Chapter 18

Walking around looking at people is easy in a casino. Thanks to my new skill, everyone had two numbers next to them. The older they were, the bigger the numbers tended to be. One set was red. The other set was yellow.

Most people had more red positive than negative yellow points, which I guess bodes well for society. I was looking for a big score though. Some of the more disreputable people in the casino were more or less even. I headed towards the back where a sea of little gray haired ladies were monopolizing the slot machines against the wall.

I spotted the diamond in the rough. She was near the end of a row, and concentrating hard on her machine. She had over 5 million red points, and only about 15000 yellow points. Must have been a saint.

1,287,305 points from my first take, but they got rounded up to 1,290,000. My being a historical event didn’t trigger, I guess because these weren’t points I earned, but took. My melon bonus didn’t trigger either. Her positive points dropped, so when I took a second time, I got half of the remainder, which rounded up to 1,940,000. My third take evened her up, leaving her with 15,479 points in red and yellow, and giving me another 1,920,000 after my round up.

Pretty nifty skill, it gave me half of what I needed for another level up, and I could do it again tomorrow. I was about to walk out, when I noticed something I had missed yesterday. They had another high stakes roulette wheel, this one open only on the weekends. The max bet was $10,000. I had more than that stashed away in a safety deposit box, so I walked over to the teller, and asked for 10k in chips. A summoned stack of cash out of my pockets, as the teller wanted to know if I was a member.

“I’ve just got this,” I said, showing him my Spirit Card.

The teller took my card, and swiped it, “Ok Mr Roberts. You are now a member, I’m showing you in a premium suite, I’m discounting the daily rate to the members room rate, plus the coupon that was applied earlier, and refunding the difference to the card. I’m also noting the transaction you’re making for chips, and giving you the appropriate spirit points, you can exchange points for future room upgrades, and drink discounts.

“Finally, if you enter in a pin number I will activate your Spirit Card so that you can use it at any atm machine or debit machine for purchases and cash withdrawals, instead of just in house.”

I punched in the last four numbers of the phone number I had growing up, and he handed the card back to me.

“Enjoy your stay, and best of luck,” he added.

I took the stack of ten $1000 chips, and headed for the roulette wheel. It was manned, but no one was around it. As I stepped up several people moved closer to watch. I glanced at a particularly blessed blond, who had moved to watch me play, and asked her what her favorite number was. She smiled, gestured at her chest and said, “44” with a wink.

There was no 44, so I put all ten down on 4, making two stacks, winking back at her, and activated my gambling skill, thousand tries one success, spending 500,000 positive points, and waited for the croupier to see if anyone else was going to play. Calling out ‘no more bets’ he spun the wheel.