, who wanders in here, racks up a debt and sells their soul? The soul contract ensures they're completely mine until a couple of years down the road; it even adds a little tarnish to the soul to tip the scales. If I make an effort and help you mortals figure out how to live longer sometimes I even get an extension."

Neatly sidestepping the horrifying insinuation of the Devil's impact on their history and medicinal advances, Dice nods.

"So, the fun is in watching them tie the noose around their own necks and take a dive off somewhere high?"

There was an unsettlingly wide grin shot his way at that. Wheezy would have laughed a bit and then felt so bad about it he'd frown for the rest of the day. There was a silver lining to this job already.

" Yess ," The Devil hissed, pupils thin and dangerous, the flick of a split tongue curling in the air like a party favor. "Isn't free will grand King?"

"Sure is boss."

-

Free will , Dice mused, was sometimes an unfair luxury some couldn't afford .

Staring at what was once someone he'd die to protect, Dice could almost smell the gun polish, antiseptic, perfume scent of their shared room. Minnie the Minnow had been at his side for nigh on the first decade of their life.

And now she couldn't even stand to look at him.

A sense of loss was buried under a wave of sick glee. As if this, this , was the thing to finally break the tie binding Dice to his past. Leaving behind his guns, his habits, his ruthlessness wasn't enough. But maybe The Die gripped his heart with something more alive than mere memory. Some one .

Wildly, Dice wondered if killing Minnie would make him a normal, soft person. The Archbishop and the Minnow, was that to be his price? The most hated and the most beloved of his old life? One to set him free and the other to keep that freedom?

There were bad days, where he'd make an off-color joke that brought a strange cast to those around him. Where, out of nowhere, he'd remember the exact sensation of crushing tiny bones and how long someone needed to be held down before they stopped needing to breathe. Where wine tasted like blood and the expensive orchestra only left him shaking in a cold sweat when they hit a violincello crescendo.

Where he'd wake up quietly in the throes of a dream that had him ripping apart all these weaknesses he'd surrounded himself with, the Queen's music filling the air and Wheeze's lifeless flat gaze followed him no matter what.

On those days, Dice hated himself enough to think he'd pay it.

"You never use knives."

Dice breathed in the accusation and breathed out everything. Idly noting it was more painful to loosen his shaking fist than continue gouging his nails into his palm. Yes. There were bad days. And sometimes worse days.

But they were only days .

What were some measly hours against the months and years that had Dice winning without the taste of iron at the back of his teeth? Where he could stand to look at himself in the mirror, girlish softness and bloodied apathy left behind for someone with strong shoulders and soft emotions?

Where he could hug Wheezy without looking for bloody handprints, show off his skills to an adoring crowd and have things in common with good and less good people rather than with murderers. Where he could look at someone who has seen the creation of the universe in the eye and know no matter what he's done, the Devil will still think him a rank amateur in comparison.

"You couldn't stop crying every time the life left their eyes." Min hissed, eyes intent and dark as pitch. "I don't think that's changed Duchess ."

"N-"

A small ping of a common die nearly beaned Minnie in the eye. Dice stared dumbly at it before looking to his left, where Dot- who'd been lounging and filing her nails as she kept watch on their, for lack of a better term, prisoner- now sported a nasty smile.

"That's King to you, poppet."

Dice wanted to reprimand her but reasoned that Minnie wasn't exactly a guest. And it warmed him something fierce. Which he'd admit to no one .

"Was this why you left? To be a pretend King somewhere else? The Queen would have crowned you in her place you know." Minnie retorted, eyes growing shiny in her hurt.

The two prodigies Queen Fidd raised from the cradle. One who cried when they killed. The other who shed tears over betrayals.

What a mess they were.

"Minnie, c'mon." Dice prodded softly, unseeing of the odd look Dot wore at the strange soft voice coming from a man she'd seen face the Devil's worst tantrums with gleeful prodding.

"You can't leave, and I won't kill you."

"Weak." she shook her head, scales glimmering in the faint light behind the iron bars. Almost as soft she murmured, " I'd seen you grow dull and frail in that bar. With that man and yet I still can't believe it "

Dice went carefully still. They knew about the bar. About Wheezy . That was…very worrying.

