[Wolfwood's gonna have to open the door himself. Inside, he will find...
A shitton, a fuckton of unfinished explosives pressed against the walls in stacks. Wolfwood hopefully knows what bombs look like, even in an unfinished state, considering where he's from.
He's clearly up to his elbows in work, or he would've answered the door himself. Without looking up from where he's currently buried in scrap metal and the like, he says:]
[Oh yeah, he knows what bombs look like. He's seen plenty. Had plenty more used against him, too, so seeing this many all bundled up in the building is a little? Concerning??
He can't help but exclaim softly:]
Jesus Christ.
[And then-]
Yeah. Didn't know you picked up a new explosives makin' hobby.
I've always been proficient at it. Did I not tell you?
[He probably left that part out.]
Enciodes and I got something for you and your partners at that house across the river. [So not Ain—] Since all of you mysteriously went missing, I thought you wouldn't want to miss out. So—
[He whistles, and from underneath the desk comes... this little thing.
It clings to Gnosis' leg. Who the FUCK is this MAN—]
It's a creature Enciodes found in what used to be that burned town. He thought it was hiding there, but lost its hiding spots when those areas were fixed.
[Gnosis nudges the little creature over to Wolfwood. It is Yours Now, Yours And Your Partners' Now, Have Fun.]
As far as both of us are aware, it doesn't like to be alone, and likes to be held. I think it'll fit in well with Angelina and that... blob-shaped bird you have.
[Wolfwood extends a hand, gently. C'mere little guy, he isn't going to hurt you. You...remind him a lot of a small orphaned child and that is definitely making him Feel things.
The little thing seems hesitant at first, still trying to hide behind Gnosis' leg. But as Wolfwood kneels there, it eventually gets brave enough to edge a little closer.
It probably helps that Wolfwood is using his other hand to pull a sucker from his pocket.]
Angelina and Bartholomew, yeah. Guess we got room for one more...
[But while he's making friends with Creature, he's looking back to Gnosis.]
Don't try t'change the subject too much. I came to check on you.
[CALLED OUT... Gnosis' headfeathers ruffle visibly, and he smooths them down with a hand. Rude.]
...well, I'm still alive, and I'm trying to stop drinking. [You know, after he nearly fucking killed himself with how much he was having in the wake of Enciodes' death.] It isn't like you to check on me. I take it someone said something?
[Oh no, he made it known that this happened, he just didn't expect anyone who was gone to catch wind of it.]
...at least he came back. There's always a chance he wouldn't have. [Like so many other people that Gnosis has lost over the year he's been here.] The bombs lying around are simply to deal with the threat. I'm planning something of a tactical nuking.
It was the property of Karlan Trade, therefore it fell into Enciodes' immediate jurisdiction — and I was "arrested" for another crime later down the line. It's a long story. Should I put on some tea?
[Wolfwood, do you really wanna sit here for a recap of the entirety of Break the Ice?]
[(sucks in a breath through my teeth) anyway the plot of Break the Ice—
Gnosis will start explaining while he goes to the kitchenette to make that tea.]
As I said, it's a long story. We'll need to backtrack slightly. In Kjerag, our government used to be made up of three clans — the Silverashes, the Browntails, and the Paleroches. The leaders of each being, respectively, Enciodes, a woman named Ratatos, and a man named Arctosz. There's also the Saintess, Enciodes' younger sister Enya, who is considered the speaker for the goddess Kjeragandr, and the Great Elder who assists in holy duties.
Kjeragi people are particularly stubborn, [he says, as the kettle starts to steam,] and quite set in their ways. Out of all Terran countries, Kjerag is considered one of the more backwater — we have very little in the way of technology. We're one of few areas that doesn't get bombarded with Catastrophes — where Originium rains from the skies and causes havoc — but we're also an area that's quite coveted by countries stronger than us. Victoria and their imperialism want to annex us, for example. It's land they can use. Land that's safe.
