Chapter 2: The Many Reasons I Left

I’m not about to tell you everything that happened in my first life. That would be many books worth of stories. To understand me and why I end up doing the things I do, you will need to know the basics of what makes me tick.

Considering all the things I had going for me, you would think I would have led an exceptionally good life. I had the same IQ as Michael Faraday, and I was fit. By the time I was 14, I could leg press over 1000 lb., and had exceptional endurance. When I was in my prime, I was so fit; my heart would fibrillate. It couldn’t keep up with the rest of my body.

It was how I got in shape that was the problem. I grew up in a violent hick village in northern BC. The closest police station was in town, a 25-minute drive away. If you phoned the cops, they knew that by the time they got there, the criminal would be long gone, so they wouldn’t even try. They would typically get there 2 hours after you phoned.

A study was done on the region, which suggested at least 50% of all households within the area had at least one person in an abusive situation. I was the one in my household. My parents never laid a hand on me. They would tell me to shut up and go to my room whenever I told them how I was always under threat of abuse. The other kids in the village were jealous and ended up giving me gang beatings all through grades 1 - 7. It didn’t matter what I said or did; my parents never cared. I could show them my long list of severe injuries as proof and would be told to stop making up stories and go to my room. By the time I was 14, if you were to ask me for a list of past injuries, I would list off the injuries I didn’t have because it was the shorter list.

One day, I woke up and said fuck this shit and started going after the kids one at a time. At first, that just made it worse. I had to show them; however far they were willing to go, I was ready to go farther.

That didn’t work out so well either. Hicks aren’t the brightest tools in the shed. By the time I reached high school, I had a reputation as the toughest kid around. Every dumb hick kid that wanted to prove he was a man would take a swing at me. At least then it was one on one instead of gang beatings. Heck, the first time I fought three guys at the same time, they didn’t have a chance. I was so used to having 10 - 20 guys attack me at once. With only three, it was too easy.

All of the fights kept me in good shape. Even after I stopped the gang beatings, I would have up to 3 fights a day. From grade 2 to grade 10, I never had a chance to heal between altercations. I was constantly injured. I didn’t have a single injury free day. By the time I was old enough to take off for the summer, I already had a list of permanent injuries that would take decades to heal if they ever did. I would be in my 30s before I had my first pain-free day.

I was a determined kid. Despite doing a stint homeless while going to school, I graduated on time.

Even after leaving that harsh life and my family behind, my life never got better. I knew what it was like to be the helpless victim that couldn’t defend himself, so I was a sucker for helping people that couldn’t help themselves. I ended up back in Fort Grand, the town by the village where I grew up. Only this time, I was a police informant. I was informing on a small organized crime outfit.

These assholes were praying on the poor that couldn’t afford it. People were coming from all over Canada to work in the oil fields of northern BC and Alberta. They would often arrive without a penny left to their name. Just as they were starting to get their heads above water, the Filipinos would rob them of everything they owned. In a small town like that, they were knocking off multiple homes every weekend.