For the Balance of a Heart: A Poker Boy Story Read online

  From what I understood, hot chocolate not only was a wonderful drug to the Silicon Suckers, but it was a critical element in their health and ability to reproduce. And clearly they had been doing a great deal of reproducing in the year we had been giving them a number of thermoses of hot chocolate every month in payment.

  After almost thirty minutes of walking behind my guides, I was shown into a large room I knew to be the Great One’s throne room. Only it was as empty as every other room and tunnel I had seen in this place.

  I was told to wait and my guides left me standing alone.

  Then from one side of the room, a tall and clearly elderly Silicon Sucker appeared and walked slowly toward me. I knew, without a doubt, even though most of the Silicon Suckers looked identical to me, that I was facing their great leader.

  I bowed very deeply.

  “It is a great honor that you have blessed us once again with your presence, my friend,” the Great One said.

  “The honor is mine,” I said, carefully respecting their tradition. “May I offer the people of this fantastic castle a gift?”

  The Great One nodded slightly and I pulled the thermos of hot chocolate from my coat and sat it on the ground in front of me.

  Two others came from a side tunnel and carefully picked up the thermos and carried it away.

  After they had left, the great one indicated that I should sit and he did the same, facing me.

  Then he nodded, a sign I had permission to speak.

  “Great One,” I said, bowing slightly as was the custom when someone spoke in front of the Great One, “I am honored by your gracious gift of time to listen to me. I have a very serious problem that only you and your wisdom can help me solve.”

  The Great One just nodded, signaling I could continue.

  “Helen, the daughter of Laverne and Benny, two of our greatest leaders, has vanished.”

  The Great One leaned forward, clearly reacting in some way to my news.

  “Helen is such a wonderful child,” the Great One said. “Full of spirit, yet very respectful, as are her parents.”

  I actually was so stunned he knew Helen, I got off my planned script and for a moment sat there not moving.

  “Has she gone into the ancient city?” the Great One asked.

  “We think she has, oh Great One,” I said, bowing again. “And I am afraid we do not know where the exit is.”

  The Great One said nothing, so I continued on.

  “We would be willing to offer four more containers of the sacred liquid per moon cycle for ten sun cycles if you knew where the exit is from the ancient city and would allow my team to enter the city from our entrance, find her, and bring her back to her parents.”

  “As I would expect of you, your willingness to risk yourself is admirable.”

  I bowed slightly in acknowledgement of the compliment. However, a sentence like that usually was followed by the word, “But…”

  “We will create a special and separate tunnel from the exit of the ancient city to the surface and allow you to use it for ten sun cycles. But for such work and use, we will require six containers per moon cycle.”

  I sat dead still for a few seconds. I was expected to negotiate. It was a custom.

  “Great One,” I finally said, “your kind offer is very generous. If I am allowed to make a counter proposal?”

  He nodded, so I went on.

  “We can only bring five more than we are doing now per moon cycle for the first year. But then, after that, we can add one more per sun cycle for the ten years of the use of the tunnel you are so graciously willing to build.”

  I was making sure that he understood that we valued our thermoses of hot chocolate as much as he did, even though we did not. And yet I was giving him a chance to continue to let his people grow and multiply.

  He nodded slightly. “Your proposal is very fair. We have an agreement. You can enter the ancient city from above at any time. It will take us only a very short amount of time to open the new tunnel from the ancient city exit to the surface.”

  “The first payment will be at your entrance tomorrow at sunrise and then with the other regular payment every moon cycle.”

  “It is always an honor,” the Great One said to me, bowing slightly.

  “The honor is always mine,” I said, bowing as deeply as I could while sitting down.

  He stood and without another word left the room.

  I waited until he was gone before standing. My legs screamed at me for sitting cross-legged on the dirt floor, but I had had no option.

  Two guides appeared a moment later and after thirty minutes of sweating in my black leather coat, we had climbed back to the surface.

  I grabbed my shoes and an instant later was in the cool air of my new office floating over Las Vegas.

  “Well done,” Laverne said, looking like she wanted to hug me.

  Benny just smiled and nodded.

  “We’re not done yet,” I said as Patty handed me a large glass of water and I took off my black coat. “We still have to find Helen and get her out of that city.”

  “At least there’s a way out now,” Laverne said. “Thanks to you and your fantastic thinking. Not sure why someone hadn’t thought of that before now.”

  With that she and Benny vanished and I slumped into the booth to tell the rest of my team what had just happened.

  After I was done, Patty gave me a little kiss on the cheek and then squeezed my hand.

  “So we’re going in,” Screamer said, nodding.

  I nodded and turned to Stan. “Is there a map of the ancient city?”

  “I’ll find out,” he said, and vanished.

  “I thought you had the exit cleared with the Silicon Suckers,” Screamer said.

  “I do,” I said, “But that ancient city is as large as the entire city of Las Vegas. We first have to find Helen. After that, I honestly have no idea where exactly that one door out is.”

  “Oh,” Screamer said, looking shocked again.

  I felt the same way.

