Author's Note: This was basically started because I wondered how the SH1 gang got along when Yuri and Alice aren't around. Which is...not much different from when they ARE around, I guess.
If you're confused about the version of rummy they're playing, they start out with 7 cards and then pick up and discard each turn--you can pick up as many as you want from the discard pile as long as you use the bottom card, but you can only discard one. The point is to get rid of all your cards by making three-of-a-kinds or straights. Hope that helps a bit...
"I choose…this card." Keith set down the King of Hearts and leaned back.
"RUMMY!"
Two hands slapped down on the suicide king split seconds from each other, but it was clear whose hand was on the bottom.
"Jesus, Mag, take your ring before you start slapping down," Halley muttered as he took the card and laid it down to build on his three-of-a-kind. His knuckle was bright red where she'd hit it.
"You don't like it, stop getting in my way," she grumbled.
Over his hand, Zhuzhen frowned before picking up a card. "So 'rummy' is for straights and three-of-a-kinds?"
Margarete nodded. "If you can put it on something already down, it's a rummy. That card was worth ten points and Keith practically gave it to him—stop putting down rummies!" she admonished the vampire sitting across from her. Now that it was her turn, she scanned her cards for any possible moves.
"I told you it is less fun playing seriously," he answered, shuffling through his massive hand. Earlier in the game Keith had picked up eleven cards merely because the bottom card finished a straight. "If you would not be so competitive you would enjoy yourself more."
"Rummy is my best game, I can't lose!"
Keith only shrugged, humming as he rearranged cards.
"You're already smoked, I've got seventy more points than you do," Halley said.
"I still say you're cheating." She groaned. "Nothing again," she muttered.
"Either prove it or stop being a sore loser."
The spy hmphed. "I don't see how your mom deals with a brat like you."
"Easy, she doesn't play cards with me. Now are you gonna discard?"
"Yeah, yeah." The eight of clubs was tossed down and Halley grinned.
"Well thanks for the present."
"Oh god!"
"And you say I'm giving him points," Keith murmured as the boy used Margarete's discard to make another three in a row.
The lights flickered and all four players looked up. By the switch stood a short figure, his brown and wrinkled hand resting on it. "What the devil are you people still doing awake?"
"Halley brought a deck of cards," Keith said. "The game is rummy; would you care to join us?"
"Is the machine ready?" Zhuzhen inquired.
"Not yet. It's near midnight though."
"Don't worry, Rog, we'll hit the sack once we hit five hundred. 'Bout another half-hour."
"Alright then."
After Roger had doddered back down the spiraling stairs, Keith made his move, finally avoiding a rummy. "So what is everyone planning to do after tomorrow, when it's all over—Master Zhuzhen, what's wrong?"
The Adept had groaned. "Margarete asked me the same question before we defeated Dehuai."
"Well, sorry, I thought it was going to be over. I'm not psychic, ask Halley."
"How should I know, anything could happen. I can only see something once it's certain to happen."
"Which is why you get to predict the weather."
"Margarete, it's your turn," Zhuzhen said, interrupting whatever response Halley had about his job as meteorologist.
She picked up a card and gave a whistle. "I've been waiting for this." With a flash she laid down three aces, discarded, and grinned at Halley. "You've lost this round," she taunted waving her one card left in his face. "You still have four cards."
"Not for long." He tossed down an ace. "Ace on your aces, six-seven-eight of diamonds, discard jack and I am out." Placing his last card on the discard pile, he waved his empty hands in her face. "Well?"
She stared at the jack and eyed all the cards on the floor. "It's not a rummy."
"I could've told you that."
"You keep this up, kiddo, and I'll make sure you don't come back down from the float tomorrow."
"Margarete!"
"What? He knows I'm joking," she told the Adept.
"But really," Keith said, as if unaware of the last two minutes, "What is everyone planning to do?"
Zhuzhen shrugged before picking up the cards for a count. "I'll go back to Shanghai—I'm sure there will be plenty for me to do. Thirty."
"Sixty-five," Margarete announced, having already counted. "That puts me at 245…"
"And I have 320."
"The cards in my hand are twenty points higher than those on the floor."
"Damn, Keith, I didn't think you could get that far in the hole. Your total's negative seventy-five. Lessee…" She bit her lip as she jotted the numbers down. "I'm going back to my job, of course. Though, I doubt anything big's gonna come up soon…you could make a good spy with some training, want to come with?" she asked the vampire with an enticing grin. "All the excitement you could want."
"I have no doubt of it, if I were working with you. Sadly, I think as of late I have been over stimulated, so I will be taking it easy."
She shrugged and turned to Halley. "Hey, offer's open to you too kiddo. Though you'd need some hair on your chest first."
The psychic snorted as he shuffled the deck. "I'm going to be in America, so forget it."
"America?" Zhuzhen's thin grey eyebrows drew together. "Why there?"
"We're gonna try looking for my dad."
For a moment everyone watched him as he dealt out the cards.
"You mean your dad's ALIVE?" Margarete exclaimed.
"Margarete, Yuri and Alice are sleeping."
"And they'll keep sleeping, you saw them. Holding hands and dreaming puppy love dreams." She turned back to Halley. "Your dad's alive?"
"Did I ever say he was dead?"
"Well, no…you never mentioned him."
"What am I supposed to say? I've never seen the guy. Everyone have seven cards? He's had plenty of chances to get himself killed though. He called himself an adventurer, but mom said against a monster he could only shoot a pistol at it or recite some pretentious poetry—she said it with a straight face, too."
Keith quirked a smile at Koudelka's description. "And they got along?"
"Enough to have me I guess." He looked down and realized while they'd been talking, everyone had made their turn. Even Margarete. "Crap, you guys distracted me! This wasn't the card I—" He stopped very suddenly, looking from Margarete's discard of the two of spades to the narrow-eyed spy herself. "Oh. Crap."
"Not the card you wanted? You've been using your ESP on me, haven't you?"
Halley raised his hand of cards, but there was no way it could have hidden the smirk on his face. "Well, yeah. Just giving you a nudge when you weren't sure which card to put down. Helps that you're duller than Yuri when it comes to magic."
"Ohohoho. You know what this means Halley?" Margarete leaned forward. "This means war." With that she picked up the deck of cards and gestured for Zhuzhen's and Keith's hands. "Sorry guys, but this is between me and Halley now."
"Thank God," Zhuzhen said, "I'm going to bed." He rose and walked downstairs, intent on joining Alice and Yuri in slumber. Keith edged closer to the action, curious.
"War is another game?"
"Uh-huh," Margarete said. "Based purely on luck, so no one can cheat." She cut deck and gave Halley half the cards. "Now. One last round, winner take all."
"Take all what?"
"…Shut up and play."