"You," Dice stopped before his voice would crack, tried to swallow past the panic, "You sound just like her you know."

The hate and poison spat upon the ever present and vague men , who would take the Queen's precious proteges and chew them up, spit them out into vacant wide eyed waifs. Weak, complacent chattel until they died. Like they tried to do to Fidd. Like they would try to do with them, mi bambini, listen to your wise mother.

Dice could recite the entire spiel by heart now, having heard it so much. He could also just about picture the sheer rage and betrayal when they reported back to her about Dice wearing slacks and answering to different pronouns.

God, Dice wishes so badly to have figured out the whole man thing earlier. The sheer hatred would have fueled him for days .

Minnie probably saw this in his face because she scoffed and turned around, ignoring them as best she could in her prison. Dice made to step closer, to continue fishing for information, but the corridor door opened and Wheezy popped his head in.

"Got some guys for ya boss!" He just about beamed, seemingly uncaring of how Minnie whipped around to stare death at him. Dice relaxed his shoulders and refrained from massaging away the stiffness in them. Dot's snort of amusement clued him in before he laid eyes on two familiar nosy brothers.

"Oh good, there should be a pair of spare manacles around here somewhere I believe." Dice smiled at the suddenly wary look the two sent him.

"Oh barf, I don't want to know about your sex life." Cuphead, the brat, said, hopping back to stay in the brightly lit corridor as Dice strode out to the fresh air of the Casino proper. Wheezy stayed in even as he flourished and bowed out a tittering Dot.

"Go corral that man of your Dotty, he's with Hopus and you know how that tends to turn out." the assistant manager wryly tattled, uncaring of the immediate and near violent bickering that broke out between the manager and the two cups. "I'll watch over our little fish here."

Dot eyed him for a bit, before smiling and laughing out a "have fun" as she strutted down the opposite way.

After everyone cleared out, Wheezy closed the door with a soft click. Another softer click ensured the lock was engaged. Turning around, he wasn’t surprised to see the assassin almost pressed against the bars as if daring him to come within strangling distance.

"That didn't go so well I take it?" He asked, pulling the lone chair and twirling it around to sit. The silence that met him wasn't unexpected but it was informative.

So.

This was one of Dice's friends.

"You know I'm kinda jealous." Wheezy started off resting his cheek on an upturned palm and leaning forwards like one buddy to another, about to impart the juiciest gossip. Silence was the only response. That was fine, he didn't need information from her. He only needed an audience.

"I mean, I've known Dice for almost half his life, but you! You knew him basically from the cradle am I right?" If Dice had been there, he could have noticed the jovial tone and coolly assessing eyes forewarned Wheezy's terrible temper.

"All I could do was help with the nightmares, the fear, the baggage from all the shit he's gone through." The smile was wiped clean off his face. Laugh lines and creases of good humor settled into cool smoothness with a whiplash intensity that had Miss Minnow watching this posturing civilian with something approaching trepidation.

"I'm jealous because you had the opportunity to help my best friend avoid some of that hurt and you didn't ."

Her mouth opened as if to defend herself, or exclaim some dime-store villain one-liner. Wheezy didn't care and steamrolled right over that to continue, "And I know you two were in the same boat. But Dice planned for months so you two had a clean ticket out of there and you sold him out , didn't you?"

Hurt children or not. Child soldier or not. Dice's sister in all but name or not.

That was unforgivable.

For years he'd been listening and piecing together the events and what was specifically not said. It was a shot in the dark, logically speaking, but Wheezy's gut instinct had him spitting it out anyway.

Minnie the Minnow flinched back.

This seasoned killer feared him, feared his truth and for a second Wheezy felt the exhilaration of a loose string tie itself up.

It lasted long enough to almost cover up the taste of disgust. At the betrayer in front of him, at the exact number of people Dice had to kill to win his freedom when they found out his plan, at himself for the brief fantasy of scorching those pretty scales in a form of twisted payback he knows Dice wouldn't thank him for.

For the one who saw two young babies and thought the best she could do was break them in order to line her pockets with money and blood.

