Post by Crow McMorris on May 29, 2016 15:18:58 GMT -6
CORONATION: NOW
Black chevrons bleed into the white marble floor beneath my feet as my blood stained Doc Martin's clatter upon the hard, slippery surface. I'm walking towards a red door now; resting at the end of a long corridor. I didn't know they had a chapter in this town. This hotel, so innocuous, so out of the way. He always said they where everywhere, if you only knew. If they allowed you to know. The colour on that door is like an exploding star, so bright that my retina's burn as I approach. That crimson door, a mesmerising vision, leading me onwards. A beacon towards the darkness that awaits. That dreaded black eclipse.
Waiting at that door is my mother. She's dressed in a long, red gown. It flows like an open vein. Blonde hair up in a loose bun. Diamonds sparkling across her pale neck. They've been dancing, her and him. A waltz, then drinks. Her nostrils are burning. She smiles as she slips something into the coat pocket of my jacket, wiping away a slither of blood from my cheek. Not mine, It's a trace of battle. I reach inside my coat, and I know instantly what it is. She smiles, happy to see
Sarah: Something for later, son. It's unsullied, pure. It will heal you quick after your match with that heretic, Wade.
Zombies use coke to heal fast. Bones still brake, flesh still bleeds. But with coke? We have ourselves a catch all. A triage in a dime bag. Just another step that we're ahead of all of you warm blooded fucks. We're faster, stronger. And yeah, we're madder. But we still know fear, the kind that comes when you're standing at the doorway of madness. Because beyond that door? He sits. The new King in yellow.
Crow: Did he buy you that dress? It looks expensive. Are we celebrating?
She nods.
Sarah: They named him king tonight, son. The whole order. It was unanimous. He holds court over everything now. The war is over. Finally over. Just as it should be.
A Civil War, the old order against the new. Old men with crooked fingers signed a decree to kill him. He must have answered as he always does. No more decrees from “The Circle of the Black Sun”. Their quills silent as he steals their crown.
Crow: I'm glad it's over. But Thuggin' won't bow as easily as he thinks. He's tenacious. Calculating. Look, let's just split. Me and you. Let's just get the fuck outta here and go see dad. Find some trouble. Talk about this away from--
Her pupils turn black. My breath would be short now, shocked dry if I still breathed. Instead I just stand there. Listening to his orders flow from her black lips as I feel rage rise to the surface. I concentrate, bury it. I can't play my hand now. We're not ready.
Sarah: He's waiting for you. Don't keep him waiting. You know how we owe him. Preparing you. Saving me. Saving us when your father was--
Gone. The door is already open as I walk inside. As it closes behind me I see him, he beckons me over and calls me “son”. His words are like ice.
2. NO MOOR.
ROMAN AND CROW: EARLY MORNING.
WHACK!
I felt a newly delivered, crisp copy of the New York Times crack across my skull as Vincent “Buddy” Roman tutted to himself. His monogrammed purple and red dressing gown hunched over the breakfast table of our newly rented apartment. The Shape's huge, imposing frame judders with righteous indignation; his anger eclipsing a bite taken from a ritually constructed tuna on rye. A glass of freshly squeezed orange juice. A cool unopened bottle of YOO HOO. And a croissant, that he routinely scoffs at each day.
Everything is kosher and in it's place; except the bruise rising on the back of my scalp. But then, that's Grandfather for you. I was getting used to it by now, if truth be told. Still, today's reason had more weight to it than most. Today was a good day to shut up and listen.
Buddy Roman: Grandson!
Crow: What?
WHACK!
Crow: Hey!
WHACK!
Crow: Now, look...
WHACK!
Crow: I know, I know you're angry; but there's no way I'm spending any more time in that isolation tank getting reprogrammed by a fraternity of oddball Frankensteens! Kapish?
WHACK!
Buddy Roman: It wasn't reprogramming, it was a Spa! And no, that's not why I'm hitting you today.
WHACK!
Crow: Spa, my ass!
WHACK!
Crow: Jam-willy! Why then?
WHACK!
Buddy Roman: That name, Grandson. Has no place in this home. Now, will you do me the common curiosity of shutting up and listening to today's insightful life lesson? I'd like to conclude business before my Yoohoo gets warm.
I placate with a shrug since my tongue so offends. Buddy mumbles something under his breath, it's probably not affectionate, then offers forth a pearl of his solid gold wisdom.
