Post by W A L T E R on Jun 12, 2020 22:15:39 GMT -5
Open your eyes, Alexander. I am trying to show you the elephant.
He loved getting his haircut; the plastic bowl balancing on his head made him feel like he had some different life. He could feel Mother’s bosom pressed against his neck and he struggled not to smile at her warmth. He was only 12 but she was already standing on a chair to cut his hair.
Still now, honey.
Her voice was raspy and ever-tired, full of hardships, abuse and sadness and survival but he didn’t hear any of that. He just heard the buzz of the clippers and felt that warmth of his mother; he sunk into some fleeting sense of happiness.
A moment of relaxation and his head slumps just enough for the clippers to graze his ear. He jerks his sizable head away from the pain and into her chest and she topples to the floor from the chair. He reaches an oversized 12-year old hand to his ear and finds blood.
You fuckin’ retard.
The clippers still clutched, she brings her right hand from her left shoulder and across the boy’s face. Crimson from his ear and now from his mouth, he coughs the taste of iron from the back of his throat and into his hand. There in the small pool of platelets is a single, solitary tooth. He holds the little calcium block in between his mighty thumb and forefinger. His racing heart slows, his breathing deepens and an odd calm takes hold.
Still now, honey.
Her voice was raspy and ever-tired, full of hardships, abuse and sadness and survival but he didn’t hear any of that. He just heard the buzz of the clippers and felt that warmth of his mother; he sunk into some fleeting sense of happiness.
A moment of relaxation and his head slumps just enough for the clippers to graze his ear. He jerks his sizable head away from the pain and into her chest and she topples to the floor from the chair. He reaches an oversized 12-year old hand to his ear and finds blood.
You fuckin’ retard.
The clippers still clutched, she brings her right hand from her left shoulder and across the boy’s face. Crimson from his ear and now from his mouth, he coughs the taste of iron from the back of his throat and into his hand. There in the small pool of platelets is a single, solitary tooth. He holds the little calcium block in between his mighty thumb and forefinger. His racing heart slows, his breathing deepens and an odd calm takes hold.
Havoc was a misnomer but I promise you that Evolution is not.
The unmistakable deep monotone of WALTER bounces off the paper-thin walls of the mobile home he stands in.
My return, not just to the ring but to the top of this place was not havoc, it was quite the opposite. My return was a restoration of ORDER. That is part of what I have always promised you, Action Wrestling: order, meaning, purpose. Havoc, chaos, CONFUSION...these are ideas of lesser minds for lesser men. The Culling means order restored, it means havoc eschewed. It means me standing alone in the center of the ring, dominance undeniable, superiority proven. It means…
EVOLUTION.
That newfound smirk slithers across WALTER’s face and he plops a familiar duffel bag to the patchy, unkempt carpet of the trailer.
I told you all before Havoc that I have not been called to this place by accident; an Evolved Man does not live by coincidence. The word EVOLUTION looms large here; all rivers flow to this moment. What I must now show Action Wrestling is that all rivers also spring from Evolution. That word indeed means death for some but life for those deemed worthy; it is a REBIRTH into superiority, into greatness, into eternity.
You, Alexander...You have not been deemed worthy.
It is not because you are untalented. No, you are quite capable of destruction. I’ve brought a bit of that out of you, haven’t it? I’ve brought you closer to that animal you once were, that oversized, traumatized youngster that ended up in the prison system. Before the concussion that led to the self-medication that led to the pathetic joke of a champion that now stands ostensibly at the top of this federation.
Have you missed this portion of yourself? Have you missed the ruthless Alexander? I’m sure you do not believe you need him. Afterall, it was lighthearted Alex Richards who won the World Title from Franklin. You sat there consuming greasy food and imbibing your wretched bile with a glib proclamation that you are who you are no matter what.
