Seeing human joy and desperation, hearing the sound of laughter and crying (even both at once)... It was intoxicating. Casinos were a wonderful place to observe humans at play.

And also a wonderful place to play with them.

Lovely, lovely, lovely. Bayfield's finally catching up with the times. A very blond, very attractive woman was sitting to the side of one of the blackjack tables, a faintly plastic smile pulling at her scarlet lips. Her eyes, hidden by a pair of sleek, black sunglasses, were taking in the surroundings. If she wasn't wearing the glasses, one would have been hard-pressed to decide which direction she was looking in. Her eyes were pure black, no whites at all. Without the glasses, she actually looked rather... alien.

She crossed her legs, and toyed with the hem of her dress - a snug, silky, red thing that made her look classy, yet very available. Where to start... the Lady of Luck requires some entertainment, she mused, her gaze following the flip of a card, on the other side of the room.

Casinos don't have the right -

Music.

It's about music, sometimes. Dionis, of course, would never admit this, except to Pan. He's sure Pan knows. (Pan has to know, after all, it's what he is.) But here -

The light is right. It's bright. It's - it's visible, it's above visible, it's warm and fluorescent and not, exactly, what he's let himself become used to (strobe lights, washes of colour against walls, bright clothing and skin and teeth and eyes) but it's.. it's nice.

Casinos are tricky. Betting is tricky. The winners are happy, of course, but the others -

Dionis. God of Revelry. (And Wine. And most Hallucinogens.) Of course he's looking out for the happiness of others. Of course he's considered this place, felt the winners like you feel electricity arcing at your knees, and of course he's - he's thought of coming.

He has, today. It must be a good day for it. Little trickles of winnings and cheer and it's not.. it isn't pure.

Of course.

But that's - that's something else entirely.

Dionis isn't about purity. You'd know by looking at him, know by looking at the shell he's made that's gone beyond shell (Az does shells, Pan does shells, Apoth got locked in one but Di never liked Apoth anyway), skin and muscle and bone and everything down to the very bottom, organic. Everything.. real. To that extent.

Pale, of course, paler in this lighting, eyes wide and grey and opaque, rimmed with red like shock or highs or crying. Body stretched out underneath in a pale wash of long limbs, bright shit (Hawaiian, or something trying to be), loose slick trousers like snakeskin or patterned vinyl - he looks like a refugee from Las Vegas, from Orlando, from some summer vacation place with thick air and citrus and white flowers at night. He looks like he's glowing, just a bit, and he is. Because of course.

That's what he does.

What Fortuna does, what this girl does -

He doesn't remember, offhand, how old she is. Some of them keep measurements, keep track of the time in the respect of their own solidification. He's sure Az does. Di never bothered. Luck, though, that's not just - that doesn't just belong to humanity. He's pretty sure Luck is universal.

Luck isn't synonymous with Happiness. Most people haven't realized this yet.

It takes him a minute, once he's inside - almost a whole minute, with the distraction of things, of people, to notice her. Her. To register where and who she is, because - he hasn't seen her in a while. She hasn't been here, 'here' being any place Dionis has been and there is, of course, the possibility that one or both have been avoiding the other.

He thinks they just don't run in the same circles.

Whether she notices him, whether she takes the time to feel him out - whether she noticed before he did, and he's never claimed to be the most observant thing in existence - but she's there, so he.. walks up.

Offers a smile.

Says "Hi."

Distantly wants a cup a coffee.

She tilted her head just fractionally to one side. Her smile widened for a moment, exposing her straight, white teeth. "Well, hello there," Fortuna purred. She made a show of looking him up and down, taking her sweet time in observing him. That's what it was, observing. She'd been aware of Dionis' presence many times before, but couldn't recall seeing him with her own two eyes. Or maybe she had, and had simply forgotten.
No matter.

"Nice evening, don't you think, honey?" she sighed, clasping her fingers together and resting them loosely on her knee. Those hands looked like they were missing something - maybe a long cigarette holder, the kind seen in old movies. Or a drink in a tall glass, with ice cubes.

Across the room, a card was turned over. Two things happened; someone laughed loudly, and at the same time, someone else swore. A smug, catty expression lit Fortuna's face.

Brief clench of teeth, the arc of motion quick and visible down his jaw. There's a moment, in passing, where he considers - what? He has no dominion here, with her. Maybe at the bar.

His pants suddenly gain pockets and he shoves a hand in, pulls out something round and thin and sticks it under his tongue. It's quite rude to talk when one's sucking on spiked wafer candy. He does so anyway, pupils dilating in slow increments and hands slack and twisting at his sides.

"Bi' rainy."

Syllables wet with saliva and his head tilts to one side, hair shaggy and green and doglike. His shoulders are tensed up high and there's something to the weight distribution of his hips that invokes a sense of past injury or scar tissue, maybe an immediate need for a chiropracter. Di rolls up onto the balls of his feet and back, his own teeth showing. They are not white or perfect, and the canines are too blunt.

"So. You look -"

Dionis doesn't bother with lengthy observation, just a flick of eyes over her face, chest, thighs. Lingers a little at the arc of her neck, like he's expecting to find something there or monitoring the apparent pulse and what's beneath.

"Good."

Tongues his bottom lip - chapped, a bit scabbed. He looks like a lot of things that he is. Druggie. Wasted. A little out of place. He is a brilliant counterpoint to her studied elegance and makes the casino as a whole look a bit cleaner in comparison.