Buddy Roman: Grandson...I am vexed today, vexed because once more, I am confronted with another one of your problems, a spectre, crawling out from under the rock of your past. A fat, Hawaiian shirted bail jumper, that pretends to be a former Wrestling Champion. A sweaty, nonsensical clown, this “Brosideon” of the deep named, Wade Moor.
Crow: Wade Moor? Forget that chin beard, Grandpa! He's just an obstacle I'll brush aside, nothing more.
Buddy Roman: But he isn't just “nothing moor” is he? He is your shadow. He's a man of infamy. The self absorbed, self proclaimed face for your murder, while Bobby Cairo stood upon the grassy knoll. Wade Moor sold the world a lie, and the world listened and believed that lie. They believed that he was your nemesis. And THAT is the problem, because as long as the world believes he's your arch-enemy, then he'll have that free meal ticket, he'll have the bookers ear. The five minute pod cast spot where he'll drone on and on, ad nauseam, about the look in your dying eyes as that wrestle slut Chelsea Armstrong screamed to be with you. How he flourished as he danced upon your grave. How he smashed the ten bell salute--
Crow: Hey, Chelsea doesn't deserve to be called--Wait, what? He did that? He interrupted MY ten bell? The fucking prick!
Buddy Roman: Oh, he picked his spots very well, Grandson, and for that I will commend him. But unlike you, Wade proved, time and time again, to be completely incapable of winning a title. And, as a proud father, I could not abide such a complete lack of competitive gumption in one of my siblings. Wade Moor could never be a child of mine, not when, with each turn of the page, he so spectacularly failed. He could not win the Tag titles with Jared Holmes, he could not win the Sea-V title, he stood zero chance against your father for the Internet. Wade Moor quickly became a joke living off your name. Off the name of #beachkrew, a dynasty that all found success around him. WITHOUT him. Wade Moor, a simpering fat boy loser, a black sheep of the litter that had to brand himself with your namesake's image just to remind the world of his apparent “deed”. A deed that he himself had zero part in. Wade Moor, your nemesis, the man that observed your fate. That observed your death. That observed. And observed. And ate that humble pie like a good little piggy as every other member of #beachkrew tasted gold EXCEPT HIM. The embarrassment that tarnished their legacy. So much so, that when the opportunity came? They had to DRAG his fat, waddling ass over Omega's body for the three count. Just to make sure that they themselves weren't branded a total failure by the IWC. THAT is your nemesis. And you should be ashamed.
Crow: I don't get it, why should I carry the shame of this? He's the psycho, he's the schizophrenic that murdered his own father. Why the fuck should I bow my head in shame?
WHACK!
Buddy Roman: Because he's out there now, dreaming of his own self importance and MAKING MONEY OFF IT! He's out there, building himself a temple on the internet based upon your death. And he's not the only one that worships it. He has followers online that ask him what it felt like to watch you die. And he answers as if it was this strange profound experience. As if this “special connection” you two have actually exists. So now you can tick, “gay subtext” to the growing list of arch nemesis boxes he's trying to fill.
Crow: Gay subtext? Hey now, wait up a minute there Gramps. That's not--
Buddy Roman: Your gay stalker is a cholesterol baked nightmare that proclaimed himself your nemesis. HOW COULD YOU ALLOW HIM TO BE SO BOLD?! This fool is nothing but a Cajun hot pocket! Dumped upon the unwilling belly of professional wrestling! Wade Moor, a steaming turd of babbling drudgery. Dragged, kicking and screaming, by his peers, towards a world title win he did not deserve!
Crow: Can we not do the Gay--
Buddy Roman: That World title belt, oh how I loved it so...that once proud and honoured belt, how it must have suffered when it awoke, to find itself wrapped around the enormous, sweaty, lard ass of a rotund, mongoloid buffoon! A gay stalking lunatic that's never seen the inside of a gym in his life, who had his back pocket (stuffed at the time with Take 5's) picked by a forty odd year old drunk, who was stumbling around Pennsylvania after awaking from a friggin' coma! Jayson Price, wondering what fucking day it was! And what day was it when he won the World title? It was Fifteen, a mere MONTH after Wade reign began! Fifteen, the day Jayson Price destroyed YOUR NEMISIS. YOUR arch-enemy! Do you not understand now the enormity of our problem?
