//------------------------------// // Chapter 3 - Poker Face // Story: A New Year's Toast of Tea // by Witching Hour //------------------------------// Strangely enough, Witch had enjoyed her evening so far. Doctor Hale Root had been very nice to talk with, as her field primarily focused on horticulture. They’d spent at least an hour over the late dinner speaking about plants and their uses, along with varying misadventures in said uses, primarily provided by accounts from Witch’s brother. She’d managed to avoid any extended conversation with Quark, and even successfully dodged Azure. Privately, Witch thought that she might even like Azure. Among her family, the blue pegasus seemed less… Troll-ish. However, Witch considers the probability of her speaking to Azure Star without the rest of her squad crashing the conversation as near to zero as probability could go. Witch had already met Shadow Star, the youngest of the Star family, from supervising the Cutie Mark Crusader meetings Trick Step hosted each week. Shadow’s older brother, Warden, had firmly declared his intent to not go into the military, despite the strong family tradition of such, and had already written some short stories that seemed charming on the quick perusal she’d been able to give them before Bronze had hauled her away to teach her how to play Badlands Hold ‘Em… Which is where Witch now finds herself, staring at the two cards in her magic and the circle of unmarried ponies around her table. Not far away, the married couples were playing at their own table, the accusations of bluffing almost drowned out by the abstaining spouses’ complaints of their partner’s penchant for a ridiculous game. “Doctor Hour? It’s your bet,” Shadow Star says, peering up at Witch from under a visor of transparent green plastic. “Oh… Um…” Witch glances hastily at her cards then levitates a few chips into the pile. “Raise twenty.” “Hey, cousin! Did you wear that thing to make Cousin Bronzy feel more at home, or did you lose a bet with Warden?” Quark snorts as he tosses in a couple of chips. “Call, by the way.” “Q, I’ll have you know that this is a visor that is traditionally worn by dealers in the casinos,” Shadow says stiffly with a disdainful sniff. “I simply thought it was appropriate since I always have to deal… The bet was over which table we’d deal for. I leave it to you to decide if I won or lost that bet.” “So you aren’t giving silent approval of my idea to start a chain of casinos referencing our House Name?” Quark grins almost ferally. “I’m almost hurt…” “But bro, there’s already a casino called ‘Shiro’s Palace’...” Cherry Bomb interjects, tossing her cards face down on the table. “Folding.” Quark turns to stare at his sister blankly before addressing the rest of the table. “Well crap… That’s four months down the toilet with a class action lawsuit for the franchise that I’ll need to wheedle out for, but at least the time building the first location makes up for it…” “I’m sure you know a guy who can make it happen,” Witch comments dryly. “He technically is a guy who can make it happen,” Bronze smirks lightly before tossing in his chips. “Problem is he’s too lazy to do something that tedious himself. I raise thirty, in case that wasn’t clear.” “Ballsy, Cous,” Azure smirks. “Let’s see how much this is worth to you. I’ll call fifty.” “Sure,” Witch agrees, tossing in the required additional chips. “Call.” “Calling, of course,” Quark smirks as he picks up two chips with his eyebrows and tosses them neatly into the pot with a well-practiced mane-flip. “You really don’t care if you lose, do you, bro?” Cherry asks. “You realize I still haven’t spent all the money I won off of you at Hearth’s Warming, right? And that was with me immediately going out and buying new art supplies…” “It’s only been two weeks, dear sister mine,” Quark responds, waving a hoof dismissively at her. “I’m sure you’ll find some wall that needs more graffiti.” “Preferably not in the palace this time though,” Azure amends, a slight frown creasing her brow as she levels her gaze at her younger cousin. “But Princess Celestia loved the new mural in her bathroom!” Cherry protests. “To be fair, the Princess seems to love anything that breaks up the monotony of Royal Life,” Bronze chuckles before nodding to Shadow. “Whenever you’re ready, Dealer.” Shadow simply shakes her head and burns a card before dealing the turn card, and a king of spades joins the jack, three and six of hearts on the table. “Doctor Hour?” “Thirty,” Witch says, levitating the three chips into the now fairly large pile of ten-bit markers. “Trying to get rid of me, dear Doctor?” Quark laughs. “You’ll find it quite difficult to do so. I call!” “If I wanted to get rid of you, I’d offer what I always offer to Commander Lightning Streak,” Witch retorts, dryly enigmatic. “And what would that be?” Quark asks, waggling his eyebrows at her. “That if he doesn’t want to see a hoof stuck up a rectum on their own x-rays, he