Hero x Villain (Innocence of a Child)
Nov 5, 2022 4:44:55 GMT -5
CJ Phoenix and Alice Gemini like this
Post by Addy A on Nov 5, 2022 4:44:55 GMT -5
One is a stranger, standing concealed by the shadows cast in the dimly lit office. The other is Doctor Todd. The good doctor sits somewhat frozen in fear behind the oversized desk.
“Are you making inroads with her?” the Stranger, his coarse cuts like a handsaw through tree branches.
“Have you ever tried to read a brick wall?” Doctor Todd responds snidely.
The Stranger snorts derisively. “Do I need Isaac to remind your wife of your obligations?”
The Doctor doesn’t hide his contempt as his single sarcastic laugh echoes around his offices. “Leave my family out of this.”
The Stranger steps forward, but not as far to allow the Doctor recognise his features.
“I’m led to believe you tried, Isaac on her.” presses the Doctor. “And he’s got nowhere - yet, you expect me to do something instantly - you’re a fool.”
“I’m not one to be insulted.” the Stranger snaps back firmly.
“Then allow me to do my job.” The Doctor snarls, just as short and just as sharp.
The Stranger walks forward and slams the palms of his hands on his desk. His everyman features make him almost indistinguishable in a crowd, but a solitary face staring at the Doctor he is imposing.
“I want her secrets. She’s not a fucking superwoman.” The Stranger’s words carry a force that makes The Doctor involuntary flinch.
The Doctor nods, “I need time.”
“The Hero?”
“When the world is in Turmoil, everyone looks to the sky, everyone looks for someone to save the day. Everyone looks for that hero. In your current guise as the superman of CruiserClash, can you be that hero?”
“Teo?”
“Children have always sought heroes, be it on their televisions, in comic books, in sportspeople or even in the arms of their fathers. It’s not a bad thing, it's a positively good option to have a role model that makes you proud and gives you something to aspire to. Fictional heroes often hold themselves aloft without falling because their stories are on the back of vanquishing their foes. It’s good business to keep the good guy challenged but unbeaten when there is a story to be told. Heroes of reality often falter, because humanity is fallible, open to distraction and easily swayed no matter how righteous we may initially seem.”
“Which begs the question.”
“Teo?”
“Where do you fall?”
“You’re probably the last of the genuine good guys in this industry. The dying one percent - the one who never sets aside the great good for their own self interest. That’s commendable, admirable. But - historically it’s probably denied you the success you’ve sought. But - we both know when you flip the coin to put yourself first - you can’t commit to being that guy, so you deny yourself the very same success you sold your soul for. But - that’s not who you are - you are Teo Blaze- the last great hero.”
“You know this.”
“I know this.”
“CruiserClash has been your Metropolis - you’ve protected your empire like every good hero should, but now we have entered Wrestler of the Year, we’ve entered much darker times, and the question that must be asked of you is this: Can you still remain the good guy when your antagonists revel in the grey and laugh at the black and white?”
“Can you?”
“Hero?”
“That’s the thing about, the darkness, the grey, the absence of true black and white - very rarely will the genuine hero survive, let alone thrive - and quite truthfully, you succeed in the small ecosystem that is CruiserClash - especially post Voorhees and Ainsworth. That was a time you sought solitude - a time you avoided the danger, but Wrestler of the Year has created a moment in time that neither you nor I can possibly avoid.”
“I don’t want to.”
“I don’t want to change you to change your stance.”
“I want you to stand as the last beacon of light in the dark abyss of madness that is the realm of Action Wrestling.”
“But I will move the world past you.”
“I will shake the foundations upon which you’re built. I move heaven and earth until they can’t be deciphered. That's the thing about me, Teo. I make things happen, they don’t always go to plan but something always happens around me. I make the world go round, and I will move the world around you, while you stand still proudly on your pedestal as that superman - but I will move the world past you and your open arms. You stand still on your ideals and you become irrelevant.”
“Hero.”
Adelaide Ainsworth sits awkwardly on the plastic chair designed for children as she plays tea parties with her daughter, Neveah.
“Drink your tea, Mummy.” Neveah says with glee as she pours an imaginary liquid from her tea pot into Adelaide’s tea cup.
“Wish it was something stronger.” Adelaide says absently.
“Do you want coffee, instead?” Neveah asks her mother.
Adelaide laughs, not realising that she spoke rather than thought her last phrase. “Sure.” she finishes with a giggle.