It was sinking in, sinking in like quicksand. So I fought the truth all I could before I faced it. Raising my voice. Stamping my feet with rage. Everything my Grandfather was saying as the truth. But to except it? That was difficult. Almost impossible. To think, that I was being compared to Wade Moor? It sickened me. So I took a breath I didn't need and screamed across the apartment.
Crow: The only thing about that twat I understand is that Wade fucking Moor managed somehow to limpet himself onto my career! That he watched as I fucking died! And then, decided that being an observer in my death meant he had somehow overcome an impossible fucking hurdle! I understand that we had a tag match once and he won it, but for the life of me I can't remember any of it because my partner that night was Alex Richards. And with Alex Richards? Your days start and end with Zim Quilla; it all translates into a drunken haze that concludes in a bar somewhere in Mexico with a half Chinese, half Romanian Prostitute, who's fire breathing a mouthful of gasoline over your singed testicles. So yeah, MASSIVE win there for Wade. Bravo for that nothing, non title victory you've decided to rewrite into Gettysburg! Just another moment in Wade's pathetic life he can use to inflate that flagging career of his, to keep it buoyant and above the shark infested waves that encircle him. Maybe he'll get around to blaming the extraterrestrials for his loss this week. Jim Thuggin' the Slovakian space God; so happy to welcome his second favourite “Earth child” Wade into the fold at UCI that he names Spencer Adams ahead of Wade as his business partner. Spencer Adams, the man that beat Wade for the Tag Team titles all those months ago. Another moment for Wade to conveniently forget. That's Wade's timid little life in a nutshell, moments to forget. Except this Sunday, This Sunday I'm going to make him remember. He says he knows how to “rule the ring.” The only ring Wade knows how to rule is a fucking doughnut!
I tried to talk my way out of the truth, but I only managed to ensnare myself still further. Buddy, as always, was right as he leaned forward and placed an arm on my shoulder.
Buddy Roman: And he...is your arch nemesis. Name one man in history who isn't measured by the quality of his enemies. What makes you so exempt?
I had only one answer.
Crow: Nothing.
Buddy Roman: For the past six months I have taught you many of the ways of a good Jew. And for your part you have listened. This tuna on rye for example, it's delivery today was almost adequate. It pleases me to see your improvement before me. To witness the eyes of my Grandson open and blink and understand the world for the first time. And today, at this breakfast table is no exception, for today is the day where you stop being Wade Moor and start being the first UCI world heavyweight champion. Now, somewhere, colliding and exploding inside your undead cerebral cortex is the genesis of creation. The birth of a new Crow. Smarter. Stronger. More cunning. And defiantly not the “imbrocile” Wade Moor.
Buddy stood up for a moment as he reached over the breakfast table with a sigh, sitting back down and handing me a paper bag.
Buddy Roman: Open it.
Crow: What is it?
Buddy Roman: Just open it and take a look with your new eyes.
I opened up the paper bag, inside was a toy set from the old days, a relic of a bygone federation. Two action figures sealed inside a plastic coffin, frozen side by side. They where part of the “Revenge play set” a pack that contained “Wade Moor” (with rocking chair action) set against “The Scarecrow” (with removable exploding chest cavity) If you saved up enough coupons the blurb on the back told you that you could get a special edition Chelsea Armstrong (with blood curdling Scream)
Beneath all that, it simply said: “Rivals”; I sat back. Threw the set down on the table.
Crow: I'll have to destroy him then.
Buddy Roman: Once won't be enough I'm afraid. His humiliation will have to be.. prolonged. This isn't just for the title. You're fighting now for your freedom. To be rid of a parasite that has coiled it's way around your life. Trust in your Grandfather, Crow.
I nodded.
Crow: I do, I do trust in you. You and father, you're all I have.
Buddy Roman: Good. Good. Now, we need to begin work on a replacement for Wade. Destroying Wade is only part of the equation. We have to find you a replacement. Someone worthy enough to step up and take that embarrassments place. Hand me the phone, son. I have an idea.
I handed Buddy the handset from the cordless and sat back.
Buddy Roman: Now, let's see if I can recall his number. Grandson! Fetch me my Rolodex!
Crow: You're what?
Buddy Roman: Never-mind. I remember now.
