Post by Odin Balfore on Jan 4, 2022 11:38:44 GMT -5
TRIALS OF DESPAIR
V.
JOHN BLACK
_____________________
POST CLASH
V.
JOHN BLACK
_____________________
POST CLASH
As Odin walks backstage, he is greeted by Jade Riley.
Jade: Odin, that was a short reign. What happened out there?
Odin: I told them that I would fail them, and I did. The TV Championship will be back around my waist soon. TJ didn’t defeat me, I defeated myself. I failed to uphold my end of the bargain with the championship.
Jade: What bargain?
Odin: The only one that matters.
Odin walks off, looking around as if he is hearing voices in all different directions.
_________________________________
TUESDAY
There is a somber and heavy feeling in the room as if the oxygen in the air had been bonded with lead. Every bit was slightly denser than the last as Odin sat at a board room table inside of a large study, so big, it might as well have been a library. He was watching a film on a large projector, cycling through it via a connected laptop. He was scrubbing through footage of him walking to the ring with the TV Championship. The camera was focused on just the TV Championship and those were the parts that he was focused on. He watched it as it swayed and glinted. His eyes were bobbing back and forth as the footage speed up and re-wound. His concentration was only broken when the door to the study was opened and closed. Deliberate thumps of footsteps stride closer to him. Odin’s eyes peer upward. It’s himself. He vanishes but the disembodied voice can still be heard clear as day.
“I didn’t bring you back to Houston so that you can feel pitiful and sorry for yourself, Mav. I told you that if you came back, you had to pay the band.” Says the ghostly voice in a gravely and snake-like tone.
“You had me sleeping in a bed and breakfast for a month.” Odin starts.
“ I was waiting for you to snap out of whatever this was. You never used to watch films when I asked you to, you always went and got drunk. Now that you lost to what - a twelve year old with B-cups, you need to find imperfections in your game?” Scoffs Odin to Odin.
“My whole game is imperfections.” Odin corrects.
“As evident by your loss to a forty-year-old woman who you outgrew when you were five. I know wrestlings changed since our day. They wouldn’t book that match. Some things change, Balfore. Others - others stay the same. Now, you have yet another match with some low midcarder named John Black. When at the top of the show they introduced some guy that I ain’t ever heard of in our life. Touting his ahem *19* world titles. How many world titles do *we* have, Mav?”
“Twenty-five,” Odin replies.
“And how many undercard titles do *we* have?”
“Mid-thirties.”
“What about tag team belts?”
“Mid teens.”
“And now you’re in a tables match against a guy who should be in line at a convention, paying you a hundred bucks to sign his replica belt. Mav, you don’t need to ‘find’ yourself. You don’t need to feel sorry for yourself. You didn’t get twenty-five world titles so you could call yourself the *unwanted* like this was 1999 all over again. That's some cringy edge-lord shit. I would have kicked your ass then and I’ll kick your ass now.”
“Are you mad that *we* arnt wrestling anymore?”
“Mav, *we* used to be in an organized global assassination ring. The dark money behind the dark money. Not this Nordic asshole that I see before me. Now, you can continue to be that asshole standing before me *or* you can pay the fucking band. Just know that *I* truly do not care about pro wrestling. *we* became who you were, not who you are now. You keep hoping that the old you just gonna pop up like a ghost and then you start digging graves like you’re going to find your own fucking corpse. Stop trying to be what everyone thinks *we* should be. See, they’ve only known us for what - ten years and each of them remembers something different about you. Something that they don’t have. Something that they lack. Something that you did better than everyone else. *Fuck them.*
*US;* we used to play for power. I suppose you can only do so much until that becomes old and stale. On a global scale, there is no such thing. Theres Bitcoin and DEXs and NFTs. There’s a whole new game to rig.”
“So what do you want me to do?”
