The Last Casino

by WeirdBeard

Chapter 5- The Bedroom

The Last Casino
by WeirdBeard
Guru rocks!
Chapter 5- The Bedroom

"So then I slapped that dumb griffin!"

"Oh no you didn't, gurl! Mmmhmm! Gimme sugah babeh, what'd that clown do next?"

"Well! I kicked him right out of the room! Ain't nobody got time for-"

Thus continued another pointless dialogue between the two secretaries of Gemstone. It sadly would have continued on for several hours, too. Typical for these lady diamond dogs. Thankfully, the dull-witted conversation was interrupted by something kicking in the door. The framework shattered from the force of the intrusion and both secretaries shrieked.

When the dust finally cleared up, a familiar gray stallion stood in the doorway. "You two. Get Rarity. Now," Jackpot ordered with simple commands that couldn't be misunderstood. The two diamond dogs quickly rose to their paws and scampered through a pristine and elegantly decorated door.

The earth pony trotted further in, leading the perplexed pair of Fang and Vinyl Scratch. Unlike most busy nights for Rarity's establishment, the waiting room was completely free other than the trio. Fang arched a scaly brow and stared at Jackpot. "Don't ya think that was a bit over the top?"

Receiving no response from his friend, the cobalt-scaled dragon shook his head and sat upon the room's sole couch. Vinyl glanced steadily about the room, surveying its every detail.

Just like the true element bearer of generosity (who still baffled Jackpot on possessing that trait), the lobby was ornately decorated with extravagantly designed furniture. The couch that Fang sat upon was a deep burgundy in color, gold trim outlining the armrests and legs. An exquisite chandelier hung taunt from the ceiling, sparkling gems dotting every facet of the artificial beauty. Jackpot suspected the larger diamonds were fake, but he buried that thought away as an other white unicorn entered the room.

"Ugh, I should have known that it was you ruffians. How dare you hassle my secretaries! Are you here to rob me, too?" Rarity accused. The alabaster white pony daintily trotted towards the trio. An all too familiar aura of judgement seemed to radiate from her sapphire blue eyes. Her gaze drifted and fixed onto Vinyl. "And who, pray tell, is this garish mare?"

Vinyl opened her mouth to retort, but Jackpot quickly cut her off. "Can it, Rare, we're not here on official business. We just need two rooms, that's it," the gray buck stated evenly. Traces of anger still laced his voice, but he fought to keep his cool in front of the selfish unicorn.

"Ooo, one for the lizard and one for the two lovers, how risque," Rarity cooed. While her comment fueled the fire building in Jackpot, it was Fang who sprang to his feet. The hot-headed dragon, in nearly a hair's-breadth of a second, was immediately mere inches away from his offender. Rarity flinched for a moment, but steeled her nerves and pressed on. "Did I push your buttons, darling?"

Fang snorted harshly, blue trails of flame emitting from his nostrils. He breathed deeply and snarled, "You had better hope that Ruby is here."

Any questions that Vinyl would have had were put on hold as she watched in confused silence. Rarity simply smirked and replied, "Your 'booty call?' Rather forward tonight, Prince Charming." The fashionista breathed in deeply and turned her head to yell back down the hallway. "Wench number 19! Your knight in shining armor is here!"

"Fang's here?!" an excited voice answered back. A heart beat later, a lithe and petite diamond dog emerged from one of the bedrooms. Her reddish-brown fur bristled as her green eyes caught sight of Fang. "Scaly!" she called out merrily, bounding forth toward the dragon. Her quickened movement soon brought her to leap upon Fang, latching onto his neck. The dragon maintained his offensive stance aimed at Rarity while the lady diamond dog climbed atop his back. "C'mon, Scaly, let Momma take care of you."

Fang glanced up at Ruby and, finally, relaxed his tensed position. He nodded curtly back at Jackpot before stomping around Rarity and entering the hallway. Without another word, the pair disappeared into a separate room and slammed the door shut.

"And then they were three," Rarity purred, glancing at Jackpot and Vinyl. The day's events had left the pair looking quite disheveled and worse for wear. Just as soon as her eyes had flickered with a 'come hither' aura though, her demeanor suddenly devolved into disgust at her guests' appearance. "On second thought, I'll leave you two be."