"I'm sure Dice told you that you couldn't escape, and that he won't kill you?" He fished out a cigarette and lit up, hoping some of the nicotine could spare him the stress headache he can feel nipping at his heels. "Well he's right. In a way."

The outer edges of the stone floor shook and fell away into nothing. Ah good, he was right on time.

The assassin jumped and her clutching hands betrayed her fear where her placid demeanor did not.

"Funny thing really. Living mortals can't be killed in the depths of hell." He had to raise his voice over the sounds of crumbling rock and the distant roar of hellfire.

"So you won't die. And you'll be released. Eventually. After we're done with your Queen." There was only about a foot of space left.

His next words caught her attention better than the imminent long drop though.

"And your Prince. And your Princess. And your Duke. And, hmm-" Wheezy pretended to think "Who was- ah yes! Marquis Bates. Right, your boss? And after him, the Sals. Have I got all the big fish?"

Her eyes were pinpricks now, and her mouth was a rigid tense line even as she tried to keep her footing on the scant inches left. Impressive.

"How- how do you -?"

"The entire house of cards sweetheart." Wheezy stood and ambled towards the door once more. "We'll topple them all."

He could only hear the panicked gasp as the last bit of the floor gave way and took their newest guest to her  accommodations before he clicked the door shut once more.

Chapter Text

///fifth hit

"Okay so, promise you won't get mad?"

Ominous words coming from someone 3 foot nothing with a punch like a speeding train. Dice resisted the urge to swear long enough to turn around and then stared despairingly at the two lightly singed and sopping brothers.

"What."

Mugman nudged his brother and muttered under his breath, "Told you that wouldn't work."

"You both went to the restroom." Dice used the last of his dignified control to stop his hands from reaching for his knives. Judging by the jump they both did, the brothers had already figured out that tell. Drat.

As they both began to spew a hurried and almost hilariously wide-eyed retelling of what was either a prank war or a fight to the death between Chips Bettigan and Chimes, Dice was left agog at the sheer wreckage they managed to run into just by chance.

Aforementioned prank war/death duel was then interrupted and won by two cups trying to find the staff bathroom on this floor resulting in the temporary confiscation of what seemed to be Chip's precious poker gun and Chimes' beloved grappling hook.

He held a hand up and couldn't even be smug at the immediate silence that followed. He turned back to the straight-faced imp. Even with the dead eyed stare behind the thick horn-rimmed glasses, Dice was willing to bet good money they were laughing inside.

"So the third swatch should do for the corridor, and the drapes can be done with this pattern here."

"Sounds good Mr. King Dice." was the pleasant rejoinder. Dice held back the irritated sigh at that. The wretched creature seemed to hear it because a small smile cracked that impassive mask as they penciled in the remodeling date for next week and toddled off.

A distinctively metallic clunk behind him had him loosing the sigh instead as he predictably caught Mugman guiltily holding the grappling gun up to shoot it at a rafter. Dice lifted an eyebrow.

Laughing weakly, Mugman gestured upwards with the gun, "I, uh- well…when am I gonna get the opportunity again right?"

Judging from the flat stare Cuphead was shooting his brother as he pointedly placed Chips' gun in Dice's outstretched hand, this wasn't the first time Mugman had tried to use the grappling gun and made everyone in a wide radius fear for their life.

When a beat or two passed with no discernible movement from the reluctant Mugman, his brother impatiently shoved a pointy elbow into his side. It made him jump and- worse yet- accidentally squeeze the trigger. Because he'd left his finger on it. Because he was unused to guns. Because he was a child.

The lethally sharp hook shot out at high speeds and a knockback that made Mugman stumble.There was no harm done, Dice was reluctantly glad to note, before he noticed where the grappling hook was heading.

Straight towards where the unsuspecting imp was walking off. Quick as a flash, Dice lifted the familiar weight in his hand and took a fraction of a second weighing the ammo, and narrowing down the most effective place to hit.

A gentle squeeze later, one of the red poker chips shot out and struck the prongs hard enough to veer it off it's path into the nearest wall.

A beat later, the delayed dread hit his spine and the tunnel vision abated back in time to hear the dismayed noise from Mugman. The imp looked back to see them all wide eyed and vaguely panicky. They shrugged and continued on, blissfully unaware.