With all of that being said, I'll stop giving you a history lesson. Before Enciodes and those others I mentioned took over the seats on the Tri-Clan Council, we were normal children once. My family, the Edelweisses, have historically worked with the Silverashes for eons as chroniclers and historians. I met him through them as a child... and we're going to conveniently gloss over the parts where I caused a lot of trouble as a with him.
[Lol. Lmao. Pouring the tea, giving Wolfwood the tea (literal) and sitting down now.]
Rather... one day, his parents were assassinated, leaving him to raise his two sisters alone. We were around ten. As it turns out, this was a conspiracy by the Browntails to throw the Silverashes into a tailspin and take them out of power, but at the time, the Edelweisses were blamed for it. I, a little boy, was to blame for the crime. The people of Kjerag loved the Silverashes, and they needed someone to blame, and who better than a family of three? We were forced to flee to Victoria, but not before I saw Enciodes one last time and agreed to change the country for the better whenever I could come back without being lynched. He did, eventually, join me in Victoria, where we spent our teenage through early adulthood in school. He took up politics, and I took up science. He asked me seriously one day if I'd go back to Kjerag with him, for our "dream", and I agreed.
[Just gonna pause here to give Wolfwood time to think about that infodump before he moves on.]
[Tea is being had, Wolfwood is having a history lesson, and gee this all sounds wildly familiar doesn't it? While No Man's doesn't experience Catastrophes as such, to say that certain areas and bits of land aren't coveted would be an understatement. There are towns that somehow manage to have their own Plants, and people stronger and with more money are constantly trying to steal them. Or, barring that, you have Knives just stealing it outright and destroying the town before they can feel its affects.
He holds his cup between his hands as he listens to Gnosis tell his tale, getting brought up to speed on the former status of Kjerag. His eyebrows raise when he drops the fact that Enciodes lost his parents in such a brutal way (again, where has he heard that before) and was forced to take the helm at such a monstrously young age. A conspiracy...
He grits his teeth behind his lips.]
They blamed a child? For the assassination of two adults?
[He interjects briefly, his gaze sharp and narrow.]
If a coup is what you'd wanted, your family could have orchestrated it fucking decades prior. Sounds like your governing parties from the time had their fucking heads so far up their asses all they could see was goddamn shit.
Mm. Well, it was, as I explained, because the Browntails and Paleroches wanted them out— but yes, my family being framed for the crime was what set the two of us on the next path.
[Maybe if he hadn't gotten accused of being one of the murderers as a child he would be more mentally okay, but anyway! Gnosis is moving on now! Shoving emotions aside goodbye.]
That said, by the time Enciodes and I returned to Kjerag, the former leaders of those clans were not in power anymore, and rather that fell to their children — Ratatos and Arctosz, as I mentioned earlier. Truth be told, my ire shouldn't have been with theirs, but there were other problems. Kjerag is historically isolationist, refuses technological advancements, and set in its "way of life". Other countries want to annex us. Despite being scorned by the people — I wasn't exactly welcome on Kjerag soil when I came back to the country — I do still care about not getting annexed by Victoria, or any other country. But to do this, we needed a proper government, and proper technology to keep ourselves from being seen as a weak and easy target.
All of these are easier said than done when two of your three leaders are incredibly stubborn. Even after Enya took over as Saintess, there was no wake-up call there, either. When Enciodes warned of Victoria's plans, something we were very aware of thanks to living there, there was nothing.
So, essentially, in the shortest terms possible: Enciodes and I faked our divorce. [what] He "fired" me from Karlan Trade, and made it a public spectacle. I offered to cast the Edelweiss name back into the fire for this plan, to be clear — even though it did put me in something of direct danger. "Scorned" and in need of a job, I fled to the Browntails to beg Ratatos and her sibling for a job, promising to share with them the secrets of Clan Silverash. Power-hungry as they are in the wake of the legacy their parents left, they accepted, and I was able to work on dismantling them from within.
[And now he's smirking.]