Jackpot snorted. "Which room's open right now?" he inquired, pawing a hoof at the floor. The fluffy carpet muffled any sound his action would have made, but irked the fashion pony as a smudge of grime was streaked upon the white shag.

"Ugh, just pick any! Wash yourselves up and don't bother me," Rarity commanded, trotting away with a huff and upturned head. Before she disappeared into a set of double doors, she looked back at the duo from the corner of her eye. "One last note though to your little marefriend. Oh, how do I put this lightly? She looks like what would happen if one of Dash's griffins had a love child with a pile of garbage. Bonne nuit."

Vinyl visibly fumed at the insult, shouting out "You filthy-!" Her rebuttal would fall short though as the owner of Gemstone slammed her doors shut. "-cow."

"C'mon, we need to get some rest," Jackpot muttered, trudging slowly towards an open room. His unicorn counterpart hesitated, but eventually followed him inside.

The room itself was similar to the lobby, posh and overly decorated. An enormous bed was set in the center of the room, ridiculously shaped like a giant heart. Red silk sheets covered its' plush looking mattress which was topped with several white pillows. In addition, a sickeningly pink basket of assorted goods lay at the foot of the bed. The only lighting within the room seemed to be a multitude of candles lining the wall, giving a suggestive but glaringly obvious ambiance to the establishment. Frankly, it disgusted Jackpot.

"Jack," Vinyl started, but paused when he didn't look back towards her. "I'm sorry about what happened at that lab-"

The gray stallion hastily interrupted her, his tone underlining with irritation. "Sorry what happened? That we were shoved into that stupid machine or do you regret that you saw part of my past? Think I'm some weak and pathetic foal?" Jackpot interrogated. He sat down upon the mattress, undoing his tattered tie and vest.

"No! I just-" she quickly responded, but stopped to gather her thoughts. "Look. Maybe I did label you as a hardass when we met and treated you like manure. I was on edge, I'm sorry."

Jackpot narrowed his eyes at the mare, who shifted uneasily on her hooves from his glare. "What does it matter now? You're just here on Celestia's wishes, a little watchdog to keep an eye on me. You don't care about me, you just care about yourself," Jackpot accused. He finally loosened his vestiges and threw them onto the floor, upon which he also set all hooves down to approach Vinyl. "Why are you still here? What's the point?!"

"I just! I... okay," she whispered in frustration. "I want to start over. I haven't been fair to you and I want to apologize."

"What the hell do you want to me to sa-?" Jackpot began to question, but was silenced as Vinyl softly put a hoof over his mouth.

"Just shut up and pay attention," the begrimed white mare quietly commanded, lowering her horn to Jackpot's head. She closed her eyes as the bright aura of her magic soon overcast the room in complete white.

---

When Jackpot's sight readjusted, he found himself in a dark living room of somepony's home. All of the furniture was overturned, however, and sizable dents were punched into the walls. The gray stallion trotted forward in the dimly light area, but felt his hoof brush against something on the floor. Upon lowering his head, he could vaguely make out the shapes of a syringe and some sort of drug paraphernalia.

As he puzzled over the items and the situation as a whole, Jackpot heard a faint sniffling down the hallway. He jerked his head up quickly and listened intently to find exactly where the source was. The sniffling seemed to stop for a moment, possibly having heard Jackpot in the other room. The buck raised a hoof to move forward, but stopped immediately when a much larger being trotted beside him.

Jackpot's eyes traced the form upwards from its' hooves until he recognized the telltale flowing mane. Celestia herself was standing next to him, but didn't seem to even notice him. Frighteningly, she almost glided through Jackpot and towards the end of the hallway. It was then that the stallion realized that Vinyl was showing him a memory. More specifically, her memory.

Celestia continued on, Jackpot trotting carefully behind. She suddenly stopped though, causing the gray buck to nearly trip over himself. He peered around her wings and mane, noticing a small huddled mass of white and blue near the last bedroom's doorway. His continued staring adjusted to see that the bundle was indeed a tiny filly.