Her smile wavered for a second, between 'a little scornful' and 'I'll just play along'. It settled on 'I'll just play along'. "Why thanks, hon. You look," she paused, rooting through her vocabulary for a word other than high. Finding none, she repeated Di's own word: "-good, as well. Now, what name may I call you by? We can't expect this conversation to go anywhere without a formal introduction, m-hm?"

Fortuna pushed the black stiletto heel of her shoe into the carpeting, leaning on it as if she was about to stand. Without coming an inch closer, she seemed to be pressed up against him, in the manner of the young girlfriends of old rich men. In reality, she was nowhere close to touching him. Nor did she feel she wanted to be.
She didn't quite like the idea of perpetual revelry..

Fortuna liked contrast. An example of contrast? Joy was so much better when set alongside misery.

A slot machine rang loudly, with the joyous explosion of noise that announced a win. The old man at the machine had been playing it for the last ten hours, straight. He had a weak heart. The shock of the sudden win was tremendous. He may, perhaps, have a heart attack.

Eyes flash wide with - surprise, mostly. Something not quite akin to shock, edging towards a respectful bewilderment. Introductions - he hasn't, in a while. He forgets - Times change. He's always been Dionis. Maybe not to the Romans, maybe not - but he has, for as long as he. For as long as he remembers. But the others -

"I forget," he says, and his back is angled straight and lilted at one side, "that some of us.."

Hears the bells, and feels the surge (proximity to this avatar and it's strange, really, that betting isn't Revelry but really, winning is) and the man's heart beneath it; pupils blown wide like Di's been shot and he has been, of course, and he knows how it feels from all manner of angles. Di's also had heart attacks, the closest thing to, and he remembers that too. Remembers how easy it is to get by them, if one were inclined to, and he maybe doesn't change anything but it's not like Az is needed here. Not now. But. Luck changes.

Head tilted, and he seems to have forgotten his place entirely, in words or this room or anywhere else, something thick and heavy coating his stomach and veins and bitter against the back of his tongue, skin humming and a sick shade of green. Fortuna leans forward, he doesn't move, doesn't - consider doing so.

"Dionis", he says, with barely a capital letter. Like 'palm frond', or 'cough', just another noun. Waits for hers, even though - well. He knows it. She's a Minor - she is what she is.

"Around here, they call me Fortuna. Lady Luck to some," she said, though her own name hadn't really been asked. Just introducing herself, after all. She twisted her body to one side to observe the man at the slot machine. He was making gasping sounds, speechless at finally winning.

Fortuna turned back to Dionis, placing her index finger against her lower lip and tilting her gaze towards the ceiling in a mock-thoughtful pose. "I wonder if he'll be living long enough to enjoy his winnings?" she mused aloud.

A smirk twitched at one corner of her mouth, - a cold, amused smirk.

Slight incline of head at her introduction - no handshake, no bowing. Easier that way, especially with what feels like the marrow in his bones cooling and solidfying into new, interesting shapes. The patterns of the carpeting are rapidly gaining massive spiritual significance, and Di watches them with something akin to reverence. Slight twitch when she smirks.

"Mm. If you're curious enough, you could always summon Az."

He doesn't, at the moment, remember how to do so, or he might offer. The rituals were always a bit haughty to him. Blood this, rose petals that, dance a jig to the Beach Boys. No one's bothered with his for a while.

"Perhaps," she said quietly. If her eyes hadn't been the dark pools that they were, they would have been glimmering with mischief. "Perhaps might give him a quick ring, find out what he's been up to...."

She sighed. "Do you know what I would dearly love to do, honey? Play a good game of so-called chance. Are you up for it?"

Eyes widen and they're not even grey anymore, they're just not - anything else. His skin, too - just green. Superman-in-Kryptonite-death-throes green and glowing. He's still stuck on the thought of actually calling Az, to here, when she moves on to the proposal.

Chance. He - man, Dionis knows Az cheats, he's not about to play with Luck. Or he wouldn't, were he to consider this, were the consideration to stick. Instead he's gone somewhere into the back of his head; calling spells, Az, carpeting, and the hum in the background of people, quarters, slots.

"How d'you play?"

Everyone has their rules.

"Oh, I don't know... it depends on the game. Something simple, maybe. We could get a few folks together and play,...Go fish, crazy eights, ... even roulette. Anything of that type. Take your pick," she said, nonchalant. A slim eyebrow was raised. "Are you feeling alright, hon? You're turning a very interesting shade of green. Been drinking out of a glow-stick or something?"

Quick, hard shake of his head - feels the movement in his temples and nowhere else, a dull floating throb of liquid pressure.

"Tried that. Tastes like shite."

There's a sheen of sweat along his forehead, upper lip, clinging to his eyelids and as it grows there's a smell that accompanies, not unpleasant but strong, like incense on clothing. Myrrh. Warm, wooden, a bit smoky. A bit like a woman's perfume.

"Besides, look who's talkin', Miss Black-Eyes."

Chews on the edge of a fingernail.

"Go Fish?"

He should possibly sit before he loses the option to consciously do so.

"Go Fish? Sounds good to me," she nodded, producing a deck of cards, sealed and unmarked. She wasn't a cheater. She didn't have to be one. "Are you any good at it?"

Funny question to ask. Actually, Fortuna wasn't fond of playing the games herself. She preferred to watch, lean at someone's elbow for a while before moving on to the next player. It wasn't much fun to play, herself, when she knew she could win.