should quit now,” Witch answers, making Quark wince and lean conspicuously away from the doctor. “Well, I always thought Commander Lightning Streak’s hoof entered through the other end when he spoke…” Bronze tosses thirty in chips onto the table before tossing an additional thirty. “I raise thirty.” “I believe she meant someone else’s hoof up his plot, cous,” Azure corrects with a small chortle and tossing in two twenty-five chips and a ten beside them. “I’ll call,” she adds blandly. Witch considers the four cards on the table and the two levitating before her for a long moment, the table banter fading in her hearing as she considers her options. She didn’t really have anything, and no real chance of getting anything with the next card either. She’d started high on the flop betting because with a three and a six on the table, she’d at least had a glimmer of a hope for a straight, but with her two and seven, and now a king on the board, that had vanished. Some thought niggled at her though, that maybe she could bluff them all. “I’ll see that, and raise forty,” Witch says, with some confidence she didn’t actually feel. Cherry lets out a low whistle. “Whoa there, Doc… It’s only the first round of the night! Don’t wanna go broke early!” “Can someone answer the door?” Quark asks the table with a grin. “Because I’ve come a’calling!” “Quark, that pun was terrible,” Bronze tosses in forty more. “I’ll call that.” “That should be punishable by law, shouldn’t it, Bronzy?” Quark leans back in his chair, pulling out a giant pretzel rod and pretending to light the end of it like a cigar. Azure rolls her eyes and hurls a small blueberry muffin that she’d had… somewhere… at Quark’s head, causing the chair to dump the stallion out the back of it. “Just wait, Quacky. You and I are up next on Grandmother’s training schedule.” Then she tosses in forty to the pot. “Call. Deal the river, dearest niece.” “I’m your only niece, Aunt Azzy,” Shadow retorts, her tone one of resigned patience, as she burns the top card and deals the last card, the ten of spades. “That doesn’t make it less true, Shady,” Azure quips back. “Well… In for a bit, in for a bale…” Witch thinks with a quick glance at her cards. “One hundred,” she announces, tossing in four of the twenty-five bit chips. “Oh sweet Luna’s Blue Moon!” Quark exclaims as he tosses in a hundred. “Those have to be some cards!” “Yes, they sure are…” Bronze muses quietly with a knowing grin. “I call.” “I’ll give your regards to the ferry pony on the River Styx, Doc,” Azure says, tossing her cards on the table. “Fold.” “All right you lot, show your cards,” Shadow says with another heavy sigh of resignation. “Dos tres!” Quark grins as he slams down a three of spades and a five of clubs. Cherry sighs heavily herself as she puts her face in her hooves. “Of course he throws away two hundred and seventy bits on a pair of threes…” “Two pair, jacks over sixes,” Bronze lays down a six of clubs and a jack of spades. “And you, dear Doctor? What was it you were bluffing with?” Witch sighs heavily, letting her two and seven drop to the table as she glances over at the couples’ table because Ruby Star starts shouting at Gold Star again. “A whole lot of nothing…” she replies, shrugging. The profound silence at her own table finally draws her attention back to the circle of ponies that were staring at her. “What?” she asks, confused. “You truly thought you were bluffing the whole time?” Bronze asks in a dumbfounded stupor. “Um... Yes?” Witch responds hesitantly, causing Quark to begin a howl of laughter that trails off into wheezes as not enough air reaches his lungs while he writhes on the floor in hysterics. Shadow simply puts her head to the table with a resounding thump, thoroughly dislodging her dealer’s visor, followed closely by Cherry doing the same. “Doc… Look at the suits,” Cherry groans, her voice muffled by the felt table top and her arms. Witch blinks a couple times, realizing finally that she’d had five heart cards since the flop. “Oh!” she exclaims, surprised. “I thought they had to be consecutive cards for a flush!” “That’s called a straight flush and it’d beat a plain flush,” Shadow explains, again sounding like a patiently suffering pony explaining something for the hundredth time. “Better watch out for this one… She'll bluff you out of your uniform, cousin,” Azure grins knowingly at Bronze Star, to which the stallion responds by scratching beneath his chin with a subtly extended middle feather. “… He wishes…” Quark wheezes as he struggles to pull himself into his chair before falling back to the floor, laughing again. “I'm sure he'll be relieved to know that I have no interest whatsoever in his uniform,” Witch responds, straightening in her chair with an air of primness as her magic neatly piles her newly acquired chips in front of her. “That’s not what they-” Cherry starts but then sighs heavily, putting her head back in her arms on the table. “Never mind…”