The railroad bridge bombing was a stunt. The bridge was owned by Karlan Trade, and I blew it up to make the lie more believable, in front of the Browntails and the general population of Kjerag who were there at the time. There were several other things like this that I'll skip over — but know that a lot of it involves further political coups. Befriending a trusted confidant of the Browntails, slipping poison into wine to poison the Great Elder and framing the Paleroches for it, the works.
[Gnosis.]
The friend I made in the Browntail Clan, Monch, I had attempt an assassination on Enciodes, knowing he'd survive it. Of course, Monch was one of Ratatos' people, so there was blowback onto that clan following the attack... Enciodes' bodyguard and my tentative friend Degenbrecher was unaware that Enciodes and I were playing the public, and I did briefly get my ass kicked by her before I was "arrested" and she was let in on what we were doing.
That said, with the Great Elder dead, Enya Silverash as the acting voice of Kjerag, and the other clans knocked out of power as they had once knocked the Silverashes out of, Enciodes has since regained traction in the Kjeragi Parliament, and currently acts as one of its true rulers. I, of course, continue to lie in the shadows and work on technological advancements in the background, and Kjerag has seen enough growth to be able to stand on its own two feet now. Sometimes I act as Speaker of the Parliament, after being "re-hired" and found "not guilty" of the crimes I was accused of.
It's a complicated story, and that's as short as I can make it.
[You know, without going into the part where Enciodes nearly burned to death, Degenbrecher kicking a wall down, Rhodes Island being generally fucking annoying, an entire brief civil war breaking out... like he is Leaving Things Out but that's the gist of the situation.]
Anyway, that's the story of why I bombed a railroad bridge.
[Wolfwood doesn't interrupt (much) while Gnosis tells his story. He does find himself wondering if Gnosis feels any sort of regret for completely and utterly ruining both his own name and that of his family's for the sake of this coup, even if it turns out that he was pardoned publicly by Enciodes in the end. That sort of thing doesn't matter when you've already got half of the public making up their minds about you, but maybe that's just it. He already knew this, so it's not like he'd be losing further favor in their eyes.
It was about helping Kjerag. All about overthrowing those in power who had cheated, lied, and stole their way into it to begin with. They were just evening the playing field, and making fools of their adversaries handily while doing so. He doubts the plan would have gone half as well without both halves of Enciodes and Gnosis working together. One, a political mastermind. The other, a engineering and scientific genius.]
That makes more sense with context.
[Like yes, he did bomb a railroad bridge, but the context means everything here.]
Some say an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind, but an eye for an eye in this case was a long time comin'. You were willin' to play the long game.
[A TERRIBLY long game. But...it's not like he hasn't seen similar. Just look at Vash, and how he's willing to just take the blame for Nai's crimes if it means keeping people safe. He will become the villain just to save the world, and Wolfwood...even to this day struggles to fathom being able to stomach it.
Maybe because he himself has never had such grand aspirations. He's not saving the world, or even one continent. He's just trying to save an orphanage, which maybe in itself is a little selfish, thinking so small.]
Some people play longer games than we do. [Looking directly at Passenger.] But yes, I suppose it did. Granted, Enciodes' sister Enya doesn't speak to him much anymore — but that isn't my story to tell entirely.
[He'll tell what he took part in, but not the family drama that he has no say in.]
We currently have a partnership with a Columbian company known as Rhine Lab, but by the point I was dragged here, the things we were doing to work together were new. Kjeragandr only knows what's gone on in our absence. Either way, as long as technological developments keep Kjerag out of hot water, I believe we'll be alright.
Mmm, yeah. I reckon Kjerag is in better hands with you two than it ever was with any of those other assholes. Like, I get wantin' to stick to tradition as much as the next guy, but if it's a matter of pride versus keepin' up with the way the world is changin'...you don't wanna end up gettin' left behind.
[Wolfwood, of course, has his own feelings and hangups about certain civilizations being granted more power and influence than another simply due to their amount of land, or resources, or whatever. No matter what world you come from- even his, a colonized alien planet divorced from Earth- it's always going to be some kind of hell like that. At least his planet doesn't have constant catastrophes raining down to complicate things.]