So what now? Now that I’ve turned Alex back into Alexander? Have I gone from frightening your brother with my presence to frightening your brother with your presence? Your consistency is what you boasted of most, Alexander. Franklin was flighty and uneven but you..you never quit, never give up, never stop. Or at least Alex Richards didn’t. He was forever undeterred by his own ineptitude. When that other place’s top talent had been chewing him up and spitting him out for years as he breezed in and out of the doors the beaten dog would always come traipsing back in. Eventually Alex the mutt even got his bone after all the real animals had gone their separate ways.
Alex Richards, World Champion.
Tell me, did it ring as hollow then as it does now? Did you know then, as you do now, that half of the card beneath you would--and has--stood above you in victory? Do you know why it rings hollow regardless of the fact that you are the one and only man who can claim to be the first ever WCF, UCI and Action Wrestling World Champion? Do you know why you’re as yet unsatisfied and disrespected by your peers?
It is because you do not belong.
You never have, Alexander. You knew that as a child and when I stand over your beaten, broken, battered body at the close of Evolution, you will know it again. Those titles, prizes, trophies? Meaningless. There is no home for you here. There will be no home for you anywhere.
Pull your stool up to the bar. Dull the pain and drown the sorrows, hide all those painful memories of failure, of some fleeting semblance of meaning, of some loosely grasped hope for a home. Pour down your gullet that poison you lean on like a cripple’s prosthetic. You need it to forget the trauma of your childhood. And you will need it to forget the trauma that I bring, the trauma of EVOLUTION.
The boy lays motionless, eyes tracing veins of water damage on the ceiling. The half-finished haircut had grown out a bit, its embarrassing lopsidedness less obvious now. The tooth, of course, did not grow back. He tongued the space where it should’ve been which was somehow comforting, his life was made largely up of empty spaces where things should’ve been.
This very moment, however, was too full. He was kept up by a semi-regular thump thump thumping from Mother’s room.
At least the thumping was the rhythmic kind complemented by muffled words and moans instead of the sporadic, violent kind accompanied by the yelling and cursing. The boy never knew which would keep him up when Mother had a friend over.
He closed his eyes, trying to force the sleep to come. The thumping seemed to grow louder in the darkness. He hated it.
No, that's a lie. He hated that he didn't hate it. He hated the thinness of the walls. He hated the illusory hope a man could bring into the trailer. He hated that the men always left and Mother would be angry after.
He hated those other things but here at night, alone with the sounds from next door...he didn't hate it at all, no matter how hard he tried to, no matter how much he knew those sounds should revolt him...they didn't. They excited him if anything.
The boy peered down toward his toes and the physical evidence of his excitement was undeniable. He sighed and gave in. Why fight what you are? His eyes closed again. Sleep would come easier soon.
This very moment, however, was too full. He was kept up by a semi-regular thump thump thumping from Mother’s room.
At least the thumping was the rhythmic kind complemented by muffled words and moans instead of the sporadic, violent kind accompanied by the yelling and cursing. The boy never knew which would keep him up when Mother had a friend over.
He closed his eyes, trying to force the sleep to come. The thumping seemed to grow louder in the darkness. He hated it.
No, that's a lie. He hated that he didn't hate it. He hated the thinness of the walls. He hated the illusory hope a man could bring into the trailer. He hated that the men always left and Mother would be angry after.
He hated those other things but here at night, alone with the sounds from next door...he didn't hate it at all, no matter how hard he tried to, no matter how much he knew those sounds should revolt him...they didn't. They excited him if anything.
The boy peered down toward his toes and the physical evidence of his excitement was undeniable. He sighed and gave in. Why fight what you are? His eyes closed again. Sleep would come easier soon.
Walter stands behind a large barrel in the living room of the mobile home.
So do you belong here now, champion? Are you finally home? Are you comfortable and happy and content? Or is there still that grating notion deep in the pit of your ample stomach that despite your ascension you still...simply don’t matter?
