Michael Kail

History

• Entry 88. History? Why?

  I was told that when I got here, they were going to ask me a lot of questions. I had no idea they were going to ask me as many as they did, though. My name, age, height, weight, previous jobs and their descriptions, what I was here for, and my history. I guess I can understand it all, but my history? What the fuck does my history have to do with anything? I will say, I guess there's really not a lot to get into when it comes to me, and the story was rather short, but in the end... Why the hell does it even matter?
  
  I told them my story. I'm a 30 year old scumbag with no reason to be here but my own. I live for myself and no one else. I take what I want, I do the things I please, and coin excites me almost more than a fun romp with a sassy little lady.
  
  It didn't start that way, though. I guess I was, at one point, a rather decent man, but now I'm like a shady character looking out from behind the shade of my own life. Since coming here, life just feels so surreal. Everything in my life has changed... A little too much. I have always had my dark secrets and my nasty traits, but never did they sit on the surface the way they do now. I feel as if I have been turned inside out, had my inner workings toyed with, and then put back together. These nasty traits and dark secrets feel like they have been amplified one hundred fold. I won't lie... I'm a little afraid of myself now that I think about it.
  
  Enough about that, though... As more will be told of me soon. Life for me started with a bang... Literally. When I was younger, my parents tried to sell me off to slavery... Slavery here at the place I now spend the most of my time. It was initially my father's idea, who told my mother that it'd give them the money to keep their heads above water for a while longer. My mother agreed without a second thought. How do I know? I was in the next room listening when I would have rather never found out.
  
  My parents weren't really good to me. My father was sadistic and cruel at times for no apparent reason, and my mother was the calm, collected one until she was drunk off her ass... Only then did I become a punching pillow for her to release any type of frustration and anger out on. I never understood why it always had to be me, but then again... Hitting my father wouldn't have done much in the way of solve the problems she was clearly having. She wasn't mentally stable by any means, and I knew that the moment my mind was capable of seeing such things. Regardless, I did love her.
  
  The day came, several days later when the man, who I never learned the name of, was due to come get me, coin in hand. I don't know what the intentions of this man were, but by the looks of what goes on here... I can only imagine, and my imagination is quite the vivid one. I went to my father's room in our old, dusty, dirty house. I remembered the guns he always kept beneath the bed, loaded and ready for a gunfight, as in my part of the little town... An overabundance of them took place. I removed both of his revolvers from the box and went to the kitchen. I'd seen him use them in the past, so I had a pretty damn good idea how they worked. There was no way I was going to be sold. No way I was going to be sent off to this shithole to kneel and grovel at the feet of these filthy scumbag sons of bitches.
  
  My mother came into the kitchen first, holding a pot full of soup which she'd been yelling at my father about all day. My last meal at home, I guess. I trained the sight on her forehead, and before she could scream, squeezed the trigger calmly... I was more calm then than I am now when I have to pull my gun on someone. I still remember the hole... And the explosion of bone, brains, and blood that came out the back of her head and splashed the dark walls with glistening red.
  
  The shot alerted my father, of course, because he came running into the kitchen to see what the hell took place. The moment he came in, his jaw dropped and his eyes turned to my still mother on the floor against the far wall. He then looked at me, "You little fucking bastard. I'll have your head!" BOOM! Another shot was fired, this one killing my father instantaneously where he stood.
  
  I can still see it in my head. How the shot didn't drop him at first. As with my mother, the mess went everywhere... But his body remained standing for several moments. I knew he was dead, but his mouth and eyes were wide open. He was staring at me, a look of wonder, hatred, and maybe even bliss painted across his facial features. As he fell, his knees hit the floor first, which made me jump and lower the smoking barrel to aim at the floor.
  
  Why did I do it? I don't fucking know, nor do I care. Well, I guess I do. I'd been consumed by my own anger and hatred, consumed by the fact that my own parents were more than willing to sell off their only son to some random fuck that'd then be able to do whatever the hell he wanted with me. No, I refused. I fired, and I refused. It was easy, almost too easy.
  
  I could say so much about that night, and the way it changed me... Changed me into something I will never return from. I feel as if I deemed myself unworthy of much of anything the moment I fired the second shot. Ever since, life's been hell for me. I don't know what the fuck to do anymore, and it seems like some kind of God I don't even believe in is now looking down on me with a shameful glare... Wondering why the fuck he put something like me on this planet. I feel like a sick recreation... A disgusting mistake that not even I am willing to clear up.
  
