“Where were you people?” Zep asked. “We were wondering when you would finally show up.”

Charlie just laughed, at Zep's outraged face. Troy just stood to the side, trying out that new stone-face technique of his. From the inside, it didn't seem to work, as Zep's face softened slightly, after looking at his face. Troy prayed that she didn't think what he just thought she did.

“Sorry, sorry,” Charlie continuously apologized. “I tried to be smart about this whole thing. Troy is still new here, so he needs the whole account set up. It all turned into a massive waiting in line.”

Taking the blame, now? That was surprising. Troy didn't mind it terribly much, but it still felt unjust to him.

“That was stupid of you”, Esme helpfully pointed out. “Just do it online, and get the paper sent directly to you.”

“Wait, you could do that?” Darlow said.

“Of course you can. Is the air thin up there, or something?” Esme rhetorically asked.

“Now, that's a low blow,” Darlow said. “And, does that apply to other paperwork signings as well?”

“First off, I would like to call it a high blow”, Zep said, much to Esme's pleasure. “To your dumb question, yes, you can. Are you telling me that for the last twenty years, you have been going to physical locations, so you could sign legal documents?”

“... No.”

“You have!”, Esme said. “Oh, this is just hilarious.”

“Nobody told me, so why should I have known that?” Darlow quipped back.

Troy and Charlie were just slowly walking over to the table, and finding themselves a seat. They had gotten off, without too much shouting, and had wordlessly agreed to act like nothing. How this communication found took place, without the two even looked at each other, will continue to be one of man's greatest secrets.

The barrage continued down on Darlow for a little while more. Troy didn't think that it was too far out of fairness. He and Charlie had not known about it either.

Well, it made sense for Troy not to know about it. He had only been working here for a few days. When it came to Charlie, though…

“How long have you even worked here?” Troy asked Charlie.

“About fifteen years, give or take,” Charlie answered with a shrug. “I don't keep count, to be partial with you. The numbers are too depressing to look at. Started as an assistant. Wanted to quit, while still being an assistant. But, I got promoted just before my resignation and did not read the paperwork. How smart I was back then.” The last tone had just a hint of bitterness, over the usual carelessness.

That last bit about paperwork seemed like something Troy should probably ask into. He didn't think he was getting promoted soon, if ever, but details that appeared annoying was likely something he should work to avoid.

“What do you mean by-” Troy began asking but was cut off by another, louder voice.

“Everyone, shut up!”, Zep nearly roared. “We were supposed to start five minutes ago, and not all of us have time to laze so much about. Is everyone ready?”

Around Troy and Charlie, the others confirmed their readiness, either by vocally stating so, nodding, or grunting. Francis was the only one in the last department.

“What do you think your chances are?” Charlie whispered to Troy.

What were his chances?

'If we ignore air resistance as a concept, we have an ideal twenty per cent chance of winning.', Adam supplied, without even being asked.

“Not too bad,” Troy whispered back. This seemed to satisfy Charlie, who went back to a standard sitting position and putting the focus on the yelling Zep.

Troy imitated him. Zep looked at him expectantly, and he hurried in nodding.

“Everybody's ready”, she said to the automation, which was fastened to the side of the table. It looked like they were playing with a poker dealer. Not too game-changing, seeing as they were in a casino.

“Then the game shall begin”, the automation said, pulling a card deck out of nowhere. “Please take your seats, everyone. The game is starting.”

Oh, it was on, Troy thought.

The automation was not technically wrong. But it didn't fit with Adam's worldview.

For the last two minutes, he had been furiously trying to keep up with all the body movements, and getting by in rhythm. Adam had missed the first twenty minutes, and he was paying for it.

The character profiles he had created had been updated since last time, but they weren't enough.

Nevertheless, Adam reviewed them for the thirty-seventh time in the last second.

As always, he started with Charlie. Adam wasn't too sure about his earlier assessment about him being the acknowledged leader of the group. It was closer to call him the self-elevated leader, who only paraded when he wanted to. It was not known how much the others respected this position of self-employed power, but they didn't seem to hate it enough to call it out.

