Dragons Luck

Nine

As usual, the crowd was light in the late afternoon at the Irish pub. The bartender was idly browsing through the newspaper and didn’t even look up, much less wave, when the man who had been playing the video poker machine finished his beer and wandered out the side door.

In the seemingly random pecking order of the bar-centered social life in the Quarter, the video poker players, sometimes referred to as video crackheads, were pretty much the bottom of the food chain. They rarely if ever interacted with any of the regulars or even the bartenders, except to get another beer or to break a twenty from the latter. Instead, they would sit glued to their chosen machines for hours, staring at the screen as they sipped their drinks and pumped more money in as needed. In a bar that was heavy on conversation and pool, this put them well under the radar. One rarely noticed their coming or going, or even their presence while they were there.

This made the role ideal for the man who had just exited the pub. Unlike most, he worked at being unnoticed. In fact, the last time he had been in town, he made a point of hanging at this specific bar and establishing himself as one of those invisible video poker players. It was the perfect guise in which he could watch and listen yet not be seen. Even now, he doubted the bartender knew or remembered his name.

Of course, being a shape-shifter helped.

Reflecting on that, the man smiled to himself. For all their self-trumpeted powers of size changing and shape-shifting, the big bad dragons barely scratched the surface of the possibilities of those skills. Young McCandles might be excused because he was still new to the game, but the older, more experienced dragons didn’t have that alibi. Their prolonged ignorance was yet another example of dragon arrogance. If you had enough power, why bother learning finesse?

Sure, big flashy changes were impressive, like shifting your form into an animal, especially a mythical one. But the same skills could be used to perform smaller, less noticeable changes that were much more useful in one’s workaday life.

Changing one’s hair color or length or the color or shade of one’s complexion was easy, but effective. So was adding or subtracting twenty years to one’s age. Changing gender was a bit more challenging, especially since it usually meant changing one’s garments as well, but it could be done.

One of the man’s favorite changes was one he was using with his current disguise. Making one leg slightly longer than the other changed his walk and the whole way he moved and held his body. In this disguise, planted in front of a video poker machine, the man had been in the pub at the same time as young McCandles and not been recognized, even though the youth had every reason to remember him. Even the much-lauded dragon powers of observation were useless unless one chose to apply them.

The man’s thoughts were interrupted when his cell phone rang. Glancing at the caller ID, he winced. He had been expecting this call sooner or later, but still dreaded it.

Looking quickly up and down the street to be sure there was no one within hearing, he leaned against a wall in the shade and opened the phone.

“Talk to me,” he said in his traditional greeting.

“George!” came an agitated female voice. “Where the hell are you?”

“Hello to you, too, Debbie,” he said, making a face at his reflection in a window. “I’m fine, thank you. How about yourself?”

In actuality, his name wasn’t really George. Though he was known by that title to those who employed him, his closely guarded secret was that he was only one of a team. The entire team was referred to as “the George” because of its purpose… to hunt dragons for pay. As one of the team’s main field agents, however, he found that even the team was referring to him more and more as “George.” That was one of the annoyances of working with a team. He was about to have to deal with another one of those downsides.

“Cut the crap, George,” came the voice of his distant teammate. “We haven’t heard from you for over a week. What are you doing?”

“I’m taking a little self-prescribed vacation,” George said. “I figure with the bonuses we got from my last job, I could afford some time off.”

There was a pause at the other end of the conversation.

“I suppose that’s right,” Debbie said with grudging acceptance. “You could have called in and told us, at least.”

“Yeah, sure.” George laughed. “And get told there was a new hot assignment that was too good to pass on. No, thanks. I’ll do it my way. If that’s not acceptable, you can always fire me.”

“Very funny,” his teammate said. “Okay. You’re on vacation. Where are you, anyway?”

Now it was George’s turn to hesitate.

“George,” came the voice, stern now. “Please tell me you’re not back in New Orleans.”

George searched for an adequate answer, but none came to mind.

“Goddamn it, George!” his teammate exploded. “You can’t—”

“Listen, Debbie,” George interrupted. “I only…”

“No, you listen!” she shot back. “You know the rules.”

“I should,” he snarled. “I wrote most of them.”

“Then you also know why the rules are there in the first place,” Debbie said, coldly. “What we’re doing is dangerous without adding complications. These are dragons we’re playing with, for God’s sake. We only get so many passes at the table before the luck changes. That’s why we only work on assignment and for a healthy fee. That makes it business and keeps them from hunting for us on a personal basis. We can’t get involved emotionally!”

“I know, I know.” George sighed. “You’re right. It’s just…”

He hesitated again.

“Talk to me, George,” Debbie said, using his own catch-phrase, but her voice softened a bit. “What’s really going on there? Are you going soft on this McCandles kid?”

“I don’t know,” George said. “He may develop into a real pain in the butt, but right now he’s okay. Maybe it’s because he was raised not knowing about dragons and hasn’t settled into the role yet. Still, he’s dragon.”

“Okay. So what is it?”

“It’s Flynn,” George said, his thoughts suddenly coming into focus. “He really got under my skin the way he insisted on a face-to-face meeting. He’s everything I hate about dragons raised to a higher power. Now he’s down here trying to work a number on young McCandles using the information we dug up for him. I just want to keep an eye on things as an uninvolved observer.”

“Uninvolved observer. Right. Just be sure you keep it that way.” Debbie hesitated. “Want any of the team down there for backup?”

“No. I’ll handle this myself,” George said, glad for the offered support. “That way, if anything blows, it won’t splash on anyone else.”

“In theory, anyway,” his teammate said. “One thing you should be aware of, though. You may have some extra company. There’s a report here from one of our watchers that says Melinda’s daughter Lizzy is on her way down there if she isn’t there already.”

“Lizzy? That psycho?” George was genuinely startled. “What’s she coming down here for?”

“Unknown,” Debbie said. “As far was we can tell, her own family doesn’t know she’s headed for the Big Easy. Just watch your back, okay?”

George found himself looking up and down the street again as he signed off. Lizzy! This just kept getting better.