"Fuck this," Robert said: "I'm not satisfied."

"I am," the Colonel said, packing up the deck and making ready to get up from the chair.

"I want another hand, at least."

"But I think we've gotten all the answers we need out of you."

"I might be able to give you more."

"I doubt it," he said, standing up at the table: "That was a very useful thing about the Doomsayers, and I don't think the lightning will be striking the same tree twice this day-"

"You still need me to interpret the last card."

"No, I don't. I know a few people who can do it for me."

"How about the Returned?" Robert asked, feeling one of the knives cutting into his skin: "We haven't gotten there, yet..."

"I think anything you could tell me about them would be perfunctory, quite frankly."

"I think I could find something-"

"Robert, please be silent," he said, walking around to look him in the eyes: "This has been an amusing game, but you knew that you would not win."

"I want my peace of mind, fucker," Robert spat: "Can you give it to me?"

The Colonel shook his head, and began to walk away: "Be done with him," he said to his men.

"Then what about the visions?" the Oracle shouted, shrinking back from the knives' kisses.

"Wait!" the ugly man said, holding up a hand. The two men paused, but still kept the knives pressed firmly against the flesh of Robert's neck.

"I've had them!" Robert yelled: "And if you're wanting to know what all I've seen, then you'd want to know about that, too!"

The Colonel turned around and walked back to look Robert in the eyes.

"You have seen it?" He asked: "Tell me truly, Robert."

"Oh, you bet your ass I've seen it," Robert said: "More than once."

He stood there for some time, looking down at his captive. Then he looked up, and indicated to the others that they should take the knives away from his throat. They did, though it was a slow and clumsy motion on their part.

"What about them?" he asked, sitting back down in the other chair.

"I've had it..." he said, panting: "I have..."

"That tells me nothing. What did you see?"

"That's just it," Robert said, looking his captor in the eyes: "I can't. Completely. Remember."

The Colonel screwed up his face: "So you want to play another hand, then?"

"And maybe get some more answers out of you? Hell yes."

The Colonel smiled, and took the deck out: "I don't think there's much else to get from me, Robert. Nothing of any use, anyway... but if you want to try your luck again, so be it."

So Robert did, and he won again: a Flush against a Straight.

"What is it about the Doomsayers that has the Guild out to dig them up and destroy them?" he asked: "I mean, they were never a pleasant bunch of folks to deal with, but who cares if they're going around saying the end is nigh? That's all they did before, and no one took them seriously. Why the fuss now?"

"Because their treason was complete and total," the Colonel said, still in shock at having been beaten yet again: "They were not only predicting the End Times, but trying to bring them about. That was all they had ever been doing, before, apparently... but it was a small and concealable treason, then. They fed Oblivion by consigning things into Nihils... Artifacts, Relics, slaves... even their own members if they could find no other sacrifices.

"But that was not enough. And when the most recent Storm still failed to be the Doomsday they had predicted for so long, they decided to go on the offensive.

"You have heard of the explosions, I am certain? The terrorist actions the Council of Guilds have blamed on leftover Renegades? It is the Doomsayers who are truly behind them, Robert... and even we cannot see them coming."

That gave Robert a start. He'd not only heard of the explosions, but he'd seen one, too - right here in the Boston Necropolis' Ghostmarket. It had been about three months ago, and it had gone off less than an hour after Robert had been there. If he'd dawdled that day, he might have been amongst the ones consigned to the Void...

No one had seen it coming: not Robert, not anyone else. At the time, he'd taken it as yet another reminder that something was seriously wrong with the Art. But if even the leaders of the Guild hadn't been able to predict it, then something was seriously wrong.

"So we are hunting them down," the Colonel went on: "All Oracles who speak of these so-called marks of the End Times are suspect. All Oracles who know too much are expendable. And all those who believe that the End Times are coming, now, are condemned. In this way are we keeping the situation under control."