But anyway. I kinda get why you've got such a massive stick up your ass, now. [Wow] Your life's been kindof constant bullshit since you were a kid.
Ha. That hardly scratches the surface. We barely talked about my childhood. [Oh, oh no.] Do you want to hear about how Enciodes and I got kidnapped as children first? Or about how my parents didn't want me?
[Wow you stopped drinking and now all your emotions are just Out now, huh.]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
succiduous) wrote2023-07-30 08:17 pm
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A shitton, a fuckton of unfinished explosives pressed against the walls in stacks. Wolfwood hopefully knows what bombs look like, even in an unfinished state, considering where he's from.
He's clearly up to his elbows in work, or he would've answered the door himself. Without looking up from where he's currently buried in scrap metal and the like, he says:]
Yes? [...] Oh, Wolfwood, you're back.
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He can't help but exclaim softly:]
Jesus Christ.
[And then-]
Yeah. Didn't know you picked up a new explosives makin' hobby.
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[He probably left that part out.]
Enciodes and I got something for you and your partners at that house across the river. [So not Ain—] Since all of you mysteriously went missing, I thought you wouldn't want to miss out. So—
[He whistles, and from underneath the desk comes... this little thing.
It clings to Gnosis' leg. Who the FUCK is this MAN—]
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[But you know what, it's fine. This is just new knowledge he has about Gnosis now. He's not even really that surprised, hearing it.
Also hang on don't change the subject he's trying to be a good friend here-]
...hah? What's this?
[Wolfwood...force of habit, really, crouches down into a squat when he realizes Gnosis has just. AN Child???]
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[Gnosis nudges the little creature over to Wolfwood. It is Yours Now, Yours And Your Partners' Now, Have Fun.]
As far as both of us are aware, it doesn't like to be alone, and likes to be held. I think it'll fit in well with Angelina and that... blob-shaped bird you have.
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[Wolfwood extends a hand, gently. C'mere little guy, he isn't going to hurt you. You...remind him a lot of a small orphaned child and that is definitely making him Feel things.
The little thing seems hesitant at first, still trying to hide behind Gnosis' leg. But as Wolfwood kneels there, it eventually gets brave enough to edge a little closer.
It probably helps that Wolfwood is using his other hand to pull a sucker from his pocket.]
Angelina and Bartholomew, yeah. Guess we got room for one more...
[But while he's making friends with Creature, he's looking back to Gnosis.]
Don't try t'change the subject too much. I came to check on you.
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...well, I'm still alive, and I'm trying to stop drinking. [You know, after he nearly fucking killed himself with how much he was having in the wake of Enciodes' death.] It isn't like you to check on me. I take it someone said something?
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[Sorry Gnosis. In fairness to him though, it probably wasn't much of a secret if you were blowing shit up about it.]
...m'sorry that happened.
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...at least he came back. There's always a chance he wouldn't have. [Like so many other people that Gnosis has lost over the year he's been here.] The bombs lying around are simply to deal with the threat. I'm planning something of a tactical nuking.
[OKAY. STOP PLANNING THAT.]
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[Asked by local man who just watched a tactical nuke blast a city off the face of the planet like-???]
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[GNOSIS, PLEASE]
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[Gnosis???]
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I bombed a railroad bridge when Enciodes and I were faking our divorce once.
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[Wolfwood's expression right now is hilarious, truly.]
So how exactly did you avoid prison for that one?
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[Wolfwood, do you really wanna sit here for a recap of the entirety of Break the Ice?]
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Yaknow what? Fuck it. I came here to talk, so let's fuckin' talk.
[Put on that tea while he finds a chair to sit in, tell him your sordid backstory maybe it'll help you both feel better.]
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Gnosis will start explaining while he goes to the kitchenette to make that tea.]
