Book Five, Chapter 58: The Speakeasy

The laundromat we were directed to had perhaps one of the laziest names in all of Carousel: The Laundromat.

Perhaps that was supposed to be ironic because, secretly, it wasn’t just a laundromat, and therefore, just calling it that was funny.

I wasn’t sure, but by all accounts, it looked like an average laundromat to me. People were inside doing their washing and drying. There was a woman inside of a little office who would take your suits or dresses to have them dry cleaned, which was a nice thing to have at a laundromat.

We ignored them all and walked to the back. As we followed the hall further into the building, we eventually found a large man standing next to a door whose only notable quality was that it was made out of thick metal and opened with a huge handle that might have been found on a door to a drug kingpin’s compound.

It was surrounded by industrial-sized washers and dryers.

The man didn’t say anything to us, but Antoine coolly said, “Pyrite.”

The man didn’t respond, and for a moment, all we could hear was the laundry machines going as he looked us up and down and reached over to open the door with a metal squeal, revealing a freight elevator.

“I’m sure it’s normal to have a freight elevator in a one-story building,” Isaac said.

The man didn’t respond.

“Yeah, like we’d get into an elevator without a light,” Isaac said—and he was right; there was no light inside the elevator.

“Isaac,” I said, “there’s no omen. You can stop checking.”

He was calling out strange details, hoping to unveil an omen because that’s how his scouting trope worked, but mine said nothing was going on, and the baby wasn’t crying, so we were probably good.

Probably.

We stepped into the elevator, and as we did, a light flickered on. There was only one button in the elevator, so we pressed it.

The trip down was jittery and frankly quite terrifying because, with all the shaking, it became possible that we were walking to our deaths despite all the evidence that we would be safe. That fear pushed itself into my mind.

But then it stopped. There was a small gate between the elevator and the floor, and another goonish-looking guy was there to open it for us.

Beyond that was a hallway with detailed red wallpaper—not the red wallpaper we saw in our heads, but similar.

We loaded out into the hallway, and carefully, I led us down to the sound of music in the distance.

Jazz music.

The further we walked, the more sounds we heard—people dancing and laughing. There was an energy and a buzz in the air.

As we finally reached the end of the hallway and turned to look, we saw a 1920s Speakeasy absolutely alive with a couple dozen NPCs. The cocktail waitresses and the bartender were wearing outfits to fit the theme and era. People were gambling at blackjack and roulette.

The bartender specifically caught my attention because not only did he have a wiry, muscular frame and sharp, penetrating eyes, but he also had a Plot Armor of 50 and a bunch of tropes I couldn’t see.

On the red wallpaper, his name was Vic Malone, but as I watched, his first name changed. It started at Vic and then became Roger and then John, and every few seconds, it would change.

He spotted us the moment we rounded the corner. He didn’t exactly smile, but there was something inviting about the way he looked at us—a sort of sardonic amusement.

I couldn’t spend all of my attention on him; there was just so much to see.

“Check out the two people dancing over by the piano,” Dina said. Her Outsider’s Perspective trope allowed her to notice strange things quickly, and she had undoubtedly noticed something strange.

The two people who were dancing were dressed to the gills and wearing masquerade masks. They didn’t register as enemies but rather as NPCs, and they didn’t seem to care that we were there. But I recognized the style of those masks, and I knew for sure what storyline they were from. Miss Brunette and Mr. Cobalt ignored us and danced like that was the only thing that mattered to them.

That couldn’t have been a coincidence. Nothing ever was.

There was a man named “Cauliflower Bill” set up at a table in the far corner with an easel, and he had a sign out that said, “Caricatures 10 dollars.” He was marked as an NPC, too, but his sign had a picture on it of a collection of clowns at a circus, and I swore as I looked at that picture that one of those clowns seemed to be looking back at me.

It was a terrifying clown that almost looked like it had another face painted above its real face with makeup.

I had to look away.

“Does anyone else get the feeling that everyone here is an enemy?” Antoine asked.

“I think you might be on to something,” I said.

And sure enough, as we looked around at the room filled with smoke and jazz, everyone who wasn’t an employee did have a sort of dark look over them—a haunting gaze. Danger leaked from their aura, and even though I couldn’t see any confirmation of this on the red wallpaper, my Hysteric scouting trope I Don’t Like It Here was making me feel very anxious.

The collection included all sorts of people—some carrying obvious weapons, others looking like ordinary folk.

“Should we leave?” Kimberly asked, clearly unsure of whether we should be here.

I had no idea. The baby wasn’t crying, so there was no danger that we weren’t aware of, but at the same time, there were plenty of dangers that we were aware of, and for some reason, they were all pretending to be NPCs.

“Let’s talk to the Paragon over here behind the bar,” I said.

Tar had hinted that the Speakeasy took in all types, but this was ridiculous.

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Antoine was quick to talk to the bartender, and he didn’t waste words.

“Are we safe here?” he asked of the man.

The man—Vic, or whatever his name was, Malone—smiled and said, “You know, we don’t get a lot of players around here these days. Wonder why that might be.”

Antoine kind of dismissed his playful greeting and said, “I just want to know if we should be here. Aren’t Paragons supposed to help the players?”

“Well, hang on there. There’s a way of going about things. Don’t just ask me if you’re in danger. Endear yourself to me so that I’m inclined to help you,” Malone said, smiling. His eyes were searching and revealed something his smiling face hid well, a slyness, a cleverness.

He wore his sleeves pushed up, and his thin, nimble fingers could fit all the way to the bottom of the glasses he was polishing.

He was one of those guys whose smile could transform his face from fierce and unwelcoming to charismatic and, frankly, warm.

I welcomed that in a place like this.

“Take a beer for each of us,” Antoine said.

“That’ll be a 50-cent piece apiece,” Malone said. “Would you like to start a tab?”