"You call this control?" Robert shouted: "Secret police? Killing our own? Jesus Fucking Christ, I thought we were supposed to be the alternative to the goddamn Hierarchy-"

"Man, you are such a fucking pussy," one of the men said, finally breaking his silence. He had a rough, New Jersey accent.

"Monty," the Colonel reprimanded him, and the other guy nodded and fell silent again.

"Fucking fascists," Robert went on: "When did we turn into the Monitors?"

"It has always been a question of control, Robert," the Colonel said - his voice back to normal now that the question had been asked, and answered: "It all comes from control, and it all comes back to control. And if you cannot see that, then I think you are either ignorant of how things truly work, or in need of a fresh viewpoint."

"Well yours sucks," the Oracle said: "And if that's the new face of the Guild, then I don't want to be a part of it, anymore."

"So be it," the Colonel said, taking the cards back for a shuffle and smiling all the while: "One last question from me to you, then, and you get your wish."

And so they went, and so the game went, with both of them knowing that this would indeed be the last hand.

They took their time, both of them: meticulously weighing their chances, picking replacements for cards only with the utmost care. They tried to fake the other out into taking cards, or not.

And then - after what seemed an hour - they came to the point of no return. They both looked over their cards at one another, and got ready to play them both.

"Do you have any regrets, now?" the Colonel asked.

"Scads," Robert replied: "Not about my choices of action, though."

"What, then?"

"I think the worst one is not asking Suzi Dershler out, that one night. If she'd been out on a date with me, I wouldn't have been standing where I was..."

"And the bullet wouldn't have taken your life."

"Dead bang, Mr. Colonel Sir," he said.

"But then, you were fated to be there. So how can you regret it?"

"Because I'm not a zombie."

The Colonel looked down his nose at that, but nodded. He probably got the reference, then...

"How about you?" Robert asked: "Any regrets?"

The Colonel scratched his decaying chin with his free hand, thought a moment, and then shook his head: "Not a single one, Robert. I lived an amazing life..."

His eyes filmed over for a second, as though remembering something. When his voice came back it was harsh and sibilant: "The first one was Josette. I think she couldn't have been a day over fifteen, which was no great matter in my time, mind you. And even if it had been, I wouldn't have been one to care, then or ever."

"What?" Robert asked, almost dropping his cards in shock.

"Of course, she protested her virtue to no end," the Colonel went on: "But I knew it was a lie. She could have really struggled if she hadn't truly wanted it. That's all women really want - a hand on the neck, maybe a slap or two so they can call it rape. And then they never have to admit to anyone that they wanted it..."

"You piece of shit..." Robert said, disgusted.

"I'm sorry... did I say something, just there?" the Colonel asked, his eyes going back to normal {For him, anyway}.

Robert just looked at him, still disgusted. The two men at his side said nothing, either, which led Robert to suspect that their master's Shadow took control of his voice quite often.

"Nothing important, then," the Colonel said, looking at his cards: "Are you ready, Robert?"

"I sure am," he said, ready to be done with this: "You ready?"

The Colonel nodded, and put down his hand: "This has been amusing, but I think it ends now."

Robert looked at it, looked at his own hand, and then put it down, not quite sure what to think.

They both had a Royal Flush. They'd tied.

Robert hadn't been lying when he'd said he'd had scads of regrets, and one of the biggest ones was that he could never find a Relic camera. It was moments like this that he really wanted one: the look on the Colonel's ugly face was priceless.

"What...?" he said, shaking his head, looking at both hands and then at the deck.

"Looks like a tie to me," Robert said, nonchalantly.

The Colonel stammered: "That's... that's never happened before. How..?"

And Robert just laughed, enjoying the utter horror and confusion on his would-be executioner's face.

"Control, huh?" he asked: "It's all about control?"

"Oh, be silent..."

"What was that line from 'Star Wars'? Something about star systems and tight fists-"

"I said be silent!" the Colonel shouted, and both men took a menacing step towards Robert.

