Encounter

The dim light above the rickety wooden table cast an eerie glow over Kusho Kagami's hunched posture. 

His hand gripped at his disheveled black medium cut hair, fingers scrunching nervously as thoughts raced through his mind.

The whir of the ceiling fan was the only sound that enveloped the bare motel room.

Kusho's eyes were downcast, his expression was one of despair and denial as the reality of his situation began to sink in. 

"How could I have been so careless?"

He knew, deep down, that it was a foregone conclusion that he had lost.

The significance of thoes words 'he had lost' were quite easy for simple for him to contemplate, yet he fought against it's meaning.

Despite his clear understanding, Kusho avoided dwelling on it as it caused him discomfort or pain. It was easier to push it away, yet that just let his delusional thoughts twist his judgment even more instead.

"What can I do to regain my loss...is it even possible?" His grip on his hair as this thought echoed through his mind "No, no there must be a way to come back from this."

"Did I overlook anything? He has won so many games against me...Wait! Yes, that must be it!"

A fragment of hope flickered across his face as he latched onto the idea.

 "I will win the next one! Of course, I'll win the next hand." Kusho nodded firmly to himself, finally releasing the tight grip he had on his hair. "After all, most things in life are based on luck. Only God truly knows who'll come out on top. I still have a chance."

But the truth was inescapable. 

By now, Kusho must have lost almost all, if not every single yen he had brought with him to the motel that night to gamble.

Was there still any hope left?

"I win again, Mr. Kagami."

Those were the words that broke Kusho's out from his deep conversation with himself. He looked up slowly to see Shogo, his opponent, smiling slyly as he placed his winning cards face-up on the table's scarred wooden surface.

Kusho's gaze dropped to his own hand, the cards that were gripped in his hands were the sole cause of his loss. He stared at them numbly. 

Why couldn't this just be a dream after all?

The crushing weight of defeat settled onto his shoulders..

A sad, desperate chuckle fought to escape his mouth, a delusional laugh meant to distract from the unimaginable loss he had just suffered.

"I...I can keep playing," Kusho replied quickly, the words tumbling out of his mouth before he could reconsider. He shuffled awkwardly out of his chair, the sound of it making a screeching sound against the hardwood floor.

Digging frantically into his bag, his hands were met with nothing but empty space and crumpled fabric.

It was then that the truth struck him, he was right.

 Kusho had indeed lost every single cent, every last yen that he had desperately brought with him in a long-shot attempt to turn his luck around.

All gone.

The end result was something he had foreseen as a grim possibility when making the decision to finally bet his life away. 

Before this game had arrived, Kusho promised that he would eventually prepare himself if this outcome ever happened, but that day never came. By ignoring any signs that pointed towards this conclusion, he had only managed to solidify it even more thoroughly.

Now he understood the excruciating agony that comes to someone when they understand there is no longer any hope left for them.

A sudden, firm grip on his shoulder jolted Kusho from his spiraling thoughts. 

He turned, startled, to find an imposing figure looming over him. The large man met Kusho's wide-eyed look with a stern gaze.

"If you can't pay, you can't play. That's the rule," the man stated passive aggressively.

Flushed with embarrassment and shame, Kusho had no choice but to admit his abject defeat. 

He rose slowly from his chair, legs feeling like dead weights.

His dark green bomber jacket was the only shield against the heavy silence and soul stern gazes of the other players that had been watching the match.

To Kusho, their expressions seemed to morph into mocking laughter that echoed in his mind. 

"What an idiot, how did he manage to lose all of his money?" he imagined them thinking, taunting his absolute failure.

Each step toward the exit felt heavier than the last, Kusho's feet weighed down by the enormous burden of his defeat. 

He avoided making eye contact with the other players, instead focusing his gaze straight ahead as he slipped away from the table and through the door leading outside.

The cold winter air hit him like a slap to the face as soon as he emerged from the stale interior of the motel. 

The biting chill slashed right against his face, the forceful wind nearly staggering him backwards a step. 

Kusho reached up with a trembling hand to pull the hood of his jacket up over his head, shielding himself cold.

But no amount of layers could protect him from the sour taste of failure. 

Hands shoved deep into the pockets of his coat, he began trudging down the concrete steps to the ground level, shoulders hunched against the biting cold.

What now? The question ricocheted through Kusho's mind. 

He had put so much faith, so much desperate hope, in the idea that God would guide his hands and grant him the big win he so desperately craved. 

But God was nowhere to be found on this frosty night. Just an endless expanse of darkness and crumpled dreams.

After walking about ten paces, head down and chest aching with loss, Kusho's eye caught on a flicker of movement up ahead. 

He lifted his gaze to find a tall, handsome young man leaning casually against the building's outer wall. 

The young man appeared to be around 17 years old, with messy brown hair hanging down over his pale skin and piercing brown eyes - eyes that snapped up to meet Kusho's as he approached.

There was something sharp and penetrating about the kid's stare that caused Kusho's spine to stiffen. It was as if those eyes could understand everything Kusho was thinking, almost like a God could.

Feeling deeply unsettled but unable to pinpoint why, Kusho averted his gaze and tried to walk a little faster to escape that unnerving look. 

But suddenly Kusho felt himself falling, and he falling he was, straight onto the hard ground.

Able to react in time, he stretched out his hands allowing him to stabilize his fall.

Confusion flashed through Kusho's mind. What had just happened?

He snapped his head around to see the young man's foot stuck out - he had been tripped.

But the young man simply stood there, arms buried in his pockets, face blank and impassive, his black quarter zip and brown hair blowing in the wind.