All three of them released a sigh that seemed to suck all the strength from their knees and just collapsed where they stood. Mugman firmly placed the gun on the carpeted floor next to Dice and shook his head weakly.

"Sorry, I-." He wet his lips and if Dice hadn't seen it, he wouldn't have been able to guess they could look even paler. "That-..sorry."

Cuphead stared dead ahead and proclaimed flatly, "I think I just lost years of my life I'll never get back."

Dice grabbed the grappling gun and activated the mechanism to reel it all back in, pretty sure this model was much faster than any other he'd ever personally used. Chimes probably souped it up. Explained how impossibly quick he was. He held it up and ignored the flinch Mugman gave at the deadly sharp hooks being waved in front of him.

"Listen up kid." Dice quietly called them to attention. Showing the proper grip, he went through the most basic of gun safety right there on the second floor corridor. After a moment he also grabbed Chips' gun and deftly emptied it, dropping the ammo into a suit pocket. Then he had them show him the grip with both guns, despite Mugman's obvious reluctance at touching it.

How amusing.

"Caution is common sense. Fear is forgivable." Dice said as he patted down his slacks to try to mitigate the wrinkles already forming from spending so long on the floor. He picked both brothers up by the scruff and brought them up to eye-height.

"Getting bystanders hurt through willful ignorance, however, isn't. Understand?"

They were damp, bedraggled and smelled faintly of the electric burns from one of Chimes' cymbals. Dice supposed the mumbles were the best he'd get.

///

Shock was always easiest on a stomach full of warm food, this Dice knew from personal experience. So he corralled the brothers to his own suite for showers while he sent their clothes down to be quickly dried by the Casino's impeccable Underworld staff.

Bless each of their little magical hearts. Five minutes later it was all returned with soft puff onto his couch while Dice was reheating chicken soup and adding some more vegetables to make it filling.

He kept his back turned as the bathroom door creaked open and the pad of wet feet scampered over to the sofa and then back to the bathroom. Rolling his eyes he started setting out bowls and cutlery in time to serve the two ravenous pits of hunger that were adolescent children.

He was allowed two minutes of silence as the two brothers ate like they didn't have a single tooth in their skulls.

"I didn't know you guys lived here too." Cuphead finally said as he slowed down enough to breathe between spoonfuls of hot soup. "I thought you guys just- I dunno, had no life and spent it all here."

Wryly, Dice had to concede that that was a pretty accurate assessment of himself if nothing else.

"Free room and board is hard to beat," Dice shrugged, "the view is nice at least."

They all took a moment .to pause and look out the nearest floor to ceiling window overlooking what was in fact, pure fire and magma with intersped red rock crags dotted here and there.

"Yeah" Mugman said flatly.

Cuphead, however, was over the amazing view of the inner workings of Hell and was instead directing worrying amounts of attention to Dice's bookcase, his stacks of decks scattered everywhere and the gleam of Chips' gun on the kitchen counter.

"Why did you never use a gun in our fight?" He finally burst out with. Apparently done biting back the myriad of questions for politeness' sake.

He let them sweat it out for a bit while he worked through his own bowl, thinking of a way to get his point across without giving anything away. Finally he left the dregs and pushed away his bowl to give them his full attention.

"I don't use them anymore. For personal reasons and for more practical ones." He starts off, already eying a Cuphead eager to interrupt.

"But!" The boy started, flexing his hand into the pose that made Dice's blood race with pre-fight jitters, a glowing orange light emanated from the tip of his index finger. "With that kind of speed, you'd be unbeatable."

Dice idly wondered if that's why they were so uncomfortable with real guns. Magical glowing fingerguns were completely different in terms of danger and use. Almost childish.

Looking at them, brows furrowed and excited over what must have seemed like a magical talent with something foreign and powerful, Dice felt so old. Worn thin in places that must have held this childish excitement at one point. At least Dice hoped it did. The alternative was too sad to think of.

"There's a point in your life," Dice makes sure to curb that raw unthinking enthusiasm with his unflinching gaze. "Where beating your enemies isn't the same as winning your battles. Do you understand?"