  Chapter Six

  Laverne found a very old map of a city that seemed to be not only the size of Las Vegas, but a hundred times larger. In fact, from what I could tell from the old map, at one time the ancient city filled the entire valley.

  Stan held that map and the rest of us carried supplies. In packs we had enough food and water to last us a month if we rationed.

  We were standing on a side street off of Freemont looking like we were heading into the wilderness for two weeks instead of through a simple door I had never noticed before.

  We waited until there was no one on the sidewalk around us, then Stan pulled the door open and held it for us to step through.

  I glanced around once more at the city I loved, hoping I would see it again, then holding Patty’s hand, I stepped through and into what looked like a long, simple hallway.

  Screamer followed, then Stan who pulled the door closed, plunging us into complete blackness.

  Patty was the only one who was thinking and had a flashlight in her hand. She snapped it on and pointed it ahead down the hallway that now looked a great deal like a tunnel.

  Now I knew where the ancient city got its nickname of “tunnels.”

  My stomach was in a tight knot and I could barely breath the stale, dust-smelling air. Only Patty’s superpower ability to keep me calm allowed me to move forward. Otherwise I was sure I would have turned and fled for the door and the street beyond.

  “Feel that?” Screamer asked.

  “Sense of dread spell,” Stan said, nodding.

  A moment later it was gone as was my need to panic and run. Now all I felt was just plain old fear.

  “Thank you,” I said.

  “Yes,” Patty said. “I was barely holding on against it.”

  “You were doing fine,” I said, squeezing her hand as I led us down the hallway and around a corner.

  There the beam of her flashlight found another door made of old wood. It had a metal pu
ll handle with strange inscriptions on the metal and the plate under the handle.

  “Here we go,” Stan said.

  I nodded and pulled the door open, sending waves of dust swirling around us in the hallway.

  It was now or never.

  I stepped through the doorway and into the ancient city.

  And stopped cold at what I saw spread out in front of me.

  “How can that be?” Patty asked breathlessly beside me.

  “Oh, oh,” Stan said.

  “You have got to be kidding?” Screamer said.

  And then, behind us, I heard the door close with a loud thump that sent a chill down my spine.

  We were standing on a high balcony with an iron railing protecting us from a very, very long fall. From the looks of it more than thirty or forty stories.

  The ancient city was spread out below us. But it wasn’t ancient and it certainly wasn’t underground and it certainly wasn’t empty.

  In fact, snow was falling gently on the massive city and I could feel the faint wind and the not-so-faint sounds of a busy city very much alive below us.

  We were no longer under Las Vegas.

  Or if we were, this was the strangest illusion I had ever seen or felt.

  Because we had stepped from a warm afternoon in Las Vegas to a cold, snowy night in a very strange city.

  Chapter Seven

  As I stared out over the fantastic city, suddenly I wished I had listened a little more carefully when Stan explained to me how my new office was out of time and space a half turn. Because I had a hunch this city was the same.

  And if we went down into those streets, I was pretty certain we would meet some real Titans. Or at least the descendents of the real Titans from legend.

  I really wished I had studied history and legends more back when I was in school. I just never expected to need it like this.

  The city stretching into the light snow looked like a fantastic alien science fiction city you might see in the movies with towering beautiful buildings and walkways crisscrossing from building to building mixed up with an ancient Eastern city with arches and columns and narrow, stone roads.

  A huge boulevard wider than The Strip in Vegas wound its way through the city and as far as I could see, lined by sleek glowing buildings that seemed to vanish up into the snow. Futuristic cars that looked like they were polished metal without windows seamlessly flowed up and down the boulevard only on the wrong side of the road as far as I was concerned, like they did in England.

  There were a few pedestrians out along the roads, but we were so high in the air I couldn’t get any idea of what they looked like.

  The snow was thin and the lights from the bustling city made it all seem sort of like I was staring over a fairy tale city inside a snow globe.

  For all I knew, I was. I was starting to learn that anything was possible when it came to my world. So maybe we were in a huge snow globe that was the prison to the Titans.

  I tried to clear that thought out of my head without much success.

  I turned and looked at the door we had come in.

  It had vanished. Just a blank, gray cement wall filled the area behind us. No going back that way.

  I knew that would be the case, but now being faced with it scared me more than I wanted to admit.

  And I had a hunch that finding the exit from this huge city wasn’t going to be easy.

  We had all stood there on that high balcony in silence for a good minute before I squeezed Patty’s hand and turned to Stan. “Got any idea how we might find Helen in this place?”

  “I know exactly where she’s at,” he said, shaking his head and coming back to our situation.

  “That’s good,” Screamer asked. “But anyone besides Poker Boy here think to bring a coat?”

  For the first time I noticed just how cold it was. Even my black leather coat didn’t cut the chill.

  An instant later all of us were wearing heavy parkas of varying colors. Patty’s was a stylish pink, mine was plain and black like my leather jacket under it, so it matched my fedora-like black hat. Screamer’s coat was green with deep pockets that he instantly stuck his hands into. Stan had put himself in a blue parka with a hood and gloves.