“Rig the game, Mav. Rig the fucking game. You got a bunch of twenty-year-olds with more rings in their head than brain cells crying about gender equality and social binaries. Why, because they don’t what the fuck they are talking about. Just like anyone in this fucking company who wants to talk about being a world champion. Or a fighter. Or a monster. Or a killer. These aren’t champions, Mav, these are fucking bag-holding marks. John Black listens to the fuckin street because he’s too dumb to listen to himself. He has street cred, *we* have the global seat of power - cred. We are not the fucking same. You want your belt back, go get it. However, you’re not a belt collector. You collect what everyone else in this company fails to comprehend, and that's *power.* There have world champions like Devito and Downfall. But Mav, this company made Roy Speede world champion. There are champions and then there’s *World. Fucking. Champions.* Right now, that's *us*. They - they don’t know power. They know play pretend to book. Winning fantasy football doesn’t make you Tom Brady and being an Action Wrestling world champion doesn’t make you a *global* champion. It just bridges the gap a little bit between them and *US.*”
The voice fades. The power goes out and with it the projector, except a shadow image of the AW TV Championship. Odin looks it over then begins to talk out loud to himself.
“John. I told you that I’m sorry. I told you that I wasn’t myself. In this grudge match, this trials of despair match. This tables match. John, know that I have no ill will against you. There is no grudge, for you have nothing that I am jealous of. You are an analog, an effigy, a host to an internal battle that I am waging against myself. I told them John, Kyrie, and TJ, that I would fail them. I told them that I would fail you. I did. Now we’re here in a table match because my internal battle is the highest point in your career and that's just sad. What’s the streets say about you now, John. I’m sure it’s nothing good. Sure, I’m a bust out but you’re just a punk in those streets and the world knows it. I’ve beaten you and battered you and put your name in the spotlight for all to see and I exposed your whole ass. In reality, you're the one that failed me.
I’m sorry, John. I didn’t mean for that to happen. I’m not better, John, but I’m better than you. I always knew that. The world always knew that. Now, you know that. Now you get to put me through a table John if you can find the strength. If you can find the strength to end this. You won’t. You can’t. The forge of suffering has broken you and this week, so will I.
At first, I thought it poetic. First you, then Kyrie and TJ. However, it’s more pathetic. I’m pathetic but that TV title calls to me because I would rather have worldwide deals than be the de facto ruler of Omega Championship Wrestling where Downfall has to wrangle scabs and bums to convince the wrestling spectrum that what he possesses is really what’s at the end of the rainbow.
It’s not.
Don’t piss on my leg, John, and tell me it’s the Action Wrestling World Championship because if there is one whore of a championship in this company, it’s that one. But this one, this is the all week, every week, kinda power. It’s invigorating and you may have noticed that.
I am not myself.
In that moment, with that kind of invigoration, I cannot apologize. I told you to believe the man when he tells you who he is. You should have believed me then and you should believe me now.
The world title may be a power-grab but there is no power-in it. It’s all roosters for the hen house but I own the land.
I cannot control these hands John, but I can give them a purpose. To put you through a table and go up against either Kyrie or TJ at Revolution. To win back my TV Championship, reclaim the power, and bring a division to heel. For twenty fucking years. For twenty fucking more. I’ll continue to be at the top of this game while fuccbois like you struggle to catch up. I would generally agree if your assessment of me but then we’d both be wrong. You wanted to dance, John, and now it’s time to pay the band. I told them, I told the world that the TV championship was a cursed idol. Now see what that curse brings. Everyones lion till they start lie-ing and I’m the only one telling you the truth. You just don’t want to hear it but let all who have ears listen. I’m coming for you, John. Then, I’m coming for THEM.
And to think John, you started this. You baptized me. Now, I’m going to return the favor. Last time, I was in my way. This time, you are. Oddly, you have become the stepping stone and now I must trample and crush you underfoot - put you through a table. So that no one, not even yourself can over with the name John Black - ever again.
John the Baptist / Odin the Unwanted
John the redeemer / Odin the Unbroken
John the Never-was. / Odin the Champion
John the No More / Odin the..
Come. and. See.
For the last time. I’m not burying you, John. You buried yourself. I’m just giving you the Eulogy that's better than you deserve. A baptism for a baptism, and a eulogy for an epiphany. An *I* for an *I*
Rest in Piss, John. Because this time, *I* choose... violence.
*You’re* Welcome
~ 1756