If you managed to nod that empty cavern atop your shoulders in acknowledgement, I applaud you. But you--like most here--likely do not understand. Let me help you.
From the duffel comes a United States Title.
I captured this title 11 months ago, Alexander. At the moment, I thought it meant everything. I thought it meant that The Evolved Man had proven--in just under a month’s time here--his superiority. I thought it meant that all of you in the back would see the err of your ways and turn the hammer upon the marble of your beings to recreate yourselves in the name of evolution...But what did it actually mean?
I steamrolled Beau Blaze. I trounced Elisabeth Hope. I Culled Kyle Kemp and was crowned a champion while others toiled away, hoping to even get on a card. And still…
He tosses it into the barrel in front of him and flame shoots up, obscuring his face for a moment.
It meant nothing.
This is the lesson I am here to teach you, Alexander. That great trophy you hold on your shoulder...it means nothing. It has not made you an Action Wrestling great, it has not made you relevant, it has not made this your home. It has made you...a champion. A word as shapeless and malleable as water itself. There’s even a saying in this business…
The title doesn’t make the man...The man makes the title.
He reaches his duffel and pulls out another US Title.
It was with this title that I began to understand what I am here to show you. It wasn’t the title; it was the man. Kyle Kemp turned my world to black and, ironically, showed me the light. I won this title back from him by introducing him to The Great Mystery. And I would do it again in a month. You see, Kemp had shown me my own need to evolve, my faults and shortcomings. I am grateful to him.
No man in this federation was able to pry this title from me. I had evolved past those that concerned themselves with the United States title and parted ways with it not in the ring but via a pen stroke. It did not matter. Torture had no choice, the title around my waist had removed it from circulation; exiled it from actual competition and put it on a pedestal that no man was able to prod.
This man...this monster MADE that title.
Walter throws it in the barrel and again the flame roars.
Is that what you did with your first title here, Alexander? Did you lift your competition to new heights only to crush them underneath your foot? Did you recapture it with a fire so hot it burned through the wings of every Icarus who dared to even reach for it?
No.
You procured the pathetic television title, lost it in a month, and then absconded. You disappeared. Just like your legacy here will. Just like the memory of you as world champion will the moment Evolution goes off the air. It’s not the disappearing I find distasteful, Alex. No, that was actually the right decision. It’s that when the man failed to make the title into anything, when you failed to make that moment into anything...After that, you had the gall to reappear.
It is for THAT you are unworthy.
The smell of bacon in the morning must entice most. To the Boy it meant there was a man in his home and he was supposed to do his best to simply not exist. Usually, he did his best; he played his part.
No matter how many times his mother hit him, there was something inside of him that compelled him to please her, serve her. Giggles bubbled into his bedroom under the door, broken up by the man’s Marlboro-choked voice.
Watch it now, or I’ll fuck ya right here on this counter.
The Boy’s lip curled. Today, he realized, he could not play his part. He leapt from bed and pushed open the door to his bedroom and entered the kitchenette.
Jiminy Fuckin’ Christ boy! What in the hell is wrong with you?!
The Man was understandably taken aback. A stark naked, near six foot 12 year old just walked into the kitchen. Mother was even less amused.
Get yer fuckin’ ass in there and get decent!
The Boy stood motionless.
Boy if you don’t move…
Her sentence was incomplete but the threat wasn’t, it hung there with the assuredness of its hundred instances in the past. The Boy did not move. She grabbed him by the shoulders, attempting to turn him back to his bedroom but she was unable. He stood there, an immovable object in his immutable nudity. The Boy’s eyes were fixed on the man who was reasonably unnerved but unreasonably reactionary.
Move yer ass, woman.
He grabbed Mother and threw her back with something between indifference and disdain. She stumbled and caught her balance with a hand on the waffle iron. Mother cawed in pain and the Boy was stirred into movement. Like a bull he rushed the Man. Strong as he was, the Boy was still just that. The Man grabbed the boy’s head as he bullrushed and took all of his moment into the pan where the bacon had been sizzling.