"Tight asses..." Robert went on, not really caring anymore. He'd not only gotten to know what it was all about, but had also had the satisfaction of knowing his murderer was an amoral rapist and a control freak, and lasted long enough to see him lose control over his circumstances. It wasn't much as far as revenge or last laughs went, but under the circumstances it would do nicely...

"This is no laughing matter," the Colonel went on.

"I really don't give a fuck," the Oracle said, shrugging and putting up his hands: "I guess we play another round, or...?"

"Not until a question has been asked, and answered," the Colonel insisted, putting his hands on the table.

"So who asks?" Robert inquired: "And who answers?"

The look in the Colonel's eyes in that moment was worth another priceless photo: "I... don't know..."

"So we sit like this forever...? Or...?"

The Colonel bit his lower lip and shook his head. And at that very moment - just when Robert thought he was going to have the pleasure of watching the man fall apart - they got their answer.

I will ask the question, Robert, a voice said, coming from right between them. That voice was low and whispery, and sounded a lot like cards being shuffled.

"Who is there?" the Colonel demanded, looking around them: "Speak!"

I said I will ask the question, Francis, the voice repeated, and Robert saw where the voice was coming from. The mouths on the figures of his face cards were moving in time with the words, though the sound wasn't quite coming from them. It was coming from the space taken up between the rest of the deck, and their respective hands. It was the True Deck in its totality.

"You didn't know it could talk?" Robert asked the Colonel, who seemed about to have apoplexy. He took the man's shivering and shaking as a 'no,' and listened for the question to be asked.

Robert Barnes Armitage, the voice whispered: You will answer this question - What vision have you had?

Robert felt the awful loss of balance and control, once more, and when he spoke it was with his mouth and voice, but not his own will.

"...but then I came to," Robert said, regaining control of his voice, but unable to stop himself from speaking - needing to get it out, now that he could fully remember it again: "And I was at the table, looking at the cards as though nothing had happened...

"But I know it was real," he finished, looking dead square into the Colonel's eyes: "And it's happened to me twice, and I know people who've had it happen to them, too. You can't tell me that's just some made-up story we're spreading to undermine your fucking Council of Guilds."

"So you say," the Colonel said, apparently having regained his confidence, now that his cards had asked the question he'd been wanting to ask all this time: "But there is no proof-"

Colonel Francis Charteris, the voice whispered, interrupting him: You will answer this question - Have you not seen these things as well?

The Colonel's face blanched yet again, and he gripped both sides of the table, as though to pick it up and toss it into the air. Robert could see him struggling against the compunction to speak - his mouth tightening in a rictus, his tendons and muscles straining under his diseased skin. And for a moment, Robert actually thought the man was going to start crying.

But it was no use, in the end, and the Colonel answered the question: "Yes. Yes, I have also seen these things..."

"You... hypocrite!" Robert shrieked: "All this time you've been fucking killing us for seeing the exact same damn thing you have! What are you doing?"

"Surviving!" the Colonel hissed, leaping out of his chair and tossing the table aside. His cards went every which way, mixing themselves up with Robert's.

"Controlling, you mean," the Oracle spat: "Lying, cheating, doing whatever you have to do just so you can have your damn odds in a row."

"You are an insolent ignoramus," the man said, shouting down at his accuser: "What do you know of these things?"

"Enough to know the value of the truth."

"And what is the truth, boy?"

"You're dogshit," Robert answered, spitting in the Colonel's face.

The Colonel slapped Robert, then. And when Robert didn't stop giving him that awful, accusing look, he slapped him again. And again. And yet again, until his own men had to take him by the arms and move him away before he totally lost it.

"So what are you guys gonna do, huh?" Robert asked, looking at the both of them and wondering how long before he went into a nihil: "You gonna serve some hypocrite? Is this what you want?"

"I don't give a fuck," Monty said, letting go of his boss' arm and whipping the silvery knife around in his hand: "Right, wrong, I'm the guy with the knife."

Robert had just enough time to wonder why that sounded familiar, and then the Colonel's men were all over him, giving him almost enough kicks to send him into his long-overdue Harrowing.