  Ever since those days, life has been like kicking cans down the dirt roads in my town... It proved you were lost, worthless, had no meaning, and would never amount to anything. I would know, I did it for a long while, and look at me now. I'm still in the state of life where things seem to simply float on an air that doesn't actually exist, and it makes me wonder what the hell ever happened to me.
  
  I've picked up even more nasty traits. I've shot more men than I can count, each one falling easier than the one before... And now it's like shooting fish in a fucking barrel. It's too easy, but never as easy... Never as easy as pulling the trigger on my parents. I don't understand it, but lately... I've looked at everyone around me as if they were dead. When I pull my gun, time slows down. I meet someone new, and I can see myself pulling my revolver and firing. I don't know why, now do I want to know why, but it scares me to no end. It's sickening when all you see is death, when all you know is hate, disgust, and morbid feelings.
  
  Anyway, I spent a lot of time wandering. I went from town to town as a child, learning new ways, getting better with my new best friends. I named them... Revolver and Revolver. I've met many men and women, and I've killed the most of them before my time in town was done. I've adopted my own ways, and I am my own man. I am me, and nobody can change it. I've forgotten what it's like to feel real, to feel like something worth anything to anybody. I've forgotten what care was, what love is, and what being "normal" is. I don't care, either. I've become something I can very slightly be proud of. I've become a man.
  
  Yes, I am a man. I accept no limits, because a man who has accepted limitation has accepted the fact that he will forever be a man that knows nothing more than what he has willingly allowed himself to learn, this is unacceptable. I want to know it all, I want to feel it all, I want to get my hands dirty. I want to devour every bit of knowledge, and possibly every sick, sorry son of a bitch who crosses my path. I want my hunger... My insatiable hunger to thrive... To become more than I ever could.
  
  I spent several years in a town named Veridan. Here is where I learned who I am, who I really am, and what I am good at. I found myself in the small casinos on a daily basis, and every bit of my money seemed to disappear every time I walked through the door. I was a failure when it came to gambling, and I was burdened with the fact that I had debts to pay for the food I'd borrowed when I had the money to buy it outright. So, I taught myself how to cheat. I counted cards, I watched the men and women who played, and even though I stuck out like a sore thumb at first, I became acquainted with a lot of them, and I learned the games inside and out... And I learned ways to cheat the system. At first it was card counting, then it was card marking. After several years it became card switching, and now I know how to make my own cards. At every given moment there's an Ace up my sleeve, and I am more than willing to use it to get where I need to be in my hand. I don't lose... I never lose...
  
  Except when I lose... I got caught multiple times, and took multiple beatings for what I'd done. Actually, on top of beatings, I even took gun shots. All the while, I was learning. I was soaking up new information, and was realizing what to do and what not to do. Slowly, very slowly, I became rich with anything I wanted. I drank like a fish, and I still do. Women wanted me, wanted everything to do with me. I was invited to special events, taken out to dinner by the most important men of the town. They wanted to know my secrets, they wanted to know how I got where I was. Every woman I slammed my dick into was there for one reason, to find out what was under the mask. They wanted my secrets, they wanted to know what I'd done. Every man that took me out questioned my success in more ways than one. It was disturbing, but life was taking a turn for the better.
  
  I stuck around in Veridan for some time, but I eventually grew tired of it. It was too easy, and at the time, I had nothing more to be there for. I wanted more, I wanted to learn more, become more. So, I set off for a town they called Arignon, and when I got there... My heart jumped into my throat. This place was amazing. It was nothing but casinos, gambling, money, women, alcohol, and anything else I could possibly think of. As a matter-of-fact, I'd call it the best place for a gambler, swindler, and cheater to be. The best part... People knew me by name in a place I'd never been before.
  
  Upon my arrival, I was greeted with open arms. I was handed anything I asked for, and not one man or woman questioned me on the way I got where I was. They didn't care, and I honestly think it's because the most of them got there by the same means I did.
  
  I dove right into my new life in Arignon, and when I was finally able to settle down in my own place, I found I could quite possibly be here for the rest of my life. It was fitting, this place... Everything about it fit me and worked for me. I loved the patrons of every single casino because they were just as crooked as me. Sure, a lot of them had attitudes, and a lot of them were ready to kill a man for just looking at them the wrong way... But it made no difference. I was becoming the same way. In just a week of being in Arignon, I shot four men for trying to cross me, and one for trying to steal the girl I'd taken for the night. Yes, it was a dog eat dog world here, and I fit right in.
  
