Dealers Fate

The air in the crumbling tile room stank of mold, rust, and fear.

Thirty women sat in two rows of cold steel chairs, their bodies bound in coarse rope and their mouths sealed with duct tape. Harsh fluorescent lights flickered above, casting a greenish pall over the damp walls and cracked floor. The room had once been a staff locker for one of the old casinos—now it was a stage for judgment.

Four of the girls were dressed in flashy casino-themed costumes: a magician’s assistant, a showgirl, a roulette hostess, and a blackjack dealer. Their makeup was smudged, their eyes wide and tear-brimmed. They had been prominent faces in the casino world, familiar to the high-rollers and tourists alike. Now, they were nothing but tokens in a violent game.

The mobster who had orchestrated this hostile takeover was known only as Vento—a cruel relic of old crime families, whose expansion into the casino district was as swift as it was brutal. He didn’t care for contracts or partnerships. You paid, or you vanished.

This particular casino had tried to resist. One of the last independent establishments in the strip, they had refused to bow. So Vento made an example of them—shutting down the doors, storming the backstage, and rounding up the staff. The male employees were gone. The women—every dancer, dealer, singer, and stagehand—were locked here. All thirty of them.

Vento’s idea was simple: The Wheel of Odds.

A giant, motorized wheel stood in the adjacent room. Each section bore a symbol: a skull, a chain, a dove, a flame. Each girl, one by one, would be strapped to the wheel. It would spin. Wherever the wheel stopped would decide her fate.

The Skull meant death. Quick, sometimes theatrical.
The Chain meant slavery—sold off to Vento's allies or put to work in his grim empire.
The Dove meant mercy. Release. Freedom. Or something close to it.
The Flame was a wildcard. Nobody yet knew what it meant.

One by one, the guards would come. A girl would be chosen. They’d untie her, drag her screaming to the next room, and the others would listen as the wheel creaked and spun. Sometimes, there was silence afterward. Sometimes, there were cries. Once, there was applause—but it came only from Vento himself.

No one knew what happened behind that second door, but each time it opened, there was one less girl in the chairs.

The four seated in front, their garish outfits a cruel reminder of the life they once had, exchanged frightened glances. The magician’s assistant fought against her bonds, her arms straining with panic. The showgirl’s lip quivered beneath the tape, eyes fixed on the cracked ceiling as if looking for a god who had long left this place. The roulette hostess sat unnaturally still, face frozen like a mannequin—playing the odds in her head, perhaps. The dealer's eyes were red from crying, her mind clearly broken by the ordeal.

And still, the wheel spun.

One girl had returned—just one. She was limp, half-conscious, and her eyes had changed. She wasn’t tied up again. She was carried out by guards like cargo.

Every time the heavy door creaked open, every breath in the room paused. When the footsteps echoed closer, each woman silently begged, Not me. Not now.

But the wheel did not listen.

And Vento watched it all—smiling behind his cigar smoke, savoring the game more than the money.

The wheel would keep spinning until the message was clear:

No one gambles against Vento.