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Junk!!V4LJD3AmOx 2011/08/17(Wed)23:59 No. 341132 ID: 07416a

I am still breathing. My brothers are not. Six of them lie dead, scattered around the table. I am the one who killed them. We had been playing poker, as usual. What was far less usual is that I was winning. Gambling is my second greatest weakness. Addiction is my worst. Junk is my name. Mana is my poison and the sweetest poison it is. Mana is power and mana is change. I will do anything for it. I have done everything for it.

First was Border. I once caught him raping a young girl. I turned my back on it. I could smell mana and didn't want to watch. I am not sorry for his death. I had won my third hand in a row and the last of his loot. so he accused me of cheating. As this was Border he did so by jumping up from the table, sweeping my kit onto the floor, dragging me from my seat, and spitting his accusation into my face. As I had been employing said kit I was full of quicksilver essences and reacted more violently than was my want. I grabbed a nearby goblet and attempted to smash him in the face.

Second was Miser. Miser was a miserable penny-pinching alcoholic who would steal the alms from a beggars bowl. I would do the same if I saw it first. His death was no great loss. He was drinking from the goblet that I had attempted to grab. My hand instead landed upon a hilt. Border jerked back and instead of carving open his cheek the blade went through his throat. I became lost for a moment in the sensation of blood on my face- I am always surprised by arterial spray- but was brought back to reality by the drunkard's hand pulling on my shoulder. I spun and planted the blade in his eye. As he stumbled back a card slipped from his sleeve. An ace of crystals, to be exact. I watched it flutter to the ground

I caught Brook's fist as tried to punch me and countered it easily. I could feel his neck snap. I am not this fast. I am not this strong. Brook was not a bad man, just a bad worker. He was lazy and stupid and had failed at everything he had tried his hand on before he fell to mercenary work. Raiding peasants when you're the one with the horses and the armor is really quite easy.

His wife was the fourth or the fifth. I'm not sure. They called her Cunt. I had never found a reason to address her, she never had anything I wanted. She jumped at me screeching like a banshee and I threw her into the wall. I heard something crack. She was loyal to Brook beyond reason and had followed him from the moment of happy marriage through each successive failure. I think that when they had arrived at the camp she had two children clinging to her waist, wide-eyed with fear. I don't recall seeing them them lately.

Jack was sprinting to the door when my chair caught him in the back of the head. He went down like a rock. He hadn't even gotten a new name yet. He hadn't even been blooded. I crouched and yanked the dagger from Miser's eye then turned and slit Cu- Brook's wife's throat. Best to be sure of these things.

I could see Xin rising from his chair as I rounded the table. He waited as I knelt to finish Jack. Xin loved me. I don't know why. The only time I ever paid attention to him was when I wanted something from him. More money, more crystal, money to get more crystal or just someone to hold me through withdrawal. Once I was done with him I was done. He opened his arms and closed his eyes as I slid the dagger into his heart. His death is the only one I regret.

Then it was done. The quicksilver feeling slowly fled. I wonder why I killed Xin. He did not deserve to die and there was no reason to kill him. That man would have followed me to hell just for the hope of my smile. He would have been useful in so many ways. I could blame the mana, but it does not affect my judgment. Whatever I have done was all my fault.

I turn to inspect my kit. It isn't broken, but what little mana remains is barely enough for three days. If I had to spellcast, and I will, it won't even last that long. I could take some of the loot and head into the Swell, but the Clan knows all my fences and suppliers. I'd be on my own, hunted, in an endless city of unfriendly millions pursued by those who know me best and soon will call me betrayer.

On the other hand I could head into the Wake. We were running perilously close to the edge as it is, it'd be so easy to just slip behind the edge of civilization. That's the source of the mana. It's so plentiful there that you can just breath it in- but so can everything else. The unmen and sorcerers and beasts. Only the crazy or the desperate go there, but I am both now, I think.

Which shall I choose?

Currently one vote city one vote Wake one vote left.