No signs had shown off more than surface-level quirks. But, of those quirks, one seemed good, for Adam's cause. A slight twitch of the brows, and a trace of bitterness in his voice. It hadn't happened often, but it happened for a reason. A reason that Adam could predict. When recounting memories, that wasn't bad in the general sense but were still annoying, these reactions came upon Charlie consistently. Adam wasn't too sure yet, but there was a good chance, that it would happen also when Charlie got less than good cards. It likely wouldn't happen with the worst card combos though. That was wishful thinking, at best. No, it would happen at the middle cards. Those that weren't the worst to have, but people would prefer some better ones. You know the ones, right?

Anyway, if Adam could find the balance, where this reaction happened, it could help in predicting the value of Charlie's cards.

Still, it wasn't proven yet, and only could be confirmed later in the game. That is, if he even revealed his cards at the end or when he folded. Adam could just make Troy ask, but that likely wouldn't work enough times.

He would just figure it out later.

Moving on to the next person, presented Darlow. The height anomaly. The instigator. Those two things just seemed to fit, when discussing him. While Adam had not spent too much time on him, one thing was getting awfully clear. Darlow was a lover of drama. But, he hid it well.

Darlow never instigated anything. Adam didn't see any, at the very least. But, he did observe him keeping the fire going. Without Darlow's subtle comments, arguments would fizzle out after a few moments. But he just kept adding to the problem, and the people around him responded classically to it. Adam wouldn't comment on the ethics of that behaviour, but he did see the analysis of stressful situations and it allowed him with a positive outlook.

In the social hierarchy, Adam deemed him to have moved up. Not that it had changed. No, it was just Adam's perspective that had. With Charlie falling in the perceived group opinion, someone needed to be seen as the leader. While Zep had shown to have some sort of commanding respect, it wasn't too consistent.

When it came to reactions, Darlow kept his figurative cards close. It could even be said, that Adam knew more about Charlie when it came to pure data.

A man that fuels the fires. A man that showed his emotions, but only just. It just worked so well on him. So, why was it so hard for Adam to understand what specific emotions were felt? Darlow should be the easiest to work with, yet it was so hard to get an accurate read on him. Adam was missing something, but he could find it.

He hoped it would show soon, or he would have a permanent wildcard as his title.

Now it was time for the previously mentioned Zep.

Adam didn't have much more with her. As mentioned, she was an inconsistent commander of sorts. She could order, when needed, but that wasn't a permanent position in the group. Calling her a starter, would fit better, in Adam's opinion. She started the discussions, and she damn well tried to finish them.

Something positive about her was her outright meanings. She showed and said exactly what she said. If that translated over to the game, it would spell winnings for Troy and him.

Speaking of Troy. What had that reaction been to his face? Could it be used for their benefit? Adam wasn't sure. He would need to ask about it when he got the chance.

The next person was Esme. A person, who at first seemed hard to understand and comprehend, but turned out to be much easier than previously thought.

Yes, the sarcastic tones had thrown him off. Adam could accept that. What he couldn't accept, was that he didn't listen to what she said, instead of how she said it.

She wasn't being ironic. She was being meta-ironic. While she was talking in sarcastic tones, she was being wholly truthful in what she said.

How Adam wanted to berate himself for his failures. But, he didn't have time for that. It would just be wasted. He had analysis to do.

And, for the last profile, there was Francis.

Francis could be described as a near void. It should have been physically impossible. Adam got nearly nothing out of him. He knew he had something, but for the life of him, Adam couldn't remember what.

He had looked over himself multiple times. The data was there, but he couldn't use it! Why? It worked with everything else. It wasn't restricting his access, no, he looked at it quite easily. But, it would just go over his figurative head. He couldn't understand it.

How was it happening?

Adam knew that Francis was the focus of it all, but why, he wasn't sure. At the end of this analysis, like all the others, Adam would just classify Francis as a wildcard.

With all the profiling done, he threw himself back into the focus. Only milliseconds had passed, while he looked away, so nothing too spectacular had happened yet. Darlow still looked like he was holding in a sneeze, and Esme was still berating Zep for her tastes in planning schedules.

“Are we just going small bets together, at the start?” Charlie asked the whole group. He got nods in return, which Troy imitated when he noticed.

