Author Games: Ace of Spades

Quarterfinals: Valentina 'Val" Daley

Everything was bleeding out. Color was slowly slipping from the walls, energy leeching from the air, light dissipating into nothing, tiredness saturating the air. Val felt none of the tiredness she expected. Instead, something akin to insomnia gripped her.

For once, the room was silent, almost peaceful. The Aces were out of sight for now, and the others were silent, some sleeping, and some simply sitting in silence. Val longed to join them, but something kept her moving. Restlessness scratched beneath the surface of her skin, and she stood. No one was looking at her, and she walked around the room, rubbing her arms for non-existent warmth. As she did, she saw a previously unnoticed door, covered in shadows. Val edged towards it, eyes darting around at the others. No one noticed as she wrapped a hand around the door knob and turned it.

It was unlocked.

For the first time since she had set foot in Milena Seble, Val felt her heart pound with something besides fear or nerves. She swallowed, and then pushed the door open. Lights flicked on as soon as she stepped forward, and she blinked at the sudden brightness. When she opened them, she saw a small room, chairs and a small table filling the space. Along one wall was a cream colored curtain, the only ornament in the entire room. Maybe it was her imagination, but Val thought she could see light hiding behind the curtain, straining weakly against the fabric to be seen. In a few steps, she had crossed the room and pushed the stiff fabric away.

A single window revealed a rain splattered view of a road and car. Rain coated the air with a fine sheet, making the green car seem ever so slightly out of focus, like a mirage. Bright headlights were like beacons in the night, and Val pressed her fingertips against the window. It was cold, and her breath made a soft fog on the glass. A fierce sense of longing filled her chest as she watched the car drive off. The sight was mundane, so regular that her eyes would have passed over it without seeing it before. But now, as she stared at the car, a look of longing glazed over her eyes, the brown turning murky.

Then she blinked, and her eyes cleared. She turned back to the table, taking in the briefcase lying in the middle. A pile of dollar bills lay scattered across it, so numerous that Val's eyes bulged slightly in her head. Beside the briefcase was picture frame, filled with faces that were newly familiar. And atop the briefcase, a sticky note. Val stared at it for a long moment. A silent war raged inside of her, and then she picked it up.

Would you rather leave this casino as the sole survivor but with the money you desperately need, or leave the casino with all the remaining players alive but as poor as you were when you came in?

Val reread the words, their meaning sinking in, layer by layer, word by word. She wet her lips and the paper crinkled in her hand. She could leave. She could leave and take the money. But at the cost of eight other lives. Her eyes flicked back to the frame, and she picked it up. Eight faces besides her own. Beneath each, a name. Adam Burke. Ren Cayse. Addilyn Devella. The names went on, and with each one she read, another weight crashed upon her shoulders.

She could do the "wrong" thing. Take the money, go home and pay her debts. Pay for Xander's rehab, and not have the cloud of shame that was a drug addict brother floating above her head. Or, she could do the "right" thing. Leave the money, go to a shitty home and shadow of the brother she'd loved. And eight other people could go home too.

She should choose to leave the money.

It would be the right choice, the one a good person would make. But she wasn't really a good person, was she? A good person wouldn't have come to the casino. A good person wouldn't have killed a defenseless old woman. A good person wouldn't hate their own brother. Self-loathing crashed over Val, suffocating her in thick, heavy smog. She pushed it away with a hard shove, gritting her teeth. Her hand hovered between the photo and the bills.