Buddy began to punch in the dial code. Eventually connecting to an answering machine.
NVL: Hello, this is the answering machine of Nathan Von Libert. Leave your pleas for mercy after the beep. BEEEEP!
Buddy Roman: Nathan? I can call you, Nathan. You and I have been circling the same foes and tormenting the same faces. I was thinking, perhaps you'd be interested in a new arch nemesis? My Grandson, Crow McMorris, is at a loose end right now. As you know he's a good kid, stuck nurse maiding an inbred BOI from the bayou and he's looking for a change up. Call me when you're not flaying the skin off a vestal virgin, or whatever you're up to. Perhaps we can start with some strictly heterosexual stalking? Then move up to death threats?
Crow: Hey!
Buddy cups the receiver.
Buddy Roman: You're already dead, what do you care?
Crow: Good point.
Buddy Roman: Now, where was I?
The door to the apartment was kicked open. In walked my father, ZMAC. He was dressed as always in his dirty denim and leathers. In one hand he held a hacksaw dripping with blood, in the other...
Crow: That's...a severed head.
ZMAC snorted. He'd been busy fighting a rival Cartel.
ZMAC: Yeah, had to decapitate this one. Cyborg. Tricky bastard. You're on patrol tonight, son. Take White Steven with you.
ZMAC dropped the severed head on the breakfast table with a dull thud. Buddy exhaled.
Buddy Roman: What a morning.
3. THE KING, SPEAKS.
THE HANGED MAN: NOW
Beyond the red door a tarot card flipped over once more in the grasp of my guardian who sat opposite. Licks of unruly flame arose from a large, open fireplace, that bathed the detailed illustration in his hand with flickering, vibrant life. The hanging man struggled now to be free. This card was different from the others I had seen; hands were instead nailed to an inverted cross, that shook with hateful, orange delight. Images in the flame, that were in truth conjured from the pit of my own seething mind, tethered me to the moment as a voice reached inside my subconscious. A scalpel of cold fear, that spent this troubled Chicago night intently searching for the truth. Hounding my history until it could run no more. A delicate, savage operation; conducted by that waving hand with the tarot card. The effete, manicured hand of the man that sat before me. A wise magus nestled deep into a large leather bound chair, a smiling face that could not fully conceal it's horrific detachment from everything. From me. From my mother. From those it had saved and appeared to love.
I took a hit from a blunt and sat back in my seat. The chess game scatted before me invited attention; ornate black and white pieces locked in a stalemate upon an ivory carved board. The whole scene was illegal in thirty nations except this room; an expanse that obeyed no law but it's own. Just another statement, another sign that this was his world, his rules as the questions began to rain down.
“And what shall we do with this Wade Moor, dear boy?” Spoke the man. This was a well breed voice that had guided me since childhood. That had taught me how to fight until my knuckles bleed. That forged me over years into a murder machine programmed to destroy. Coded and sent on a collision course with fate, and what came after. It may have been Zombie McMorris and Kaz Mazy that saved me, but it was this man that prepared me for that moment. Because of him, I always knew death would take me, but I knew also, that it could never hold me.
“Wade Moor? I say cremate the prick and be done with it.” I began “Put this rambling imbecile out of his fucking misery and bury his plebeian ashes in a rose garden. Ten years ago he tried to drag me into his schizoid hell and he's been my lap dog ever since. I say, let the lap dog taste death. A true fucking death. That arrives when today's Wade Moor becomes tomorrow's forgotten fool. Let the world spin off it's axis as his memory fades. As the world moves on. That's what hell looks like for a Wade Moor. And I want him to see that reflection, staring right back at him as I lift up that UCI World Heavyweight title above my head, it's shimmering gold blinding him with my victory.”
“But what of #beachkrew? How do you factor them into this?”
“I don't. #beachkrew is a shattered memory now. Wade's “friends” have abandoned him. Dustin Beaver and Kyle Kemp don't follow him on social media. To them, Wade has effectually become a twitter pariah. Those boys from the old WINObago days barely acknowledge Wade's existence. They've chosen to forget him, because Wade represents failure. The failure of an all powerful ideal, that was corrupted and blighted from within and allowed to collapse under the weight of Wade's myopic lack of vision.”
The man nodded. All too well aware of the facts.