They tentatively shake their head.

Part of Dice wants to wash himself of this headache of a situation, it's scraping old wounds raw and even now he can feel the phantom sensation of smooth metal against his palm like an addiction. He felt more at home clutching a gun than another person's hand at one point in his life. He's starting to think that will never fully go away.

Part of him wants to sit back and watch them stumble through what he suffered. The youthful, stupid acquisition of power without the restraint. The damage that's wrought along the way to friends and enemies alike. The irrational fear of holding someone's hand because you might crush it like you've easily crushed others.

He wants to see them fail and feel better about how he failed as well.

That would be entertaining. But not satisfying. And despite everything, he'd feel at least partly responsible.

"After you beat us," and wow, there goes only a split second of teeth grinding, so it's not a sore wound anymore at least, "but before you fought the boss, why did you burn the contracts?"

Mugman frowns, " Well. I think it's...because-" He exchanges a look with his brother who picks up the answer baton like they're at a relay race to the finish.

"They were just people. Like us." Cuphead answered, tiny brow furrowed in uncharacteristic deep thought. "Some of 'em were maybe tricked. Others made a deal or whatever. But- but we knew we were gonna fight to be free, no matter what stupid thing we did, because we were strong enough. We were strong enough for them too, so we did it."

That was...surprisingly moral for a couple of brats in short pants, Dice is reluctantly impressed despite himself.

"If you two had been able to finagle your contracts from us somehow and destroyed them. Would you still have fought us to a knockout?"

"No" they shrugged in unison. Simple as that.

Dice propped up his chin on a hand and smirked at them through the pangs of envy. He had to break for that kind of morality, for that obvious answer. How was that fair? It wasn't. But nothing ever was, and being bitter about it was a waste of time so he discarded those thoughts.

"The most pragmatic thing to do would have been to kill us all as soon as you'd won."

One of them dropped a spoon at that and the clatter fell loud in the heavy silence.

"W-what?" Mugman's voice pitched several octaves higher in his shock. "K-kill-?"

Oh boy, he sounded faint.

Cuphead scowled up at him, "We weren't gonna kill you stupid. We just wanted our dumb soul contracts ripped up, jeez."

"And deep inside my cold little heart, I'm sure I appreciate it, Cupface." He put a theatrical hand to his heart at that, if only to stop the blue one from fainting through sheer annoyance at his patronizing tone. He dropped the act and continued on in a serious enough voice that he knew they would remember it. He hoped so at least.

"You'll get stronger, and that's fine. But just make sure you stay in control of that strength. You two are able to easily kill someone even as you are now, even if you don't want to. " He stands up at that, feeling like some kind of morally righteous pompous asshole spouting children's virtues like people want to hear it.

But then again. They're children's virtues for a reason.

He goes around picking up the bowls like a good host and taking them to soak in the sink for later.

"Why didn't you kill us?" Mugman quietly asks, huddled by the kitchen counter with his brother.

"Because I didn't want to."

It's out of his mouth before he can stop it. The answer that's been bubbling under the surface ever since Satan Himself stared him down and accused him of sabotaging his own job.

They're just children. They're just enemies. They're just targets.

Dice stops and doesn't turn around, breathing in and out in a pattern to calm his racing heart. He clenches his bare fist in the water, suddenly nauseous at how his veins look like writhing strings burrowing deep in his arms.

"No one will ever make me do what I don't want to, ever again."

///

After escorting the understandingly quiet boys out past the train tracks and making sure they got on their way back home. Dice detoured to drop off Chips' and Chimes' guns. Vowing to never breathe a word of what happened in the two hours they were parted.

Declining an offer of drinks, Dice dithered between his office and his suite, feeling unreasonably tired for only midday. Wheezy's room won that contest, and even when it showed itself to be empty, Dice knew he was allowed to make himself at home.

'Making himself at home' ended up with Dice on the sofa, folded up and hiding his face in his knees. The pressure against his eyes held whatever wayward tears threatened to fall at bay and the darkness behind his eyelids was a soothing grey. He clasped his hands together like that would make the tantalizing feeling of a gun in hand go away.

