Luther was seething with rage as he paced his way back to his tenement's doorstep. He couldn't even compose himself long enough to turn the doorknob. Instead, he gave the plant pot at the side of the doorstep a good kick. The pot flew a few hundred meters away before it splattered and spilled the pitiful dandelion plant on the pavement. 

Seeing that the plant's demise didn't diminish a shred of his anger, he sank down to sit on the doorstep and dug his face into his hands. Instead of breaking down in tears, he stopped himself and chose to contemplate on what was written in the pink piece of paper he got from The Vigil Gazette. 

'"Unskilled worker.' Utilizing an outdated printing press for a news agency active 24 hours a day, seven days a week was hardly 'unskilled'. I had to learn uncommon skills and specializations to operate such an archaic device and yet those damned government bureaucrats have the gall to label me as unskilled? Those sheltered assholes who can't even carry a ream of paper to save their lives want to take away my sole source of income just to appeal to some elitist pricks?"

As he sank deeper and deeper into his head, Luther's anger developed into—something else. Something more volatile yet less explosive: a disdain for his newfound status quo. It filled his head with ideas without clouding his judgment and lit a fire within him without making him vulnerable to burning himself out. Everything started to finally make sense to him as if the universe finally decided that he was worthy of learning its secrets.

With his newfound motivation in full display, he summoned his strength back into existence as he finally opened the tenement's door and burst up the flight of stairs. As he stood up sweating in front of his landlord, two words slipped out of his mouth:

"I'm. leaving." 

"Isn't a quarter past 9 a bit too early for moonshine, Mr. Finley?" Luther's landlord retorted as a smile spread across his face. He didn't seem to notice Luther's profuse sweating or acknowledge Luther's serious intonation. Or maybe he did notice but didn't care anyway.

Seeing that the only response he got from his tenant was a blank stare, the smile on his face transformed into a hearty chuckle.

"Well, well, I've never seen this side of you before but I like it, kid," he said as his eyes slid to rendezvous with Luther's stare.

"I never thought I'd ever see it in your eyes but alas, I was wrong. Who knew Luther Finley, the chap who worked an ancient printing press for a living would ever know what passion and determination meant? " the landlord shrugged and continued:

"Say no more, I know better than to get between a man and his goals. On your way you go, young fella."

Luther nodded and turned around to be on his way to his room when the same voice rang out:

"Before I forget, yes, your past IOU's have been forgiven. I have enough tenants to turn a profit either way. Do not worry. Go forth and multiply, Mr. Finley."

Luther sneered at his landlord's crude attempt at humor as he disappeared back into the tenement's hallways and into his living quarters. He could finally get ready for the journey. He placed the small stack of clothes within his regular rotation into his suitcase, along with the bare necessities: $30, a fashionable hat a former colleague bought for him, and an improvised shiv made out of rusty roofing materials. Things you need to stay alive out there.

Oh and before he forgot, he also packed a single book into the suitcase. It was the manifesto guiding him through the journey he is embarking on: a journal he stole from a distant relative's bookshelf. The kicker was that It belonged to someone probably affiliated with the Mob. 

Now, how did a deceased mobster's journal and an unexpected bout of unemployment push a headstrong young man into a life of crime? Well, one doesn't need integral calculus or some convoluted clinical test to find out why he turned to that path. Despite not being an intellectually advanced person, Luther was a big fan of classic and contemporary literature and one of the people whose work left a huge imprint on him was Russian author, Anton Chekhov. One of Chekhov's most famous published quotes was: "If in the first act you have hung a pistol on the wall, then in the following one it should be fired. Otherwise don't put it there."

​​​

Luther, being the type to apply most pieces of advice to himself, appropriated this concept through his lens. He applied it in order to rationalize every single event or object he has come into contact with. And when he got laid off of his blue-collar job, it just all clicked with him. The journal he found in his aunt's attic a decade ago was his 'Chekhov's gun'. And this led him down a path which he will never stray away from. 

Luther arrived at the City of Angels two days after moving out of the tenement. He slept on the streets and found temporary work daily while trying to impress several of the local reputable mobsters' associates. Thanks to some philanthropic soup kitchens, he rarely got hungry.

One day, he took on a construction job just around Inglewood as per usual. The work was hard but the pay was good, just the way he wanted it. During lunch break, one of the older workers pulled him over to the side. 

"Have you ever heard of unions before, young man?" the gruff old man inquired. 

"Oh, I'm not... exactly a regular," Luther stuttered.

"Doesn't matter, kid," the old man replied, "we all deserve rights as workers, whether permanent or not."

"I don't exactly know what to do when I'm in a union," Luther meekly admitted.

"That is exactly the point. You don't have to do any dumb shit like hazing or acting like a thug. You join us and we got your back. Then we'll teach you about your rights. The ones you should know so those bloody slave-drivers we call foremen can't work you like a slave in Ancient Egypt," the old man enthusiastically declaimed as if he's rehearsed it all his life just for this moment, ​​​​​​"Just say yes and if you dislike it, you can leave anytime you like."

"Fine, sign me up," Luther sighed.

For the remainder of the construction gig, Luther was affiliated with the local union. It didn't have a name, they just used subtle hand gestures to signal they were part of the group. Within that group, Luther met their de facto leader, a Frenchman known only as Pierre. He was the son of Communard refugees who immigrated to Quebec to escape the failed revolution which happened back home. He left his parents as soon as he became of age and wandered the world looking for meaning as he worked odd jobs in between his journey. 

Luther respected Pierre's intellect. He learned a lot about the Marxist perspective on power structures and how economics impacts life from Pierre, for which he was grateful. He didn't wholeheartedly agree with everything he learned but he saw the merit in analyzing worldly concepts through that lens. Unbeknownst to Pierre, these concepts somehow further convinced Luther of his decision to look for employment within the criminal underworld.

Using Marxist economic theory, Luther rationalized that being a philantropic mafioso has to be just since he would be redistributing resources and means of production, and that criminal activity is a form of revolution against the bourgeoisie, in a sense. Quite the stretch, but nevertheless, it reaffirmed his decision to turn to a life of crime.

A week after the construction job, someone dropped an envelope inside his bag while he was doing some agricultural field work. It contained a message from NotoriousBIG. And the rest was history.