Epilogue: Still Game

Lois Lane's heels clicked through the empty club. It was too early for the revelers to filter in, and no one bothered to lock the door on an illegal club.

The women had been found, as Blaze had said. Or their bodies had been. Two had OD'd; bodies like pornstars, and the tastes to match, but not the tolerances. Tonya Wong and Mara de la Cruz, their beautiful bodies laid out on slabs, unclaimed until Lois had recognized them and contacted the families.

Diana Reynolds had been harder to find. Lois had to wait a week for the head to wash up in Metropolis harbor. They found the body, later. Coat with a pocket full of stones. She had just walked off the pier.

"It happens, sometimes," the coroner told her. "People that get elective surgery...they think they're getting what they want, but then they look in the mirror and don't recognize the person that's there. They realize what they've lost."

That left Jenny Dunlap. 22, majoring in Modern Dance. Skinny. Flat. Blonde.

Cathy Cuntlapper had debuted the week after Jenny had gone missing. Impossibly huge breasts. Agile. A natural redhead. She put experienced strippers by storm. Earned five thousand a night for a week in Metropolis before moving on to Gotham. Made even more money there, but she fell in with the wrong people. They took her down to Blüdhaven.

Strippers die in Blüdhaven every week. It barely rates the third page of the locals, unless it was a slow news day and a particularly gruesome ****. Her client called 9-1-1 when her pimp wouldn't. It took half an hour for the ambulance to arrive. "Cathy Cuntlapper" was found dead on arrival. Cause of ****: autoerotic asphixiation.

Lois Lane tidied up the mess that was the end of four promising young women. Contacted their families. Wrote her article. She left out mention of who had given them their cosmetic enhancements. No one needed to know how to follow in their footsteps.

It took six weeks for Lois to retrace her steps. Ride the elevator down. Step through the Black Door.

The green felt table was there. A deck of cards. Lois sniffed, smelling ozone and musk. Blaze's smell. It felt like the darkness was breathing, and the hair rose up on the back of her neck, telling her to go.

Lois stepped forward, hand gripping something in her pocket. She dropped it in the middle of the table, and would have turned to go...

Blaze came up behind her. Naked, but the shadows seemed to cover her like a long dark dress. Eyes glowing white, horns arching back, almost like the shadow of a crown. She grasped Lois by the shoulders, her hands hot even through the reporter's shirt.

"Hello sweetmeat," she said, and nuzzled the reporter's cheek, planted a burning kiss on her neck. "What's this?"

The reporter stared down at the plastic wand.

"Missed my period. Came up positive this morning. I know you knew, but I thought..."

Lois could almost feel the smile.

"How kind of you. But since you're here...another game?"

The pregnant woman shuddered. "I saw what happened. To the others."

"Tragic," Blaze let Lois go and slid around the table, fingers trailing on the edge of the felt. A deck of cards emerged, beside the pregnancy test. She took a seat on the opposite side of the table, her white eyes burning into Lois Lane. "I didn't kill them."

"Didn't you?" Lois said, her voice hollow.

"I am not a **** dealer who blames the addicts for eating the poison they sell," Blaze told her. "I am an investor. If those women had lived, they might have gone on to become legends...and polished their souls to bright, gleaming things. Yet I cannot hold their hand throughout their lives, I cannot tell them how to live. Anymore than a teacher is responsible for every student. Sit. Let's play."

The pregnant reporter put her hand on the back of her chair. Not sitting down just yet.

"Why should I trust you?" Her violet eyes stared defiantly at the demon, but Blaze's poker face was already in place.

"I will never lie to you, Lois Lane," Blaze said. "I mean you no harm. A friendly game."

Lois felt her own poker face fall into place. "What are the stakes?"

Blaze shuffled. "Is there nothing you wish? You are pregnant with quadruplets, after all. That can get...expensive."

The demon snapped her fingers. A pile of green bills appeared on the table, accompanied by a distant clap of thunder.

"Eighty thousand should cover the costs of pregnancy and birth," the demon said.

Lois looked at the money. If it was real...but she still didn't trust Blaze. Not yet.

"And what is my bet?"

Blaze put the shuffled deck in the center of the table. "I will give you one thousand dollars a week for...child support...for the duration of the pregnancy," the demon said. "And you will accompany me on a date. Next week."

"A date," Lois repeated, her tone registering her disbelief.

The demon didn't even crack a smile. Lois could almost hear her next words. "Think of the babies," or "You see, you win either way." Her jaw worked...and she felt a hot, stabbing shard of hatred inside of her just then, because she knew the demon was right, and Blaze knew she was right. Lois sank into the seat. The scarlet succubus dealt:

Lois: (10♣) 8♦

A good deal. Lois was about to say stay...when the demon made a rude noise in the back of her throat, and turned over her face-down card.

Blaze: A♣ Q♠

A natural.

"You che—" Lois started, but didn't finish.

"We can play again," the scarlet succubus said. She looked up from the cards, and for just half a moment, the mask slipped...and Lois couldn't read the emotion in the demonic dickgirl's face. "I'll give you another chance. Same stakes."

Lois stared hard...but nodded. Blaze didn't even bother to shuffle, she swept the old cards into a pile to the side and dealt again.

Lois: (K♥) 6♣

Blaze: (7♦) 9♦

"Stay," Lois said. Blaze took a card. The King of Diamonds flipped up...and without emotion, Blaze flipped up her other card. She had gone bust.

The pregnant reporter was enough of a gambler to know when to walk away from the table. She stood up, hands scooping up the piled bills and stuffing them into her purse...and when that wasn't enough, her jacket pockets.

"Thanks for the game, Blaze," Lois said. "One week. Seven o'clock. You can pick me up at my place."

Lois turned away. She got three steps toward the door when the words came after her.

"Nice playing with you, Lois," the reporter turned around and caught a flash of Blaze, holding the pregnancy test in both hands...and the faintest little smile on her face. Not her Mona Lisa smile, but something more honest.

The pregnant reporter turned back and kept walking.

She was sure Blaze hadn't cheated. Yet she was also sure that Blaze had gotten exactly what she wanted. That smile haunted Lois as much as the faces of the four dead women. Lois had no illusions about what Blaze was...but a part of her investigative brain was now wondering who she was...and what she had planned.

One thing the reporter knew for certain: her game with Lois Lane had only begun.