Sap Part 1

I don't know when they started selling it or why it had become illegal at the time, but Sap had been a hot item on the black market for a while and as a dealer, that meant I was doing exceptionally well for myself as an orphaned 17 year old who lived on the streets.

I didn't mind it though. Being an orphan. I liked it better on my own. I ran away from the state homes when I was 13. It was only a few months after I ran that I discovered Sap. I had met a kid about the same age as me around the Aqueducts, which was a commonly used hideout for runaways and homeless as no one liked to chance the hike to them. Luke had found me hiding in an ally behind a donut shop one night about a week after I ran. He too had been orphaned but ran before he was put through the system. Seeing as he had no family it wasn't all that hard for him to run without fear of someone coming to look for him or file reports with the police.

Luke had a very unpleasant life. He was beaten by his dad and ignored by his mom. He had only ever really known pain and didn't have any type of childhood. His mom and dad were collectors of Sap and used Luke to mule the unrefined product around the city to the dealers who purified it. So needless to say, he grew up around the stuff. I, however, lucked out as I was born and raised outside the city on a little farm. My parents were self sustaining citizens who pretty much kept to themselves. It wasn't until I was about 12 when they were murdered.

You see, about 12 years ago, when I was 5, there was a crime spike that started happening across the nation and with so few people willing to put their own lives on the line over staying home and protecting their family, there wasn't much police force to help keep the numbers down. I didn't know it then but that was about the time that Sap hit the market and people started using it hard. Back then the product wasn't refined and sold in the most dense and purist form which had alot of people feeling invulnerable and untouchable. Due to that they decided to start killing and robbing people for money to buy more and never worried much about the emotional toll they were putting on themselves as they were riding the high when committing the crimes. That's what happened the night they came to the house.