"Little one," the Princess of the Sun whispered. The almost inaudible call still startled the young foal, yelping in fear at the sudden realization of the imposing alicorn. Celestia smiled faintly though and cooed, "It's okay. I'm not here to hurt you. Are your parents here?"

The little filly didn't answer, but her eyes darted to the inside of the room that she sat beside. The Princess followed her gaze inside, Jackpot doing likewise. The bedroom was similarly distraught, but two sets of hooves could be seen behind the flipped bed. "I see," Celestia whispered. She silently leaned down and pressed her muzzle to the foal. "I'm sorry, little one."

Her apology seemed to dishearten the small filly as tiny hooves were wrapped around Celestia's face. The foal sobbed loudly, tears running freely from her eyes.

As Jackpot observed the emotional scene, he felt himself being somehow tugged away from the memory. The scene soon faded away from his vision and was quickly replaced with the previous room from earlier. Vinyl was inches away from his face, eyes still shut tightly.

Before he could utter a reply, the mare closed the distance and wrapped her hooves around his neck. He felt her tighten a bit as she shuddered heavily. He wasn't quite sure what to say, so he remained silent while Vinyl held onto him. Finally, the bitter stallion relaxed and felt genuine sympathy for her. She wasn't some typical high-society brat. She had gone through the same pain he had as a young colt.

"Guess we aren't that different after all," Vinyl sadly muttered. Her white hooves still clutched Jackpot's body, and he soon found himself returning the embrace.

"I'm sorry," the buck whispered. He nuzzled her cheek softly and gently led her towards the bed. "Let's get some sleep, okay?"

Vinyl hesitated, but slowly released her grip from Jackpot. "Yeah, that sounds good to me," she replied. Her rear hoof, however, brushed up against the basket that had been sitting near the bed and accidentally spilled its' contents. "Ugh, what idiot put this garbage here?"

"Must be some pathetic type of welcoming gift for gues-" Jackpot began to respond, but paused in mid-sentence when he looked closer at the basket. The hideous thing was coated with all things pink, a sure sign of one other faux element bearer: Pinkie Pie. However, that wasn't the only thing that had caught Jackpot's attention.

Vinyl noticed his stunned expression. "What? What is it?" she quickly inquired.

Before he could reply, a high-pitched howl screamed from the hallway. The gray stallion immediately bounded out of the room, kicking open the door. In his haste, he kicked up one of the pink bottles from the basket, but Vinyl hurriedly caught it with her magic. She turned it over in inspection and realized what had silenced Jackpot. This particular potion contained something very fatal for the stallion's assistant: dragons-bane.

The mare quickly followed after Jackpot, who had already kicked open the door of Fang and Ruby's room. The diamond dog was in hysterics, screaming over the now convulsing dragon. Jackpot was kneeling by on the floor by his assistant's side, shouting questions at Ruby. "What happened?!"

"I- I- I dunno! H-he ate that whole basket just to show me he could, but he was fine at first!" the diamond dog wailed.

Jackpot began pushing against his friend's chest, trying desperately to help the dragon expel the poison. However, Fang was already foaming at the foam, eyes rolling in his sockets. "How long ago did he eat it?"

Ruby bit her paw, her nerves becoming more and more frazzled. "M-maybe twenty minutes ago."

"Sonuva, FANG! C'mon, buddy, you gotta get that out of you right now!" Jackpot yelled, continuing the chest compression on the dragon. He pounded his hooves against Fang desperately, trying everything to help save him. Sadly, it wasn't enough and it was too little, too late. "FANG!"

Vinyl and Ruby stood by, unable and unsure of what to do. The dragon's breathing was shortening and becoming more rapid, until he gave one last, long exhale. Jackpot stopped his pounding and now fully realized of just what was unfolding.

His aide over the past years, his fellow combatant when things got dicey, his source of sanity in the hellish city, his friend through it all, was now gone. As if the city itself was celebrating, a roar of thunder pealed from outside as the weather fully broke into the brewing storm. Fang was dead.

Author's Note:

Couldn't sleep at all last night because I felt bad that I left this story hanging while I still have an ending in mind. WE SHALL PRESS ON! YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!

And yes, cheesy story is cheesy.

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[SethTheWizard]

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