AU General Info

[temperedadmin]

Skaia City was a peaceful place, the shining jewel of the city being the Hope Casino and Hotel in the heart of it all. High class, but with lenient enough standards to keep even the low class public happy. After all, the one in charge of it all prided himself on being an excellent host. But he of all people knew that peace came with a price. With Skaia being bordered by the two towns of Derse and Prospit, who were swarmed with opposing gangs always looking for a fight on the neutral grounds of Skaia, for a while there it wasn't as peaceful as it is now. Everyone believes that when Mr. Dorian Scratch came to town and set up his business, it was a symbol of change for the city. Hope for a peaceful future and the inhabitants were too pleased by the sudden lack of gang wars to question just how this miracle had happened.

For Mr. Scratch, the answer was simple. Little known knowledge is that Mr. Scratch, or Doc Scratch as he preferred to be called, was not in fact the one who came up with the idea of the Hope Casino and Hotel. Even the well known and powerful Scratch had someone he must report to with every move he makes, one Mr. English who lives on the other side of the town. If Scratch had his way about it it would be Felt Casino instead of Hope, but Mr. English was rather adamant on Scratch not changing anything without his permission. And as both Scratch and English knew, the only way to stop a gang war that has gone on for generations is not to simply build a symbol, but to take down the cause of the problem. That's why Mr. English started his own gang, Alpha Omega, because while they may not be the start of the wars, they would be the end of it and the start of a new beginning. And unfortunately for the gangs of Derse and Prospit, Alpha Omega was not only more well organized but contained far more dangerous people. Because when someone has something they wish to protect, they become that much more powerful together.

Almost all of the employees for the casino were trained assassins, hitman who could deal cards mix drinks and take out troublesome opposition with the best of them. As such the age limit for working at the casino was "technically" 21 because of law standards but as far as Doc and Mr. English were concerned, no age was too young if a child had the will and the talent to go far. After all, Mr. English himself was only fifteen when he started this whole thing with his two best chums Di-Stri and Ro-Lal. They weren't pleased when he said he had no intentions of running the gang after getting things started, the job of a mafia don just seemed so boring compared to what else he had in mind, and the two of them knew him well enough that they wouldn't be able to change his mind. No one asked where he found Dorian Scratch and his two teenage daughters or why he trusted him as he did, but the moment Scratch was put into control the business flourished just as Mr. English hoped it would.

As for Mr. English himself, or Jake as he preferred to be called, he went about his way and set up shop on the other side of town. An indoor shooting range he had built specially for himself. Above the range was a cozy three bedroom house with the basic necessities, and in the basement was where he would set up his illegal arms dealership. Of course, it would be suspicious if he only sold to Alpha Omega so his business was considered neutral grounds where any gang could stop by and scope out his merchandise for the right price. And when he wasn't doing that, he fancied himself a freelance hitman who stopped trouble before it started.

Though before he knew it, the subject of children and how to handle them within such an environment was brought up. Because apparently most of his friends didn't know the meaning of no sex before marriage and there were far too many babies within the first few years of the Casino's establishment. Even Doc Scratch himself had upped his daughter count from two to four, and Jake was saddled with his orphaned niece who's parents had died in a crash on their way back to their island home. So it was decided he would not make it mandatory, but he thought it would be a neat idea to keep it all in the family. Though the options were either a child was raised to be part of the gang or they were not allowed knowledge of it at all in order to keep them safe.

To his surprise, most of them preferred to keep the children in the know about what was going on in the family business, there were only a few cases where they chose to keep the little ones out of danger. Only three of them were actually hidden away from the dark life, one young Sollux Captor who was the illegitimate grandchild of Doc Scratch himself due to Mr. Captor not being able to control himself around Scratch's daughter, along with Karkat Vantas and his little sister Nepeta. Though fate's hand is cruel, and in time the children would be pulled back into the dark world their parents had tried to hide from them, but that wouldn't be for many years still to come.

And even then, more children who weren't even affiliated with the original gang would come to them and become part of the family. Whether it be of their own will, or of the will of their parents who felt the need to sell their child to Doc Scratch to pay off their debts to the casino. But the stories of the poor boy who was abandoned by his family and taken in by a more questionable one, the orphaned boy taken in by a rival gang only to end up right back where he was meant to be, or the way that Jake tricked his dear friend Jane into letting him raise her nephew and turning him into a hitman along with his own niece are for another day.