Eventually his Deck noticed his lack of movement and wriggled free of their confinement in his suit pocket. Hearts, judging by the fidgeting pressure on his knee, was also 'making herself at home'.

Diamonds seemed to be making odd huffing noises as she slipped up against the side of his head and stuck herself quite firmly there. Perhaps she was trying to sing...?

There was a pointed push against this chest and he pried his torso away from his thighs to let Spades, his sleepy girl, curl up against his vest and promptly shut her eyes. While he had a fantastic view of everything now, he noted that Clubs had gone and tied his shoelaces together, again.

She was now using it as a swing and shamelessly stuck a tongue out in his direction when she caught him looking.

"You're all grounded."

The indignant squeak from Diamonds plastered against the side of his face was worth the kick Hearts gave his knee.

Time passed and Dice didn't notice, hazily watching his Deck use his various limbs for their own amusement. It was fine. He wasn't using them anyway. He was stuck inside his own head, chewing on something that threatened to burst forth messily if it wasn't given attention.

Pretty soon, he noticed his lower lids felt heavy, and that his view had been steadily filling with tears. Blinking hard broke the fragile balance and tears dripped down his face, eventually splashing poor Spades who fluttered up and patted at the corner of his head she could reach.

His voice was waterlogged of course, but if he spoke at a whisper, he could pretend it was raspy for another reason.

"I didn't want to."

A truth.

Whatever messed up borrowed morals he pieced together after the wreckage of his old life, they weren't gonna give him a sainthood for them, that's for sure.

Robbing people blind in poker? Cheating? Pettiness he should be above? Not a blip on his radar.

Working voluntarily for the adversary of all of humanity, The Devil Himself? Dice could swing it if the pay was good and the benefits worth it.

Luring people into signing their souls over to the Devil? Shit, Dice didn't push them through the Casino doors. Didn't force them to bet stupid things when they should know better.

Murder?

No. Not that. Never that.

"I don't want to." He whispers again, now speaking to the four Aces cradled in his lap gazing up worriedly at him. As if it was a magical phrase, a confidence trick, that would ensure he kept his free will, his hard won control over his own life.

He feels like a child, stretched too thin and made to grow too fast and as a result, grew wrong. Face hot and tight with tears, he remembers hiding away and crying back then too.

"I don't want to. I don't want to. I don't want to."

I never wanted to.

The thought drops into the pond of rippling whispers of his mind and buries everything under a wave of heavy solemnity. Only a child of five or six and they'd sent in little assassin-in-training Die. A solemn little girl pleased as punch she was finally strong enough to do what her family went off to do in the middle of the night.

She was strong enough to hide her trepidation as the target let her stay out of the rain and offered her a warm bed for the night. Strong enough to dig the knife deep and watch the thick blood bubble up between stained teeth. Watching her own reflection in the target's wide terrified eyes.

Not strong enough to know better.

He'd been crying then too. That was the first and last assassination Dice ever did with a knife. At least with a gun, he'd never had to see himself and all his horror reflected out of wide fearful eyes.

He'd never wanted to. Not ever.

But he still did it. And he doesn't know if he ever wants to let go of the familiar guilt and self-loathing just in case. Just in case he ever forgets how easy it was to get him to do something he never wanted to.

///

When Wheezy lets himself into his suite, it's well past sunset and he's finally done checking in on all his little clockwork plans. He stops at the sofa, seeing Dice sprawled sideways, clothes still all on and shoes oddly tied together. Jeez, this kid.

All his little Aces are cloistered on his chest, so it looks like he fell asleep with a winning hand clutched close. He sets a careful hand on his shoulder, pressing down hard enough to stop him from jolting up and punching someone's lights out.

"It's just me."

At that Dice stops fluttering his eyes open and slumps back into slumber. His eyes are red and puffy from what seems to have been some serious waterworks. Wheezy frowns at that but still gently takes his shoes off and drags a warm blanket over.

The Aces blink up at him and despite never saying a word manage to convey a sleepy chorus of thanks. Wheezy squints at them, pretty sure they're smarter than Dice says they are. The Spade climbs over her sisters and sets up on one covered shoulder, keeping watch over the sleeping pile.

Too smart by half, Wheezy'd bet anything.