As I said, it's a long story. We'll need to backtrack slightly. In Kjerag, our government used to be made up of three clans — the Silverashes, the Browntails, and the Paleroches. The leaders of each being, respectively, Enciodes, a woman named Ratatos, and a man named Arctosz. There's also the Saintess, Enciodes' younger sister Enya, who is considered the speaker for the goddess Kjeragandr, and the Great Elder who assists in holy duties.
Kjeragi people are particularly stubborn, [he says, as the kettle starts to steam,] and quite set in their ways. Out of all Terran countries, Kjerag is considered one of the more backwater — we have very little in the way of technology. We're one of few areas that doesn't get bombarded with Catastrophes — where Originium rains from the skies and causes havoc — but we're also an area that's quite coveted by countries stronger than us. Victoria and their imperialism want to annex us, for example. It's land they can use. Land that's safe.
With all of that being said, I'll stop giving you a history lesson. Before Enciodes and those others I mentioned took over the seats on the Tri-Clan Council, we were normal children once. My family, the Edelweisses, have historically worked with the Silverashes for eons as chroniclers and historians. I met him through them as a child... and we're going to conveniently gloss over the parts where I caused a lot of trouble as a with him.
[Lol. Lmao. Pouring the tea, giving Wolfwood the tea (literal) and sitting down now.]
Rather... one day, his parents were assassinated, leaving him to raise his two sisters alone. We were around ten. As it turns out, this was a conspiracy by the Browntails to throw the Silverashes into a tailspin and take them out of power, but at the time, the Edelweisses were blamed for it. I, a little boy, was to blame for the crime. The people of Kjerag loved the Silverashes, and they needed someone to blame, and who better than a family of three? We were forced to flee to Victoria, but not before I saw Enciodes one last time and agreed to change the country for the better whenever I could come back without being lynched. He did, eventually, join me in Victoria, where we spent our teenage through early adulthood in school. He took up politics, and I took up science. He asked me seriously one day if I'd go back to Kjerag with him, for our "dream", and I agreed.
[Just gonna pause here to give Wolfwood time to think about that infodump before he moves on.]
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He holds his cup between his hands as he listens to Gnosis tell his tale, getting brought up to speed on the former status of Kjerag. His eyebrows raise when he drops the fact that Enciodes lost his parents in such a brutal way (again, where has he heard that before) and was forced to take the helm at such a monstrously young age. A conspiracy...
He grits his teeth behind his lips.]
They blamed a child? For the assassination of two adults?
[He interjects briefly, his gaze sharp and narrow.]
If a coup is what you'd wanted, your family could have orchestrated it fucking decades prior. Sounds like your governing parties from the time had their fucking heads so far up their asses all they could see was goddamn shit.
[Sips his tea.]
...anyway, sorry. Continue.
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[Maybe if he hadn't gotten accused of being one of the murderers as a child he would be more mentally okay, but anyway! Gnosis is moving on now! Shoving emotions aside goodbye.]
That said, by the time Enciodes and I returned to Kjerag, the former leaders of those clans were not in power anymore, and rather that fell to their children — Ratatos and Arctosz, as I mentioned earlier. Truth be told, my ire shouldn't have been with theirs, but there were other problems. Kjerag is historically isolationist, refuses technological advancements, and set in its "way of life". Other countries want to annex us. Despite being scorned by the people — I wasn't exactly welcome on Kjerag soil when I came back to the country — I do still care about not getting annexed by Victoria, or any other country. But to do this, we needed a proper government, and proper technology to keep ourselves from being seen as a weak and easy target.
All of these are easier said than done when two of your three leaders are incredibly stubborn. Even after Enya took over as Saintess, there was no wake-up call there, either. When Enciodes warned of Victoria's plans, something we were very aware of thanks to living there, there was nothing.
So, essentially, in the shortest terms possible: Enciodes and I faked our divorce. [what] He "fired" me from Karlan Trade, and made it a public spectacle. I offered to cast the Edelweiss name back into the fire for this plan, to be clear — even though it did put me in something of direct danger. "Scorned" and in need of a job, I fled to the Browntails to beg Ratatos and her sibling for a job, promising to share with them the secrets of Clan Silverash. Power-hungry as they are in the wake of the legacy their parents left, they accepted, and I was able to work on dismantling them from within.
