Let's just say, Merlin has a bad case of overconfidence.

It's not that Merlin was reckless, per se. Well, not exclusively that, anyway. Over the course of the past several years, Merlin's willing interactions with people from all different walks of life had drastically changed his perception of the world. And due to his hyper-empathy, he found himself relating to their struggle, despite the fact that he himself had not been **** to endure even a fraction of the hardships of his peers. At least... he hadn't yet.

But while he had been on the road during his self-appointed exile, he found himself in the parking lot of a bar-grill-and-inn combo called the Love Shack. Merlin scowled at the name. To him, it reeked of 1960s mindsets, for some reason. Was it because of the very concept reminded him of brothels for one reason or another, or was it because now the song "Love Shack" by the B-52s was playing in his head just now, a song he didn't even like? Either way, he wasn't amused.

Merlin had been on the road pretty much non-stop and was starving. However **** he may have been to give his business to this worn-down glorified shed on the side of the road, he didn't really have any other choices.

Upon entering, the putrid, unrelenting stench of **** danced around Merlin's nostrils, garnering a physical reaction from him. "Eugh-!" he recoiled, waving his hand around in front of his nose in an attempt to whisk away the waft. "The hell kind of place is this that that kind of stench is acceptable?"

Despite his surprise at the unappealing odor assaulting his senses, Merlin, for some reason, decided to stick around and see what more this rundown glorified truck stop had to offer. Not that there was much that could convince him that anything here would be worth his time, mind you.

Sitting down at the somewhat rough counter at the center-left of the bar ('when was the last time this thing was smoothed down for splinters?' Merlin thought to himself as he did), he obtained the server's attention. The server in question, a young lady with a nametag that read 'Leslie', looked at Merlin as she pulled out her notepad with a ballpoint pen and recited, "Welcome to The Love Shack! My name is Leslie, and I'll be your server today. How may I serve you?"

Merlin didn't even look her in the eye as he read the menu, sighed, and glumly responded "How often do your superiors make you say that?"

Leslie, not sure how to respond, asks the question again, this time slower. Merlin looks at her, unimpressed, and answers, "I'll take just a lemon iced tea." He gave the menu back to Leslie as he turned his back to her. "Please and thank you."

As Merlin walks away from the young woman, he notices a pair in the back, an older man and an equally elderly woman. Between them was a round table, with room for maybe one more, and they were both holding cards and making small talk to each other.

Merlin smirked. He had played in his high school's poker club for several years and thought he was pretty good himself. He believed that he could've gone pro if he really wanted to, but had to remind himself that most of the professional poker players he knew of either burned out super hard or ended up contributing nothing else to society other than the temporary entertaining of the general populace, something that didn't really sound all that enticing to him.

Seeing the duo go back and forth at an age-old tradition of the American household did strike a realization in Merlin, though. Since he was technically unemployed right now (though absolutely not struggling financially), he needed to find some way to make a couple extra bucks tucked away. It made him upset that, even though was the most freedom that he had ever felt in his life (oh, believe me, desr reader, he'll know what _real _freedom feels like soon enough), he still had to rely on the power of the dollar to keep him going.

And besides, these two strangers seem like they would be more than willing to let a new friend in on their little game. Why not ask?

Ignoring the lemon iced tea that Leslie had just placed on the counter for him ("Uhh...sir?" she attempted to capture Merlin's attention, but failed), Merlin made his way over to the couple. "Pardon me, you two," he began. "But I just couldn't help myself. I'm a bit of a pro at poker myself, and I was wondering if you had room for one more?"

The man looked over at our main man and grinned slightly. "Help yourself," he answered. The man had an air of mystery about him. Dark blue eyes, heavy bags underneath them, and a gray trucker's hat hiding a mullet on top. "Name's Hugo. Hugo Cierega."

The woman perked up at Merlin's offer. "And I'm Loretta! Loretta Blair." Compared to Hugo, Loretta seemed much more relaxed, if her bright hazel eyes and smile with a light snaggle tooth were anything to go off of. Both of them had spoken in deep Southern accents to signify that, much like Merlin, they were here just for a quick visit.

"Now, here's the thing," Merlin began. "I'm a bit of a nomad right now. I'm traveling across the United States to see what I can see and do what I can do." He quickly remembered the lemon iced tea he had left behind at the counter, excused himself to bring it back, and returned with it in hand, all without tipping Leslie. "So I was hoping that I would be able to put down a couple dollars in hopes that you'll do the same thing so that I could fund my trip more reliably." With that, he stuck his hand out in front of Hugo, offering a handshake. "Deal?"

Hugo just stared at his hand in mild befuddlement. "So let me get this straight, kid," he answered after a bit of silence. "You want us to put our hard-earned dollars on the line, cash that we practically bent over backwards to get, working tirelessly for jobs that couldn't give two shits of whether or not we lived or died... just so you can take your tin can across state lines a little longer?"

Hugo's dismissiveness of Merlin's offer sent the redhead a bit aback, but he still insisted. "...yyyyyes?" he answered cautiously.

Hugo looked back at Loretta. Loretta looked back at Hugo. The two gave each other a silent exchange... and then smiled.

"Alright, young man," Hugo finally answered. "We'll play along." With that, he reached into his back pocket, opened up his wallet, and pulled out a $20 bill. "Match me."

Without a second thought, Merlin reached into his Dungeons & Dragons themed wallet and pulled out a $20 of his own, placing next to Hugo's. "Alright," Merlin replied. "I'm ready when you are."

"Good," Hugo reciprocated with a grin. He proceeded to shuffle the deck in such a way that Merlin didn't even register that it had been shuffled until the cards were being sorted out. 'Uhh... what was that?' he thought.

Pushing the thought that he may have made a mistake out his head, Merlin buckled down and got ready to play. Which he wouldn't realize until later would be the most dire choice of his life.