Neveah, in all of her childish innocence empties the ‘tea’ from the cup onto the floor, before topping it up with imaginary coffee from another pot. Both generations of Ainsworth’s clink their plastic cups together and drink up in a splendid moment of mother-daughter bonding. Putting their cups back on the table, Neveah stands to lean across the top of her tea seat and table and kiss her on the forehead.
“Love you Mum.” Neveah says genuinely.
“Love you too, baby girl.” Adelaide assures her daughter.
In the background, Gloria Ainsworth is abhorred by the bonding between her daughter and grand-daughter. She pours herself another red wine and walks past the play time, making her presence as noisy as possible. tongue.
Adelaide, unable to bite her “What?” she demands of her mother.
“Huh?” her mother pleads ignorance in the way only she can?
“You want some Tea, Nanny?” Asks Neveah.
“I’m good, Darlin’” chuckles Gloria as she continues past the play set and heads upstairs and away the shenanigans of Adelaide and her daughter.
“Cake?” Neveah asks her mother, while holding a plastic piece of chocolate cake.
“Sure.” she answers, taking the piece of cake and pretending to eat it.
Mother and daughter share the moment, smiling at together in unison.
“Mum?” Neveah says in the sweetest voice.
“Yeh, baby girl?” questions Adelaide with trepidation, expecting something grandiose.
“You’re my hero.”
“The funny thing about being the hero, Teo - is that there is always a section of the crowd that’s waiting with bated breath for you to fail, so they can find their own elation in your very desolation. It’s a conundrum of society, really. We seek heroes to allow us to escape from our own pain, yet we seek the pain of our heroes to feel better within ourselves. Teo, it must leave you dizzy in a way that a selfish bitch like me can never hope to understand. While, I stand and move the world for my own benefit, and get called every misguided name under the sun for it, mind you. You stand still and move the world for everyone’s benefit (allegedly.) And yet no one really values your contribution.”
“That must turn your insides out, or maybe it doesn’t - an ignorant cunt like me could just be reading you wrong and you’re really Captain V leading Marvel’s original Thunderbolts for the public's perception.”
“And that’s all that you’re really about isn't it, Teo? A hero in the public’s eye. It’s not a bad thing - but eventually everything will come crumbling down around you. Where you stand right now, it leaves you with no return - you leave CruiserClash and their resident Superman vanquishing Serenity Holmes and Karlie Nash time and time again - an undefeatable and impenetrable champion. Well played, son. Unfortunately, it’s left you unable to flay your favourite joker in your hand hasn’t it, hero? Every time you’ve left CruiserClash to stand on the main stage, you’ve played the underdog role - but you can’t now - not this time. You’re a hero, a superman. You must stand tall or see your society collapse so to speak.”
“Despite the champion versus champion nature of our battle you’ll be expected to beat me just on the nature of our tournament seeding. If you lose, it will consign to the realm of only being a strong Cruiserweight Champion and nothing more. Especially, considering your recent failings in the trios tournament.”
“Who’d want to be a hero?”
“You?”
“Not me.”
“But every hero is only as good as his rogue’s gallery - unfortunately for you, Del Sol you haven’t had a gallery that really holds you in high esteem when the children need to smile. Until now.”
“You need me.”
“That’s self-serving braggadocio you need opposite you, Teo. Consider this, hero, when you stand against me the sick and the weak will look for you to save them from the Baddest Bitch Action Wrestling has ever seen. By facing me this week, you finally get the villain you need to become the hero you want the world to see you as. And when I crush you under the heels of my stilettos, some will mourn the death of their hero. Others, they’ll laugh, because they’ll see you as nothing more than a self-aggrandizing muppet - either way they’ll remember you more than they think of you now.”
“That's what you want.”
“That’s what you need.”
“It’s why you can’t be the underdog. The plucky fighter to overcome. It was once your narrative, but like I’ve demonstrated with my understated eloquence it’s not you anymore - you’re pinnacle of your realm - even if it is CruiserClash. This first round matchup is just another lose-lose situation for you, if you win as anticipated. The hero always wins in the end, right? If you lose, well - what sort of fucking hero were you really? Lose-lose. Me, what have I got to lose. A little bit of pride, a little bit of ego - hell, hero, it’s not like I haven’t had those bent out of shape and smashed to pieces before. That doesn’t matter, I’ll bounce back. But will you? Will you spring to your feet and remain the great hero, can you recover your own pride and dignity when you’re holding the shattered pieces of your famed red sunglasses in the palm of your hand. While I bathe in the afterglow of your crushing defeat, hero?”
“This isn’t Pokemon: The Movie - you won’t be revived by the tears of Pikachu to save the day.”
“Fuck no.”
“Because at the end of the day I’m the one that everyone secretly roots for.”
“The Villain.”