The Boy’s ear sizzled and his nostrils were flooded with that smell of bacon again. Tears flooded his eyes and face but he was just able to make out Mother--who watched, unmoving, unhelpful, not fighting for the Boy. Her boy. The Man released him after what may have been a moment or a minute--time doesn’t much exist with your face held to a griddle.
Fuck this.
The Man released his grip and headed to the exit. Mother could suddenly move again and tugged on his arm, begging him to stay. She pulled and pleaded but he threw her to the ground, looked back once at the Boy holding his scalded face, spit on the floor, and left. Mother wailed in greater pain than when her hand was burnt.
The Boy knew this was a mistake. He knew this man had hurt Mother worse than the waffle iron did. The Boy would fix this. He toweled the still-stinging grease off his face, rose to his feet and yanked open a drawer. He pulled out a claw hammer and the screen door slammed shut behind him.
No matter how many times his mother hit him, there was something inside of him that compelled him to please her, serve her. Giggles bubbled into his bedroom under the door, broken up by the man’s Marlboro-choked voice.
Watch it now, or I’ll fuck ya right here on this counter.
The Boy’s lip curled. Today, he realized, he could not play his part. He leapt from bed and pushed open the door to his bedroom and entered the kitchenette.
Jiminy Fuckin’ Christ boy! What in the hell is wrong with you?!
The Man was understandably taken aback. A stark naked, near six foot 12 year old just walked into the kitchen. Mother was even less amused.
Get yer fuckin’ ass in there and get decent!
The Boy stood motionless.
Boy if you don’t move…
Her sentence was incomplete but the threat wasn’t, it hung there with the assuredness of its hundred instances in the past. The Boy did not move. She grabbed him by the shoulders, attempting to turn him back to his bedroom but she was unable. He stood there, an immovable object in his immutable nudity. The Boy’s eyes were fixed on the man who was reasonably unnerved but unreasonably reactionary.
Move yer ass, woman.
He grabbed Mother and threw her back with something between indifference and disdain. She stumbled and caught her balance with a hand on the waffle iron. Mother cawed in pain and the Boy was stirred into movement. Like a bull he rushed the Man. Strong as he was, the Boy was still just that. The Man grabbed the boy’s head as he bullrushed and took all of his moment into the pan where the bacon had been sizzling.
The Boy’s ear sizzled and his nostrils were flooded with that smell of bacon again. Tears flooded his eyes and face but he was just able to make out Mother--who watched, unmoving, unhelpful, not fighting for the Boy. Her boy. The Man released him after what may have been a moment or a minute--time doesn’t much exist with your face held to a griddle.
Fuck this.
The Man released his grip and headed to the exit. Mother could suddenly move again and tugged on his arm, begging him to stay. She pulled and pleaded but he threw her to the ground, looked back once at the Boy holding his scalded face, spit on the floor, and left. Mother wailed in greater pain than when her hand was burnt.
The Boy knew this was a mistake. He knew this man had hurt Mother worse than the waffle iron did. The Boy would fix this. He toweled the still-stinging grease off his face, rose to his feet and yanked open a drawer. He pulled out a claw hammer and the screen door slammed shut behind him.
We return to the trailer today and WALTER in front of the flaming barrel. The World Title he won from Frank Patrick Venable is slung over his shoulder.
We both won our grand prize from Action Wrestling’s only three-time World Champion, Frank Patrick Venable, a man undeniably as known for losing titles as he is for winning them. But what was the difference, Alexander? What was the difference in THE MAN we beat?
When Franklin struck me with Headshot after Headshot after Headshot before suffering The Culling, he was as hungry as he’s ever been. He’d mobilized not only Action Wrestling with his crusade to Put Down the Mongrel but even The World itself. Mountain Dew caps, suddenly the FBI was interested in me again...and still...with all those eyes and ears, all those Headshots...that man could not make the title. Not until I made him...evolve.