“No collusion, please”, the automation stated, while shuffling cards at an extreme speed. Adam was surprised at it, to be honest. The calculations needed for such a thing. Maybe it was just prerecorded movements, though. That would suck out Adam's interest in a heartbeat.

“It's not collusion if everybody wins”, Charlie quipped back.

Yes it was, Adam thought

“Yes, it is,” Darlow pointed out. Plus points for him. “If anybody gets anything out of it, its collusion.”

“I'm getting a good look at your long face”, Charlie pushed back. “Does that make it collusion?”

Had Adam really classified Darlow, as the main fire keeper? Charlie seemed eager to challenge him for that particular throne.

“Gentlemen, can we please tone discussion down, and officially begin the game?” the automation said. The two didn't seem to care much about, what it said.

“If you benefit from it, in this game, then yes!”, Darlow said. “And if I get anything out of seeing your bad choices, it'll be collusion on my side too.”

They seemed to be equal, in wanting to keep the discussion going. Too equal, if one could call it. The balance needed to fall, in the name of useful data!

Adam would need to call in assistance, from the higherups. Or would it be lower-ups? Adam wasn't too sure about his personal elevation, compared to Troy.

…

'Troy. Please try to scale, their discussion down.', Adam sent to Troy.

He reacted, with a small twitch in the wrists. But, he didn't seem to move from his position, and certainly not vocalising any sounds. What was wrong?

Was Adam's request too vague? No, it should seem so. Then, what held Troy back, from completing his given mission?

He thought back to a little earlier. During the whole debriefing, Dr Fidelis had spoken to him about his orders directed at Troy. He had informed Adam, that some of them had been… ungrateful if you could call it that.

Adam hadn't given Troy any reason to do the tasks that were asked of him. In Adam's opinion, having the position to specifically do so, should be enough motivation, but that was apparently limited to himself. Others needed outsourced motivators, to be productive for a longer amount of time.

Dr Fidelis had given Adams a couple of different suggestions, in how he could motivate Troy to do the asked tasks. The first, and simplest, was simply stating the goal of the task, along with the request. It somehow gave purpose to the action, which was a strong motivator. Adam had already fallen off the thread there, so he didn't even try to relate to it.

The second method was, giving encouraging words as Troy completed the assigned objectives. Adam thought he had already been doing that. After a few more moments of thought in that direction, he conceded that he had slightly misjudged, what exactly counted as a proper motivational speech.

Giving corrections were not a productive part of an encouraging speech. Dr Fidelis had asked Adam to repeat that sentence a few times. He didn't agree with it, but he would try to follow it as strictly as his reasoning let him.

And, now, it was time to put that information to the practical side of research.

'It's for the sake of learning their personalities further. If you do this, I'll have a stronger grasp on how they will react to outside pressure.', Adam explained to Troy. It wasn't a complete explanation of the task's goal, but it was close enough.

This… actually seemed to work. Troy looked up from the table and even cleared his throat. This didn't catch either of the two's attention, but it was the thought that counted.

“Could you tone it down, please?” Troy politely asked. His face was mostly in the direction of Charlie, who was also the one, that reacted the most to the statement. That might have been due to the low decibel level, which Troy's voice had, but that was just Adam's personal theory. Something that they needed to work on in the future, though. But not mentioned now, of course. That would be demotivating.

Speaking of motivating.

'Nice job.', Adam congratulated Troy. Troy tried his best to hide his reaction to the words, but Adam could feel the impact that it had upon him.

“As Zep said, we are supposed to play a game, and not everyone can have enough free time to enjoy it”, Troy continued, this time a little louder. “If you stop babbling incorrectly at each other, we might actually have time to finish this game of ours together.”

Charlie seemed surprised at Troy's straightness with his words. Adam noted that down, for future reference.

“Troy's right, Darlow”, Charlie said. “Mind getting back to our polite discussion at a later date.”

“Of course, my dear sir”, Darlow said, not quite as polite. “Let us instead engage in this fine challenge of Texas Hold'em.”

Seeing no further distraction, the automation began dealing out the cards.

Oh, the stakes had finally become a reality.

Adam couldn't wait.