"What's your problem?" Kusho demanded through gritted teeth, his fury from the loss of all his money was now revealing. "You just tripped me for no damn reason!"

The young man's expression did not change. There was no remorse or confusion in his piercing eyes.

"You're a disgrace," he stated plainly, the words hanging heavy between them.

Kusho sputtered, confusion momentarily mixed with his anger as he processed the random insult from this total stranger.

"What...what are you talking about? And who are you?" He pushed himself up off the ground, knees stinging from the harsh impact. 

Brushing himself off, Kusho stared at the young man, trying to intimidate him. In Japan, the young should always respect those who are older.

"That gambler you were just playing against inside," the young man began, nodding towards the second floor room of the motel in which Kusho had just gambled in. "Your opponent, Shogo. He is a much better gambler than you, and that is why he easily took all of your money."

"Much better than me? We played a total of 10 games, I won the first 4 games and he won the last 6," he immediately insisted, shaking his head in denial.

But the young man's gaze didn't waver. "And yet you were the one who ended up with the deficit isn't that right?" he said patronizingly. "When I was watching the rounds in there, I saw how easily Shogo tricked you. It wouldn't surprise me if he's some retired pro swindler."

Kusho opened his mouth to launch another execuse, but the young man didn't let him. "Don't bother denying it. 

He had beaten you before you had even started playing. Those first couple rounds he let you win? That was just his way of building up your confidence and over-inflated ego to get you hooked into keeping the games going."

"No way," Kusho replied angrily, more forcefully this time as he jabbed a finger towards the young man. "Those first rounds were just the pay off of my bluffing skills, I could tell my practice was paying off"

An audible scoff came from the young man. "You're being naive. That's exactly what Shogo wanted you to think." His tone carried a hint of disdain, as if he was talking to a child.

"After you had won those first games, and you felt invincible, superior to Shogo. That is when he had beaten you"

Kusho felt his brow furrowing in bewilderment at the young man's accusations and unflappable confidence. "After he let me win the first games? I already told you those games were completely fair" he shot back heatedly.

But the young man simply shook his head in a slow, exaggerated display of disappointment as a grin spread across his face.

"Don't be stupid. After getting you fully invested and arrogant, Shogo flipped the script. He demolished you game after game after game without breaking a sweat. But by then, your own supreme arrogance had you utterly convinced you were just suffering an unlucky streak that was bound to turn around eventually. Your bets increased game after game, and by the blink of an eye, it was now Shogo's. Like taking candy from a child"

As much as Kusho wanted to reject what the young man was saying, he now had realized it. He had been completely and utterly controlled by that man. Shogo.

"But...but why is it not possible for me to eventually win, even if Shogo is some sort of brilliant gambler?" Kusho asked, his voice edged with a desperate rasp. "Having a low probability doesn't make something impossible. In the end, gambling is still a game based on luck and chance, right?"

The young man's expression turned grim. "That's where you're wrong," he stated bluntly, his eyes piercing in. "There is no such thing as 'luck' when it comes to geniuses and con artists like Shogo. Even if luck did exist as a force, he would still always find a way to game the system in his favor."

Kusho was now confused. "What do you mean? If I had understood Shogo's trick like you did, I most likely could have figured out a way to counter it. So how can you be so sure about that?" he challenged.

The young man let silence sit for a while, his hair blowing in the wind. He simply met Kusho's gaze with his piercing stare. "You seriously think that small trick is the only thing Shogo has up his sleeve" he said, letting out a laugh. "Shogo is cheating as well, and most likely in a way only someone more genius than him could counter"

Just then, Kusho felt his heart kick up its cadence as hope, unbidden but insistent, flared to life in his chest once more. He immediately leaned forward, words tumbling from his mouth with desperation.

"Tell me! Tell me how that bastard is cheating so I can go back in there and get my revenge! I need to expose his cheating ways and take back what he stole from me!"

The young man's smile dropped once again, he seemed unmoved by Kusho's anguished plea.

His only response was to utter a single word. "Why?"

Kusho sputtered, gripping at the air with both hands. "Why?? I just told you. To get revenge on that so-called genius for stealing all my money in a scam! I'm in deep debt and I desperately need that money back. Shogo swindled me out of over 290,000 yen, every last cent I brought with me tonight!"

The young man simply looked straight at Kusho, his face an emotionless mask once more. "No, that's not what I mean," his face started to derange…slowly changing into a maniacally smile "I mean why do you think have the privilege of being the one who does that"

A heavy silence fell between them like a suffocating blanket. The young man continued, his face returning to normal, "I uncovered Shogo's cheating methods all by myself through careful observation. So why exactly should I share that valuable information with you, a stranger, to help get your petty revenge? I don't even know who you are."

Kusho opened his mouth to argue further, but nothing came out except a pained, wheezing sound. 

Tears of despair and defeat began welling up unbidden in his eyes as the weight of his loss, of his utter failure, crashed down upon him in that moment with the force of a tidal wave.

He bent forward, crumpling to the cold ground as his body was wracked with ragged sobs. 

Head cradled in his hands, Kusho began whispering despondently through the tears and shuddered breaths.

"Please sir, my name is Kusho Kagami. Please help me so I can at least get some of my money back, I will do anything you want just help me!"

Kusho's words dissolved into unintelligible gasps and hitches as he wept openly on the ground, drawing his knees up tight against his chest.

He felt so small in that moment, like an insignificant speck of dirt being ground into the uncaring pavement.

The young man started to smile jokingly. "You can call me Takashi. Takashi Taiko. I'll help you out but not in the way you want, but trust me it will be much more worth it because I have a plan to beat Shogo. All you have to do is do this one thing for me."