  I was glad he hadn’t given me and Patty gloves. I got a lot of strength from her touch.

  “That help?” Stan asked, smiling.

  “Thanks,” Patty said.

  “So how do you know where Helen is at here?” I asked Stan.

  “We have a connection when we are close in distance,” Stan said. “I’ve kind of ignored it for years, but it’s still there.”

  “A connection?” Patty asked.

  Stan nodded, turning to stare out over the beautiful and very alien city around us. “We were married once.”

  I just stared at my boss like he had become an alien.

  Stan had been married to Lady Luck’s daughter. That must have been some divorce.

  “Can you jump us to her?” Patty asked, since I hadn’t said anything.

  He nodded and a moment later we were standing in the snow in what looked like a garden surrounded by stone walls. A brown stone patio filled the center of the garden and in the background was a singly-story home with warm orange lights coming from the windows.

  The most stunning, redheaded woman I had ever seen was smiling at us.

  She wore a white dress that looked more like a thin nightgown. It sort of drifted around her frame and blew in the wind. She had to be cold since I was pretty certain I was seeing through most of that dress or nightgown or whatever it was.

  She moved barefooted in the snow across the stone of the patio toward us, her bright red hair blowing in the wind.

  All of us stood frozen as she approached and kissed Stan in such a way that most of the snow in the garden area must have melted.

  Then she broke the kiss and said, “Wonderful to see you again, my husband.”

  “Ex-husband,” Stan said.

  She ignored him and extended her hand to me. “I’m Helen. You must be Poker Boy.”

  I’m not sure if it was the thin blowing white dress around the naked body in the snow, or her radiant smile, but something caused me to pause before extending my hand as well. “Nice to meet you.”

  Then Helen turned to Patty. “The famous Patty Ledgerwood I presume.”

  “An honor,” Patty said, shaking Helen’s hand.

  Then Helen turned to Screamer and nodded and said nothing.

  “Nice seeing you again as well, Sheila,” Screamer said, smiling.

  I managed to take my eyes off of Helen long enough to look at Screamer with a puzzled look. Clearly he had met her before, only she had called herself Sheila to him.

  Wow, did I have a lot of questions when we got out of here.

  The woman in the thin, white blowing dress seemed like no Sheila I had ever met.

  Screamer just kept his eyes on Helen, and she shrugged and smiled at him.

  The next moment we all were inside in a warm living room with a crackling fire in a huge stone fireplace. Helen now had on regular jeans and a flannel shirt and her hair was pulled back. It didn’t decrease her beauty in any respect. But it sure made her seem far more human.

  Outside in the snow, she had been a goddess. Now she seemed almost normal, if that was possible.

  I pretty much doubted it.

  The room around us reminded me of a mountain lodge, with warm-brown logs as walls and high ceilings with log rafters. Tan overstuffed couches and chairs surrounded the fireplace and a couple of scarred coffee tables filled the center area.

  The air had a faint smoke smell from the burning logs and every-so-often the fire would pop or crackle.

  Thick, dark-brown carpet covered all of the floor except a stone area in front of the fireplace. The carpet added to the feeling of warmth in the room.

  I could spend a lot of time in a place like this, especially if it was snowing outside.

  “Nice entrance,” Stan said to her as he p
ulled off his parka and dropped down onto a couch.

  “You know I always play the part, dear husband,” Helen said, laughing. “Thought I was going to freeze off a part or two for a moment there.”

  “Ex-husband,” Stan said more to himself.

  “It was a show all right,” Screamer said, taking off his parka as well.

  “I thought it impressive,” Patty said as we both took off our coats and sat on a couch facing Stan.

  “Thank you,” Helen said, nodding to Patty.

  Screamer moved to a chair near the fireplace and Helen sat alone in a large, overstuffed chair facing all of us.

  “So did you find what you came for?” Stan asked Helen, his voice clearly telling me he wasn’t into any idle chatting, even though I had about a thousand questions I would have loved to have answered at that moment.

  Helen smiled and her eyes lit up like a child’s eyes with a new toy. “And what do you think I came for?”

  “One of the keys of Janus,” Stan said.

  She laughed, a perfect laugh that might draw someone from across a room. “I did. I had researched it well and knew exactly where it was hidden. I found it within twenty minutes of arriving here.”

  “And how did you plan on getting back with it?” Screamer asked, also clearly not interested in just having a social visit.

  She turned to me, then glanced at Stan. “I knew Mother and Dad would send a rescue party. And I knew it would be you and Poker Boy and his team. And I knew Poker Boy knew the Silicon Suckers and would bargain with them to open the exit, since I am pretty sure the exit has to go into their territory.”

  She turned to me. “You did that, didn’t you?”

  “I did,” I said, stunned that she had played us like I played a sucker at a poker table.

  “Great,” she said, clapping her hands together. “Then let’s get out of here before the Titans discover some of the Gods are among them. I have a hunch they won’t like that much.”

  “Do you know where the exit is at?” I asked.

  Helen looked at me like I now had two heads. “No. Don’t you?”