[And now he's smirking.]
The railroad bridge bombing was a stunt. The bridge was owned by Karlan Trade, and I blew it up to make the lie more believable, in front of the Browntails and the general population of Kjerag who were there at the time. There were several other things like this that I'll skip over — but know that a lot of it involves further political coups. Befriending a trusted confidant of the Browntails, slipping poison into wine to poison the Great Elder and framing the Paleroches for it, the works.
[Gnosis.]
The friend I made in the Browntail Clan, Monch, I had attempt an assassination on Enciodes, knowing he'd survive it. Of course, Monch was one of Ratatos' people, so there was blowback onto that clan following the attack... Enciodes' bodyguard and my tentative friend Degenbrecher was unaware that Enciodes and I were playing the public, and I did briefly get my ass kicked by her before I was "arrested" and she was let in on what we were doing.
That said, with the Great Elder dead, Enya Silverash as the acting voice of Kjerag, and the other clans knocked out of power as they had once knocked the Silverashes out of, Enciodes has since regained traction in the Kjeragi Parliament, and currently acts as one of its true rulers. I, of course, continue to lie in the shadows and work on technological advancements in the background, and Kjerag has seen enough growth to be able to stand on its own two feet now. Sometimes I act as Speaker of the Parliament, after being "re-hired" and found "not guilty" of the crimes I was accused of.
It's a complicated story, and that's as short as I can make it.
[You know, without going into the part where Enciodes nearly burned to death, Degenbrecher kicking a wall down, Rhodes Island being generally fucking annoying, an entire brief civil war breaking out... like he is Leaving Things Out but that's the gist of the situation.]
Anyway, that's the story of why I bombed a railroad bridge.
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It was about helping Kjerag. All about overthrowing those in power who had cheated, lied, and stole their way into it to begin with. They were just evening the playing field, and making fools of their adversaries handily while doing so. He doubts the plan would have gone half as well without both halves of Enciodes and Gnosis working together. One, a political mastermind. The other, a engineering and scientific genius.]
That makes more sense with context.
[Like yes, he did bomb a railroad bridge, but the context means everything here.]
Some say an eye for an eye makes the whole world blind, but an eye for an eye in this case was a long time comin'. You were willin' to play the long game.
[A TERRIBLY long game. But...it's not like he hasn't seen similar. Just look at Vash, and how he's willing to just take the blame for Nai's crimes if it means keeping people safe. He will become the villain just to save the world, and Wolfwood...even to this day struggles to fathom being able to stomach it.
Maybe because he himself has never had such grand aspirations. He's not saving the world, or even one continent. He's just trying to save an orphanage, which maybe in itself is a little selfish, thinking so small.]
Did it all work out like you'd hoped, in the end?
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[He'll tell what he took part in, but not the family drama that he has no say in.]
We currently have a partnership with a Columbian company known as Rhine Lab, but by the point I was dragged here, the things we were doing to work together were new. Kjeragandr only knows what's gone on in our absence. Either way, as long as technological developments keep Kjerag out of hot water, I believe we'll be alright.
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[Wolfwood, of course, has his own feelings and hangups about certain civilizations being granted more power and influence than another simply due to their amount of land, or resources, or whatever. No matter what world you come from- even his, a colonized alien planet divorced from Earth- it's always going to be some kind of hell like that. At least his planet doesn't have constant catastrophes raining down to complicate things.]
But anyway. I kinda get why you've got such a massive stick up your ass, now. [Wow] Your life's been kindof constant bullshit since you were a kid.
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[Wow you stopped drinking and now all your emotions are just Out now, huh.]
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Okay now you're fuckin' with me.
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I wish I was, Wolfwood, I wish I was. There's a reason I grew up getting the education of a Silverash instead of an Edelweiss, we'll say.
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