“Wade betrayed #beachkrew with his self absorbed mantra to promote himself. He forgot about the mission and focused on the prize. And it was that self absorption that fractured the cause. That drove a wedge within the team. How ironic then, that Wade's narrow minded obsession to hold the world title led to his own downfall. Wade, unable to unseat my father ZMAC from the internet title, unable to win the Tag Team titles. Unable to win the Trios titles. Simply, unable. A muted, emasculated clown that was handed the World title belt after #beachkrew, en mass, took it upon themselves to turn this lumbering wreck named Wade Moor into a champion. Not because Wade deserved it, but because he was their embarrassment. A three hundred pound burden they had to carry on their backs and drag over the line. Just to legitimise and protect their own championship reigns. And what does Wade do one month later? He loses it to a fucking drunk.”
“Of all the transgression this sweaty mass of piss has inflicted upon me, the idea that he somehow qualifies to be my nemesis has to be the worst.”
“Is that you, or Buddy talking? I heard his podcast on the way from the airport today. Smart man, good to see you're listening to him too”
“He's my Grandfather. I would be a fool not to. Besides, he's right. In need to change up, leave wade behind, he has no one left, no one he can trust. No salvation from the earth once it takes him. I say...let the soil smother Wade with a veil of obscurity, a shroud that crushes his legacy into shit. I say...this Sunday? I fucking END HIM.”
The apartment around me awoke from it's cluttered slumber, dancing to the orange tune of a falsetto of crackling wood. My eyes adjusted to the dark as I saw a memory box of decades gone by; family relics that had gathered dust here since the nineteen hundreds. A room, carved seemingly from the mind of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle. It was the belly of a sleeping dinosaur, that had swallowed a loud grandfather clock. It's metronomic beat inspiring me.
“But maybe, maybe that's too easy. Too quick. Hear that sound? That will be my final victory. Wade Moor, fading away. It's inevitable that it will happen. Time only ticks for one of us now. And with each passing day, that truth will only grow louder as new scares form; as bones grow weary of the struggle. As time matches on; leaving behind a Wade Moor that was nothing but an observer in his own life. Never the participant. A world champion by circumstance rather than by design. A mantle, stripped from Wade by an old drunk; who awoke one day from his slumber; just long enough for that drunk, Jayson Price, to strip Wade of the lie that he wore around his fat, type two diabetes,waist.”
“Your final victory, Yes. But what of your first?” That voice grounding me. Here, in this dank room was the difference. What a schizophrenic idiot named Wade Moor could never understand. I was not this “Cory Cane” he mumbled on about. I never was. That was a time and a place that was swallowed whole by a solar storm. Me? I'm Corey McMorris. And right here, right now? New rules apply. Because now, when I look into the mirror, I don't see the face of a naive people's champion any more, I see mine. I see the face of a man that will fight in my corner for a change. That will fight my battles and win my wars. I see the pale face of a killer that isn't sacrificing himself for the fans. Instead, I see a man who sacrifices his enemies. Bleeds them dry for God wrestling. And in exchange, is bestowed with the honour of victory. That's my reflection, a prism of seething rage caught in a cracked portrait. A picture that never ages, instead it's one that laughs as his enemies wither.
All my enemies, even the man opposite.
“I may still harbour compassion. I may convert loyalty, and understanding for those less fortunate. But I temper it all now with a ruthlessness. Maybe I'm not the hero they think I am. Perhaps that man died and never returned, devoid of the qualities that made me once loved. Yet, instead of fearing that truth, I welcome it, for it will forge me into a dagger of hate that will pierce my enemies hearts and leave them dead. My final freedom, from an arch enemy that was never worthy of the name in the first place. That poor, deluded fool named....”
Johnny Rabid: Wade Moor. Yes, my son. He should fall. He has failed you. He has failed me and the cause. I am the King in Yellow. Tonight was my coronation. I now rule an army capable of defeating the Owls on my terms. And If all goes well? One day soon, I will be the United Kingdom's next Prime minister. This is the lesson you must learn, Crow. That in this universe of ours? You have to dream big. Tell my “old friend” Wade that I hope he finds his attackers. I hope he discovers their identity. So I may buy them a drink and toast them, along with your victory this Sunday. Here's to the future.
Good. Day.
Rabid raised a glass of fine Cognac. I joined him in a toast, as I plotted my vengeance, deep within the subconscious of my Buddy Roman'ed mind.