Two months later when Franklin would make some semblance of good on the promise to put down The Beast, he began the greatest World Title reign of his career. Thanks to me. Thanks to what I put him through, thanks to the pain and suffering he saw me inflict, thanks to the mirror I held to him to show him his hypocrisy and foolishness.
But alas, Franklin was still Franklin. And he would again become...distracted.
You know that, right Alexander? That the only competitor with a less impressive victory over Franklin than you is Elisabeth Hope? Look at Franklin the week of your “battle.” Look at the emotional turmoil he was putting himself through--hear his words and know they smack of distraction and weakness. This was not the man I had evolved him into. This was a man that even Alex Richards could beat. With a stomach full of greasy buffet food and a liver still pumping out Zimquila.
Because that’s what you do right? You just stay the course. You’re “a grinder” who “never quits.” That’s how you billed yourself before that moment of great triumph. Those are the words of a man who doesn't--who can’t--evolve. I heard those words then and knew you needed me to bring Alexander back or again the man would not make the title. Again, Alex Richards’ reign--like his career to this point--would be meaningless.
Walter’s World Title joins the pyre and it surges again. From the nearby room, a thump thump thumping is heard.
And here we are. We all saw what I’ve turned you into and it is not the Alex Richards everyone knows, loves, and doesn’t respect. It’s something that COULD be feared...had we not already seen behind the curtain to know that this Great and Powerful Al is but still the same coward hiding behind boots of poison.
What happened last time it was “personal” for you, Alexander? What happened last time you were set on being so vicious and so bloodthirsty? As I’m sure your “habits” have dampened your mental capacities allow me to remind you: you failed.
Dandy brought out some similar strain of viciousness in you. You were so full of hate and vitriol in that lead up to XIII just like you are now….And Dandy laid you flat out. Because all that rage and that hate...all that violence you put on display against Logan Demon Joker…
That isn’t you, Alexander. You’re the fat pathetic punchline who adorns himself with monikers like “The Demon of the Drive Thru” and “The Bane of the Buffet.” You’re RJ Collins with some modicum of talent. You bring a stench of pathetic to the top of this card with your presence that compels Culling.
The Boy is flat on his back again, tracing that same vein of water damage on the ceiling but this time, a smile is spread across his face. Just beneath his balled up right fist is the hammer, painted crimson. Matching splatter is on his forearms, torso and some droplets splotch his face. HIs wide smile exposes the tooth lost weeks earlier.
What was this unfamiliar feeling? And how long would it stay? Could he keep it? Bottle it up somehow? Surely he couldn’t. But he had to try.
He scrambled to the floor suddenly and pulled a wooden container from under his bed, about the size and dimensions of a shoebox. He opened first the lid and then his bloodied right hand as we pan closer to the palm frozen momentarily over the box. The Boy on his knees in bliss, all but praying to this box.
In that puddle of scarlet in his opened palm we can now make out a spec of white enamel--a tooth. With great reverence, the Boy places it delicately into the box next to the other. Again his tongue mines the gap where it used to be in his mouth. He wonders if The Man is doing the same. The Boy is happy.
What was this unfamiliar feeling? And how long would it stay? Could he keep it? Bottle it up somehow? Surely he couldn’t. But he had to try.
He scrambled to the floor suddenly and pulled a wooden container from under his bed, about the size and dimensions of a shoebox. He opened first the lid and then his bloodied right hand as we pan closer to the palm frozen momentarily over the box. The Boy on his knees in bliss, all but praying to this box.
In that puddle of scarlet in his opened palm we can now make out a spec of white enamel--a tooth. With great reverence, the Boy places it delicately into the box next to the other. Again his tongue mines the gap where it used to be in his mouth. He wonders if The Man is doing the same. The Boy is happy.
A year ago, I debuted at Evolution and the announcer spoke of the future:
“I bet in one year this man will be World Champion!”
