With no weekly stat reports to do, and with not a lot of exciting things on the forum, I thought I would liven things up with the first official kdice novel. I will start out the novel to set the context. Feel free to add your own chapters to guide the story.

--skrum

DIAMONDS ARE ALL KINDS OF FOREVER
by
skrumgaer et. al.

CHAPTER 1

The smell of a casino is nauseating at three in the morning.

A man in white slacks and a blue golf shirt stood at the railing of a deck of the casino, gazing at the reflections of lights dancing in the waters of Buzzard Inlet The halyards?

?That?s Burrard Inlet, not Buzzard Inlet?, said a voice.

?Oh, sorry?, said the Author.

--gazing at the reflections of lights dancing in the waters of Burrand Inlet. The halyards of moored sailboats slapped against their masts in the fresh breeze.

The man in the blue golf shirt took a few last puff on his cigarette--made for him specially with three gold bands--tossed it into the gold-plated butt kit provided by the management, turned, and strolled back into the casino.

The next game was about to begin. An attendant unhooked a velvet rope to allow the man in the blue golf shirt to enter the gaming area. He turned and followed the periphery of the arena until he reached the blue curtain that marked his booth. He lifted the curtain aside, entered, and sat down.

When his eyes were adjusted to the gloom, he saw the ghostly gaming board below him, and, around its periphery, the soft glow of lamps: onyx, aquamarine, carmine, emerald, violet, lemon. A soft azure lamp shone under his own window.

The game began. Ghostly holographic images of dice appeared on the board. Giant hands rolled dice, armies advanced, and armies were vanquished. The man in the blue golf shift moved his mouse with skill. In time, only he and aquamarine remained. Aquamarine rolled and lost, sent up his flag, and his dice turned grey. The dice vanished, a giant holographic rake pushed giant holographic chips with diamonds on them in his direction, and a holographic croupier intoned, ?le bleu, deux cent quatre vingt points?. The man in the blue golf shirt was electric with excitement?not because of the two hundred and eighty points, but because of the outcome of the last roll which was still on the screen.

He had defended an 8 v 8. But not an ordinary 8v8.

He had successfully defended a 1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1 versus 1,1,1,1,1,1,1,1.

Only once before in the history of kdice had this outcome occurred?in Royale-au-Mer just before the war. All casinos had a standing offer that anyone who won such a standoff would received a hundred thousand francs.

The curtain stirred behind the man with the blue golf shirt and the attendant peered in; behind him stood a croupier, a flesh-and-blood one this time, who led the man in the blue golf shirt to the caisse.

At the caisse, a cheque was being prepared. The croupier asked the man in the blue golf shirt in whose name the cheque was to be written, and the man said, ?Bond. James Bond.?

James Bond, rather annoyed that through most of Chapter 1 that he had been referred to as ?the man in the blue golf shirt?, pocketed the cheque, turned, and strode out the front door of the casino. He handed his key ticket to the valet, who left and momentarily returned with a gun-metal grey 3.5-litre Bentley, the one with the 3:4 gear ratio and Austin-Villiers supercharger. The valet gestured to Bond, who stood quizzically for a moment and asked the valet to show him the ticket again.

?That?s number 81, not 18?, said Bond.

?Pardon?, said the valet, who drove the Bentley away and returned with a gun-metal grey, 50 cc Vespa with a keyboard between the handlebars and a few other features that had been added by Q Branch. Bond mounted the machine, purred out of the parking lot, and headed down the street toward the hotel, trying to remember to stay on the right side of the road. As he rode, his thoughts turned to his mission. The hundred thousand francs would now make that possible. He recalled old M saying, ?As usual, outbound trip and funeral expenses are payable by us. The rest is up to you?.

Bond recalled that last meeting in M?s office by Hyde Park earlier in the spring. Bond had sat down for the hundredth time, perhaps the two hundredth time, opposite those same rheumy eyes and that same grey drooping mustache. M ought to have retired a long time ago, but pensions in the Secret Service were not that good.

?We need someone who?s good at kdice. Chess, too.?, M had said. ?You?re the man.? Pigeons on the window sill outside pecked forlornly at a raisin-filled bun that had been propped up on the inside of the glass. ?Here?s what you need to get started?. M handed Bond a stiff brown envelope with a single large red wax seal.

Bond had managed to convince M that after twenty-eight James Bond novels the Universal Export cover had been blown. Smirking hotel clerks would ask, ?Universal Export? 007? How?s old M doing?? So Bond had set up a new cover. He would go as a professor of ornithology with a specialization in birds of the Caribbean. He would report to Station in J in Jamaica rather than directly to London. Bond liked oblique control.

Bond broke the seal. Inside was a single sheet of paper and on the sheet was one image.