Kid’s got alligator blood. Can’t get rid of him.

Dead cards, coolers, and bad beats walk into a bar.

Not at the same time.
Dead Cards is already there—has been for hours—sitting on a stool that wobbles even when no one touches it. The felt from nearby tables sheds little green fibers that stick to his sleeves like static. He watches every flop on the TVs overhead but none of the turns.

Cooler arrives exactly at 8:17. Not 8:16. Not 8:18. He adjusts his jacket like the room owes him something. The room immediately tightens.

Bad Beat explodes through the door late, talking mid-sentence:
“—and I swear on everything holy, if the river pairs the—oh. Hey. You guys already here?”

The bartender looks up. He doesn’t sigh. He doesn’t smile. He just says,
“Great. The narrative department arrived.”

Dead Cards orders water. Always water.
Cooler orders something expensive that the bar technically carries but never sells.
Bad Beat orders whatever the last pissed-off guy at the rail had—still warm with regret.

Somebody at Table 3 says, “I’m only playing premiums.”
Bad Beat nearly chokes on his drink laughing.

A TV in the corner shows a sports replay that hasn’t actually happened yet. The announcer says, “Unbelievable,” before anything occurs.

Cooler stands.

At that exact moment, two players at different tables both shove for their stacks with identical chip counts. Neither one notices the other. Someone in the room whispers, “That can’t be a coincidence.”

Dead Cards blinks. One river next hour disappears from existence.

Bad Beat claps once. Somewhere, top set shrinks to second set.

The bartender wipes a glass that is already clean and says,
“So. Who you here for tonight?”

Cooler nods toward a table where a young guy is double-checking pot odds on his phone like it’s a seatbelt.

Bad Beat nods at the loud guy who keeps announcing his hands before showdown.

Dead Cards points at the quiet one. The one folding everything. The one doing everything right.

The flop hits.

Nobody remembers the exact cards, but three people say “Ohhh” in three different emotional keys.

One guy says, “That’s actually good for my range.”
Another guy says, “No it isn’t.”
Both are wrong.

Cooler sits down.

A massive pot builds like weather.

Bad Beat leans over the rail and whispers encouragement that somehow sounds like a threat.

Dead Cards checks his phone. It has no screen. He nods anyway.

Turn card.

Three players like it.
Four players pretend they do.
One player realizes they should not have come tonight.

River.

Nobody moves.

Then one man exhales in a way that sounds like his bank app just spoke aloud.

Cooler stands again.

At the bar, someone says, “I was ahead the whole way.”
The bartender replies, “No you weren’t.”
The man doesn’t hear him.

Dead Cards sips his water. “Statistically,” he says, “you were never alive.”

Another round shows up unasked.

Bad Beat is pacing now. He thrives on the pacing. Every step he takes adds exactly one outer to someone else’s nightmare.

A new player walks in—clean hoodie, clean confidence, clean belief that none of this applies to him.

He says, “Seat change.”

The room exhales like an old house.

Cooler stands.

Dead Cards finally smiles. Very slight. A misdeal of fate.

Bad Beat leans into the new player’s ear and whispers, “You’re due.”

The table forms around him immediately.

Flop: good enough.
Turn: better than expected.
River: illegal in four states.

The new player freezes.

Someone says, “I’d call there sometimes.”
Someone else says, “That’s a mandatory fold.”
Dead Cards says, “It was always a check-raise from the future.”

Chips move. Not fast. Heavy. Final.

The new player stares at his stack like it betrayed him under oath.

Bad Beat grins. Cooler sits. Dead Cards looks away—already finished with him.

At another table, a man wins with the worst hand he will ever show down. He celebrates loudly. The universe writes his name down.

At another table, a man loses with the best hand he will ever make. He doesn’t react at all. The universe underlines his name.

The bartender looks at the three of them and says,
“You ever think about giving people a night off?”

Cooler says, “They wouldn’t recognize it.”
Bad Beat says, “They’d call it suspicious.”
Dead Cards says nothing. The deck answers for him with two bricks and a dream.

Midnight arrives without asking.

The TVs switch sports again. Different game. Same emotional ending.

Someone wins a buy-in and immediately says, “Now I’m playing with house money.”

Bad Beat winces. Physically.

Someone loses a buy-in and immediately says, “I’m still rolled for this.”

Cooler cracks his neck like thunder.

Dead Cards reaches into his pocket and pulls out five consecutive missed flops for the same guy.

The felt hums. The chips click in that predatory rhythm.

A man starts to say, “If we’re being objective—” and is mathematically removed from the conversation by the river.

Another man says, “That’s poker,” and nobody knows what he means anymore.

The bartender now has two receipt printers that only print phrases like:

standard

cooler spot

unlucky

nice hand though

Bad Beat is no longer walking. He is appearing.

Cooler is no longer standing. He is occurring.

Dead Cards is pointing at tables that do not yet exist.

The new player is back again.
But older this time.
And balder.
And immediately stuck.

He says, “Seat change.”

Cooler stands.

Across the room, someone wins with ace-high. Someone else Googles “expected value” like it’s a funeral home.

The clock on the wall says RIVER.
The calendar says REBUY.
The bartender’s name tag now says SUNGOVERNMENT.

Bad Beat talks directly to the deck.
The deck listens.

Dead Cards removes every king from the next three orbits. He does it politely.

Cooler raises his glass:
“To domination without witnesses.”

Bad Beat raises his:
“To justice with a sense of humor.”

Dead Cards raises his:
“To the fourth heart.”

They drink.

Somebody is all-in with a hand they don’t deserve.
Somebody calls with a hand they can’t release.
Somebody wins with a hand they will misremember forever.

The explanation forms before the chips stop moving.

The room rehypothecates reality.

Someone yells “RIGGED” and the building nods.

The bartender finally looks directly at you and says,
“You’ve been here a long time.”

You haven’t moved.

Dead Cards points at your once-perceptually-solid confidence.

Cooler stands in your seat.

Bad Beat asks if you’ve ever considered that the deck might be reviewing you.

The flop comes out in a language you almost recognize.

The turn rewrites something from earlier that you were sure happened.

The river arrives early and late at the same time.

Someone wins.
Someone loses.
Someone explains.

The explanation begins eating the room.

Tables become hands.
Hands become stories.
Stories become screenshots.
Screenshots become proof of nothing.

The bartender pours one last round into a glass that isn’t there.

Dead Cards whispers something to a card that hasn’t been drawn yet.
Cooler stands up inside a pot that already ended.
Bad Beat laughs in a way that sounds like a disconnect noise.

A man folds the nuts.
A man calls without cards.
A man rivers a feeling.

The deck shuffles itself.

The chips clack in Fibonacci.

Someone wins theoretical money.

Someone loses optical money.

Someone is arguing with the concept of second place.

The TVs are now showing hands from five minutes in the future.
Everyone is still making the same mistakes on purpose.

The floor is a graph.
The graph is downward.
Someone says, “Zoom out bro.”
The graph zooms out and you nearly collapse.

Bad Beat spills a drink into yesterday.

Cooler stands in all remaining chairs.

Dead Cards finally turns toward you and says...

Spoiler

Show

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