CHAPTER 25

 He closed the door behind them. The Emergency lights gave every room in the casino a strange eerie and yellowish glow but, it had a more dramatic effect in this particular one. That probably had something to do with all of the medieval looking devices, cages, and other assorted instruments of mayhem lying around. The little short guy that Jack and Jack understood to be named, Nicky, seemed to be pleased with what was here. At the same moment both Jack’s asked, “Casino comes with it’s own dungeon, does it?”

Big Jack looked a bit more disturbed than the little one. He went to say something else, once again but, found the same words coming out of his clone, “would you stop doing that. That… you.. Stop it!”

 “Hey!” Their irritation was nothing to match that of Santoro. He had his pistol in one hand, the Zat gun in another, and his baseball bat cradled in his arm pit. “If you don’t mind I’ll be the one giving orders around here.” He motioned to one of the cages with his pistol and it was obvious what he wanted. Only after his three captives went to step in did he command, “not you sweetie.”

Little Jack stepped in between the bat wielding maniac and his new bride, “forget it.”

“Fine,” Nicky replied with an easy going shrug, “I’ll just shoot you now and get it over with.”

Cassie pushed Little Jack aside, “I’ll be ok.” 

Little Jack wanted to say something but she kissed him. Then she winked and repeated, “it will be ok. Do what he says.”

Santoro grumbled, “this is going to be easier than I thought. Too bad.” He motioned to the girl and she shut the cage door. When the lock on it clicked he relaxed a little more and made a closer examination of the Zat, “you know I watched you use this on that security guy. Fancy looking Taser gun or something like that?”

Big Jack groaned, “something like that. Just hold the snake head and push that button on top.”

That caused Santoro to laugh as he lazily walked over to the cage, “you think I’m that stupid? I’m going to enjoy this little toy when I figure out how to make it work.” Nicky reached up and pulled a tarp down that covered the cage completely, “no need to let them see what’s coming, you know?” He pointed to a contraption in the corner of the room, “now time for you to answer a few questions for me darling.”

Cassandra saw the blade and gulped. It was a guillotine! She felt gripped in fear as he dragged her to it and forced her down into the stocks beneath the blade. Cassie listened to the metal pin lock her head into place. She looked down at the basket beneath. She looked back up at the evil grin on his face. His hand was resting on a lever. He jerked it. The blade fell.


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 The main casino floor had turned into a small riot. The security people and police had arrived and were trying to clear the hordes of chip grabbing customers out. They were not having an easy time of it. Mulder flashed his badge to some of the Police. It got him past their line and to one of the back doors. Normally it would have taken a card key to get in to this part of the casino but, currently it was unlocked. Mulder cracked the door and peeked in. There were two armed private security types on the other side. He then closed the door and looked to Skully, “I don’t think we can follow him this way.”

“Let me see,” replied Skully who was more than just a little agitated at the moment. She knew they had to follow Benedict or they were not going to find who they were looking for. She peeked in the door and jumped back with a short scream rolling off her lips.

Teal’c opened the door all the way, “were you unsuccessful in distracting Benedict?”

Looking past the four Air Force types, Mulder saw the security guards unconscious on the floor. He had no idea how they got that way. Before he could ask about that, Skully cut him off and explained the situation, “we were trying to follow Benedict. He went this way.”

Daniel was following the group watching the dark hallway from the direction they had came, “well he didn’t come by us.”

“Daniel Jackson is correct,” Teal’c added. “We would have passed him in the hall had that been the case.” An eyebrow shot up.

Mulder supported his partner, “I saw him go in this door. Seeing is believing, you know?”

Sam found the compromise, “he must have went in one of those doors back there.”

“Major Carter,” asked Teal’c, “did you not say they were locked?”

Janet was still jumpy and pacing around, “he must have had a manual key or something. Come on, I’m not waiting. Cassie is obviously not in this hall!” 

As the Doctor pushed her way past Daniel he only shrugged to his compatriots, “well I guess we do what the Doctor ordered.”
They followed, at a safe distance since Janet had now produced a forty-five caliber pistol. When she got to the first locked door, after a few choice swear words, she blew the door knob off. After kicking it open, and finding nothing, she moved to the next.

The gun fire did not go unnoticed. A horde of security came out of the darkness shouting orders for everyone to get on the floor. No one did and it ended with an armed standoff. 

This was broken by a calm voice that came out of the darkness. Skully recognized it and gulped as she heard the ice cold demeanor.

Benedict only said, “kill them.”