  Just being here was like a blessing, for every day I was learning something new. I had become a master of catching thieves and cheats, but being one myself... I don't feel I had the right to say anything about it, so I only watched. I watched and learned. I saw so many get caught, so many disappeared into the back rooms where they were never seen again. I don't know what happened, nor do I want to know. Did I get caught here? One might ask that, and the answer is yes. I got caught several times, but in the end, I'm one helluva talker, and I know how to get myself out of situations, which I always did. Sure, I didn't walk out unscathed, but it's better to take a beating like no other than to be killed for stealing from the companies I happened to frequent... Right?
  
  In the end, every beating made me better at my chosen profession. On top of all of it, I was becoming an alcoholic... I mean, I'd had alcohol problems for some time already, but in this place the drinks were free as long as you were playing, and I'd take down ten to fifteen before security stepped in and said something about it to me. I didn't care, as after a while, ten to fifteen drinks did very little. Well, they did a lot, but I was developing my own ways of covering it up without making it obvious. I'd gamble all night, sleep with any woman I wanted during the day, catch a quick nap, and be right back at it as soon as I woke. My life was a simple cycle, soaking up simple things, and I couldn't have loved it more.
  
  My cheating skills were going through the roof, and part of me was starting to think that I was just getting too good for my own good. That was a fucking lie, though! The more I won, the more money I got, and the happier I would become. It was all about money, it was always about money. Money and women, they were all that mattered. So, as my cheating skills got better, I found it would be a good time to branch out into different jobs. Like swindling? Stealing? Oh, yes... I wanted to do them all.
  
  I know swindling and cheating are more-or-less one and the same, but in this case I'd say they were slightly different. I swindled a man for the first time in Arignon. I'd been there for a while and this man had really pissed me off with his petty little fucking problems, and he always liked to step in on the things I started, trying to get me shoved out of the scene all the damn time. So... I cooked up a little lie. I told him I'd do what he needed me to do if he taught me his ways and let me live with him as more of an apprentice. I told him I'd do exactly as he said at all times, and when he wanted me to get something for him, I'd more-or-less be his little bitch.
  
  Of course, he agreed with me, and the moment he agreed with me was the moment he gave up on any chance of having anything of his own. I lived with him for a few months, met his whole family, including his wife, kids, and his friends. He tried to teach me new ways, and even though I knew and understood all of them I acted as if I had no clue. Little did he know, I was being the typical sneaky little fuck I'd become so long ago. I was taking the night time, while him and his wife were sleeping, to go into his study and look into his information.
  
  I wanted to know everything about this bastard, I wanted to find out who he was, where he'd been, what he'd done in his life, and most importantly... I wanted to know how much coin he had in either bank accounts, his house, or stored away somewhere. Sure as shit, he had more than he knew what to do with, and the thought made my mouth water as if someone had handed me a bottle of whiskey and a one pound steak that was meant for me and only me. I had no idea what the hell to do at first, but I figured it out. I was going to take it, but I was going to do it slowly, and I was going to change this man forever, and nobody would know who the hell he was. Sure, they would see him for him, as his appearance would not change... But his name. Oh, his good name was something I was planning on chewing up and spitting out.
  
  Over a few years I worked. I spent my time slowly draining his bank account by using his name in the bank with a new employee that had never seen him before. My "Master" only went to the bank on Wednesdays, and this employee only worked the weekends. So I knew from there that there was no way I'd ever be caught slowly draining him of every coin he owned. I even found a safe code in his desk in the study, it was scratched into the wood on the inside of a drawer... Tricky little bastard. Next to the code was a piece of paper taped in place. It was full of information, like where the safe even was, which was in his room under the second board beneath the bed on the right side where he slept. I found that safe, and I stole everything from it. I knew he never went to this safe, as it was more of a backup for anything he might need in life. I took the jewels, the coin, the account information for anything he had. It was all mine.
  
  When I got done with the safe it was time to work on his oh-so-loving wife. Too easy, for after only a few hours of talking to her I found myself in her bed fucking her brains out, and she was crying out information that I needed for my own profit.