Jeeb cheats his baboon

In the deep recesses of Cape Town’s underbelly, where even the feeble light of the moon dared not tread, Jeeb stood—a dark figure carved from the same grim substance as the alley itself. The shadows clung to him like a second skin, their inky tendrils barely disturbed by the harsh strobe of light that sporadically burst from above. This light was cruel, slicing through the blackness in jagged intervals, revealing in agonizing detail the squalor of the scene: the crumbling walls, the damp air thick with rot, and the pitiful creature huddled at Jeeb's feet.

The baboon, a creature once full of vitality and pride, was now a wretched caricature of its former self. Its fur hung in filthy, matted clumps; its eyes, once sharp and filled with life, were now dimmed with the weariness of one too long acquainted with despair. The pitiful animal was beyond the reach of hope, yet in the flicker of its hollow gaze, a spark of desperate yearning remained. It was this glimmer that Jeeb had come to extinguish. On the rickety table before him, three cups—chipped and stained by the grime of a thousand deceits—stood waiting. Each cup bore the weight of a thousand lies, and beneath one, a small, smooth stone lay hidden, though not by chance. Jeeb, thin as a wraith, crouched low, his hands trembling not with fear or uncertainty, but with a perverse excitement. This was his stage, and the baboon his final audience.

“Once more, my old friend,” Jeeb murmured, his voice thick with a venomous sweetness. “This is your last chance. Pick the right cup, and you walk away from this hell. But choose wrong…” He let the words hang, suspended in the fetid air, the unspoken consequence more terrifying than anything he could articulate. The baboon, shoulders hunched, its breath a ragged rasp, looked at the cups with a mixture of fear and a forlorn, almost pathetic resolve. It knew the game was rigged. It had always known. But this was all that was left to it—this final, hopeless gamble for a freedom it could no longer imagine.

Jeeb’s fingers moved with a practiced ease, shuffling the cups with a speed that was almost supernatural, the sound of ceramic against wood a sharp counterpoint to the oppressive silence of the alley. The baboon’s eyes followed the movement, though it was futile, the cups blurring into a meaningless whirlwind before they settled into their final positions. Jeeb’s smile widened, a thin, cruel slash across his gaunt face. The strobe light flickered once more, casting long, distorted shadows that seemed to mock the baboon’s every breath.

Time, in that dreadful moment, seemed to stretch and warp, each heartbeat a painful eternity. The baboon hesitated, a trembling finger hovering over the cups. Left, right, middle—it didn’t matter. Deep down, in the core of its being, it knew the outcome was already decided. Still, it reached out, its clawed hand pointing at the cup on the left. It was a choice born of nothing but despair, a move made not in the hope of winning, but in the resignation to a fate long since sealed.

Jeeb’s eyes glinted with a sadistic glee as he lifted the cup, the baboon’s breath catching in its throat. Beneath it, there was nothing but the bare, splintered wood. The emptiness, the confirmation of the baboon’s deepest fears, was more than the creature could bear. Its body sagged, collapsing in on itself as if the very life had been sucked out. Jeeb let the silence linger, savoring the sight of the baboon’s abject surrender. Then, with a mocking flourish, he lifted the middle cup, revealing the stone—so small, so insignificant, yet holding the power to destroy.

The baboon did not react, its spirit crushed beyond the possibility of recovery. It stared blankly at the ground, no longer seeing, no longer caring. Jeeb stood slowly, the satisfaction of victory a bitter taste on his tongue. He had broken the baboon, snuffed out the last of its defiance, and yet, as he turned to leave, he felt nothing but a hollow emptiness where triumph should have been.

The alley swallowed him whole, his figure disappearing into the oppressive darkness, leaving behind only the flickering light and the broken baboon, abandoned to the cold, unfeeling night. In that forsaken corner of the city, where the light barely held its ground against the encroaching shadows, there was no mercy, no deliverance—only the relentless cruelty of fate and the final, crushing loss of a creature too defeated to even mourn its fate.