Welcome to Gaia! ::

It was goddamn beautiful! The noise! The smell! The booze! Bing was so caught up in all the things he'd missed, that it didn't occur to him at all how surreal this all was. That there shouldn't be a normal casino smack dab in the middle of the zombie apocalypse. Forgotten, or intentionally repressed, those thoughts were the furthest thing from Bing's mind.

In high spirits, Bing wandered the tables and slot machines, pausing to look over the games, and slap a few patrons on the shoulder. When a well-dressed waiter type tapped him on the shoulder with a cocktail to offer, Bing immediately accepted, toasted the guy, and took a very satisfied sip. Booze. Real booze. Pungent and spicy and burning his throat. Bing could already feel himself relaxing.

"Welcome to Delta Casinos! To begin, we will play with a currency called Casino coins. You can use them later for fantastic prizes!" the waiter said, handing Bing a small case of coins.

"Hey, thanks, man." Bing replied, jovially, opened the case, and flipped one of the chips to the attendant. "For your trouble. 'Fraid I haven't got any singles on me! Not yet, anyway! Heh."

[Coins: 24]

Time passed, and Bing began to realize something was raining on his parade. The cocktail had long since been drained, and at first he mistook the dizziness for a light buzz. But it got worse. Dammit, he wasn't a lightweight, he could hold his liquor! What was going on?

Sweating now, Bing stumbled over to a free slot machine, just to sit on the stool for a bit, he told himself. Regain his equilibrium. He leaned on the machine, watching as the world swam around him.

It finally occurred to him that the drink might have been drugged. Just in time for the world to tilt dangerously, spilling him to the floor.

Lights out.

When he came to, pretty much everything hurt. Especially his ego. He realized immediately that he'd been had. When his senses finally decided to co-operate, he found he was sitting at a classroom desk. Just. What. Speakers at the front of the class boomed out at the 'students', welcoming them to the Tenth Annual Casino Games. Around him, applause sprang to life. It didn't sound like canned applause. Were there people in here with them? Bing strained against his restraints, but wasn't able to so much as turn his head and look his captors in the eye.

The voice continued, explaining a messed up set of rules they were expected to follow. Some crazy scheme involving buying people, themselves or others, from the casino. s**t. s**t. s**t. Where was Benji? Bing strained his eyes looking for the kid. He needed to get him out of here. Probably by playing by these psycho's rules.

When the voice finally asked for questions, Bing remained silent. He knew all he needed to know. One of the waiter types walked up, grabbed Bing's chair, and dragged him away.

He was propped back up in a room with two new people, ones he didn't recognize, but the voice said they were losers from the previous game. Bing wasn't really interested in being anyone's patron. He was going to have his task cut out for him just getting Benji out of here.

But that girl was a looker...

Ah, what the hell.

"The girl." Benji said, unmoved by the subsequent dragging of the young man to the next room. However, the glimpse he caught of the room when they opened the door pinged an alarm in Bing's head.

"What's in the room?" he asked the waiter.

"Are you certain you want to know?" he replied. Bing didn't like his tone.

"When I ask a question, I mean it." Bing growled, ignoring the girl's signals.

"Then we will tell you, at a price."

The girl screamed, and the scream was cut off by a loud buzzing. Bing stared at the girl's body as it thrashed, the removal of her head so clean and quick, the nerves had to catch up. As he watched, more buzz saws appeared, cutting her body down further. It was surgical, indifferent. Like a... like a slaughterhouse.

And Bing realized that was exactly what it was.

"Bloody cannibals." he muttered. Damn shame about the girl. At least it had been a quick death.

As he was led down a corridor toward a set of doors, Bing realized he was going to have to be very careful about the price of things around here. That and he wanted his chip back from that waiter-f*%#.