It took me less time to procure that prize but he wasn’t exactly wrong. Because now...one year later...I will be World Champion again.
I have brought you here, Alexander, to what most would call my “home.” So that you can watch me burn my trophies, my Action Wrestling Titles. So that you can know that they--like you--are meaningless.
Walter reaches to his side and produces that same wooden box, decades of wear on it now.
I thought perhaps if I showed you this place and spoke to you of the irrelevance of these false markers of success that you could evolve...You could understand and see the whole elephant. Perhaps you would not grope away blindly. Perhaps you could know that Alex and Alexander...are one in the same. And that without each other, neither can succeed.
EVOLVE, Alexander Richards. Bring them both to me. And let me lay them both at my feet.
We are not so different, Alexander. Our childhoods taught us that violence is the path. But you? You forewent that path. You dulled that lesson with drugs and alcohol and your pathetic desperation to BELONG.
With Shaun. With Rebecca. With Pantheon. With The Guardians. With Action Wrestling.
I will bring you back to the one place you truly know you belong, Alexander...in the middle of that ring, staring up at those Bright Lights, wondering why you keep grinding, how much failure can one man endure, when is enough...enough.
More thumping from the adjacent room. That familiar thud of flesh being thrown against a wall.
After being Marked by the Beast, you will not need to visit your father to know that you are a loser. You will not need him to spit on you because I’ll dump your Confused Mass by the road side and let every derelict in Minnesota relieve himself on your carcass.
Thank me, Alex! I am bringing to YOU what you have previously had to seek out! The truth of your failure! Of your inferiority!
As I sat listening to your promos, you brought up time and time again your three World Title losses. You would bring it up under the guise of a parry, cutting off their likely jab before they made it. But it exposed you, Alexander.
You brought up those losses time and time again because YOU could not stop thinking about them. You declared, chest out and loud to everyone who hadn’t asked:
I AM NOT DEFINED BY THOSE LOSSES!
The World, as it always does when you speak, shrugged and went about its business. You were the one defining yourself by those losses. And now, when I rip that title from your hands and batter your lifeless corpse with it, you will define yourself by another one.
Shall we speak of more history, Alexander? Our shared one is brief but relevant. I laid you flat at the UCI reunion show. Usually a past victory is barely worth a mention but what was it you told me beforehand?
You told me that I didn’t stand a chance because I was there “for no reason” while you were there because of your pride in UCI, a place that you thought of as...home. And even with your superior motivation--which I’m sure you think you have now--and even in a place you called “home”--which I’m sure you now call Action Wrestling--you did what you can be most counted on to do: YOU FAILED.
So it has been and so it shall be.
A muffled voice calls out from an adjacent room.
I have come to set you free, Alex. Heed the advice of Friedrich Schiller
“Don't let your heart depend on things
That ornament life in a fleeting way!
He who possesses, let him learn to lose,
He who is fortunate, let him learn pain.”
My heart does not depend on that title the way yours does. But I need it to show others what I have shown you. I need to dangle it like a carrot out in front of all you lesser beings so that you snap and lunge for it and I may pull it back and replace it with a noose from The Gallows. You all seek to possess but will learn to lose. You are fortunate and will learn pain.
Now is not your time and this is not your place, GOAT Slayer. The moniker handed down to you by finer minds in creative will go unfulfilled.
There are no trophies, Alexander.
Walter opens the box and we get just a glance of its contents before he turns it upside down. The container was nearly full to the brim with...teeth, hundreds of them. His tiny ivory trophies now a waterfall into the flames.
There is no home, Alexander.
Walter kicks over the flaming barrel. The couch is engulfed. The curtains are ablaze. The old manufactured home is a tinderbox. The muffled voices from the other room have turned into screams.
There is only you...and I...and EVOLUTION.
BURN IT DOWN
BE REBORN
EVOLUTION...IS HERE.