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.