[pshrynk]

As Vera walked into the Casino, she looked around. There, in a corner and looking vacuous, was Slick. He was already building up his personna to be the slack-witted subsitute that Montsnmags had to push in at the last minute or lose a place in the tournament. The good Doctor was lounging at the lobby bar, telling anyone who cared to listen that his other player was out with a sudden case of death by strangulation and he'd had to grab some guy off the street to sit in. He was checking to see if the rules allowed a substitution after he could find someone with some skills. (They didn't, but that was all a part of the cover.)

Next to Dr Montsnmags was a man wearing a white linen suit with the legs of the pants well above the high water mark. For some reason, he was wearing a fez cap, as well. Either he was another shill who was going to try to mop the floor with the other players at the right time, or a complete moron. After watching him spill his brightly pink colored drink down his front, she decided on moron. He didn't seem to care about the rules on subsitution.

Sitting in the back of the lobby was a nattily dressed man with a razor thin moustache and round spectacles. Beside him sat a large brown, black, and white dog. For some reason, the dog looke to be the smarter of the pair.

Another thin man was wandering round the lobby, head down. As he aimlessly passed by her, Vera heard him muttering, "One thousand three hudred fifty nine, one thousand three hundred sixty, one thousand.. Oh excuse me! Didn't mean to bump into you like that! Oh, bugger! One, two..."

She blinked and shook her head as a pair of wool socks rolled past her feet. She could have sworn that one of them had a safety pin in its cuff.

Along the front of the lobby, a large woman was swearing in German at a waiter as a small Japanese man stood by, looking slightly embarrassed.

Fortunately, she did not see that strange man who had told her that she had a sister last night in the bar. That was just toos trange for words, actually.

All of this had taken only two seconds to take in. Vera prided herself on being able to pick up the details in a flash.

Then, her eyes rounded to Vivaldi, who was sitting disinterestedly beside a man wearing a floppy aviator's cap. The man with hte thin moustache had just sidled up to him and started to engage a conversation when they both looked up at her. Her heart fluttered in a way she was quite unacustomed to. The fly-boy was absolutely gorgeous!