Post by Crow McMorris on Jun 12, 2016 9:52:52 GMT -6
From Agent: Mosley, Donald.
[ID Code: ZER01137]To: FCB Secure Data Vault
[IP: 34.115.21.116]
Subject: Notes on the future of UCI
[Access: Granted]
It's been a year since “1the Wav3” shocked our planet. Over thirty million people lost their lives in one day. It was a tide of insanity, a signal that infected us all. A lapse of reason transmitted directly into our minds that consumed nations, cities, and families; shattering lives under a cloud of madness that purged us of reason. And with each life consumed, a new link in a chain was formed, a line of human machine code comprised of misery, that formed a equation of violence and death that encircled the world. Each act of barbarism, each murder, was calculated and designed to the nth degree, a “masterpiece of terrorism”, that held the Earth to ransom with but a single phone call, and a single ultimatum.
1he wav3 crossed all boundaries, and ignored all segregations. No man or woman was safe. No religion offered sanctuary. No border contained asylum. “1he wav3” was a bio-molecular programme, a hack that hot-wired the mind. For years we had been exposed to an insidious slow burn brainwashing operation, an intravenous drip administered through blip verts in super-bowl commercials and contrails dripping from the wings of tourist packed 747's . Now, those behind the treatment could sit back in the shadows, conformable in the knowledge that they now possessed the ultimate dead man's trigger, a weapon that they fully intended to use at will. Whenever the whim struck them.
Only exposure to televised violence seems to dampen the effects of 1he Wav3. A flaw built deliberately into the heart of the programme. It's with this realisation, that the full, horrific extent of the plan now becomes obvious. For our faceless enemies are in fact drug dealers, pushing their own unique brand of opiate. A world now addicted to the rush of unchecked violence.
With the Federations smashed however, new laws needed to be created to monitor and control the spread of this new combat sports gold rush. The F.C.B. (Federal Combat Bureau) was soon formed, a combination of Military Police, F.B.I, and Homeland Security. The F.C.B are Minute men, encamped (like an army) across the United States and beyond. Sworn in to patrol a newly created patchwork of “Arena Sectors” that now criss cross the fabric of our dangerous post-wav3 landscape.
Each sector has a custodian, a Fight Cartel that has been granted a licence by the United States Government to provide the nation's population with organised, weekly violence. Each match, each battle performed within these arena walls contains a key, a treatment that locks away, “1he wav3”, and protects the cerebral cortex from possible psychotropic re-activation. The Fight Cartels are our firewall if you will, our last line of defence from a “2econd Wave”, a possible new assault that would send us all inexorably back to a technological stone age.
It is imperative that the Cartels flourish, for if this generation, and the one beyond, stand any chance of survival in the coming years; the cartel initiative must succeed.
One of the most prominent lights to guide us exists in arena Sector 01773; the South side of Chicago. Their custodian is the United Championship Infinite, whose crooked fingers of influence stretch across Hyde Park, the Jackson Park Highlands District, Kenwood and Beverly. These upper middle class locations, coupled with a blossoming affiliation with newly anointed Mayor, David Sanchez, paints them unfortunately as prime targets for hostile invasion and takeover by Westside and Northside Cartels. An act of violence protected, and enforced by Federal law. For in this brave new world, the only law that matters is survival of the fittest. Only the strongest Cartels can survive. Only those capable of demonstrating strength will expand their custodian powers to other sectors. The Fight Cartels hold our fate in their grasp. They must prove to be worthy of the honour. Their arena's must become hallowed grounds for tamed, subdued audiences. While their Championships must become...
THE BATTLE STANDARD that leads the way. Gold straps that herald power and faith in their product. A totem for a world's sanity, held tightly in their hands. For the UCI; there moment to ascend arrives at Lazarus. But also their most vulnerable juncture. For if they're attacked now, at this critical era in their development? Then their chances of survival shorten: from good, to none at all.
ACT I: SIXTEEN POUNDS
Eight fifty one on a Thursday morning. Eden's highway is hitting the rush hour. A large metal snake of traffic now hugs the cook county interstate as temperatures soar and tempers shorten. Car horns sing out a cacophony of frustrated noise as a sturdy but meek looking Security Van (blacked out windows, compliment of three young armed officers inside) waits paternity in amongst a slowing vertebrae of flummoxed drivers. The van's patience however will not be rewarded this day as they turn ninety degrees onto the Kennedy Expressway and confront their nightmarish fate head on.
A mean looking camouflaged warhorse is barrelling now towards them; an MRAP (Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected ) Humvee, kitted out with a haphazard, welded-together snow plough is incoming at speed. Tires screaming as the crudely fitted plough sends a wake of sparks skyward, the plough's steel smouldering with a heat shimmer that heralds nothing but blistering pain.
This old soldier has seen conflicts halfway across the world, from the desolate cities of Syria, to the streets of Afghanistan. It's fought insurgencies and grounded them into dust; it carries the scars of futile attempts to slow its course, the stains of it's victims, worn like warpaint along the length of it's four wheel driven, bulletproof chassis.
With age comes viciousness, the MRAP has been especially out-rigged for urban combat; customised with metal spikes affixed to the vehicle's wheel hubs; several spinning, serrated blades that now sing a low symphony of chaos as they cut through the air pollution and that snake of terrified traffic that is now desperate to avoid its path.
Vehicles crash blindly now into each other as they attempt to outmanoeuvre the oncoming storm. A line of humbled sports hatchbacks that began their day with nothing but the local school run to contend with, but who now find themselves recast as helpless victims, collateral damage to be crushed beneath the tires of the MRAP's ravaged path, their inferior fibreglass and steel doors shredded to pieces, while the Humvee supercharged engine spits out turbo charged insults as it's rusting box passes by, preparing itself to deliver a fatal, one sided jousting competition against its younger, smaller cousin.
The Security van tries to swerve to avoid the incoming assault but it's too late, the rusting MRAP is charging forward with destructive purpose. Scything down all obstacles as it collides, sending the younger vehicle cartwheeling into the air!
The Guards shriek as the Security van rolls end over end down the Interstate, finding themselves now trapped inside a brutal washing machine. A nightmare of screaming steel and shattering glass that is churning over and over. Naive, ill prepared bodies, bounce from floor to ceiling as bags of hundred dollar bills flutter inside the tumbling void. Money now tainted with crimson as bones break and skin lacerates.
The MRAP buries it's plough under the chassis of the security van which now lies helpless on it's broken side, the guards within are unconsciousness as it's crumpled shell is pushed ever onwards towards the final fate that awaits them, the Kennedy Expressway bridge, a structure that has a sheer fifty foot drop with a cordoned off interstate beneath.
A bloodied hand raps against a passenger window inside the van, a futile gesture from a dying Guard. The plea is ignored as the MRAP lowers gear and shoves the vehicle unceremoniously off the bridge, crashing down onto the back of a waiting flatbed construction truck, it's spine more used to hauling bags of cement than a security truck but still, it's large sturdy dipper remains fit for purpose; the vehicle hijacked earlier that day from its depot to complete this exact mission.
Police sirens echo off in the distance as the flatbed drives casually away, all eyes remaining on the MRAP as it shrugs off it's new blue and white pursuers, gunning it's turbo charged engine and heading straight for a north side heaven and safety.
While inside that Security truck. Resting ideally among the corpses and the money; lies the UNITED CHAMPIONSHIP INFINITE'S WORLD HEAVYWEIGHT BELT; it's strongbox cracked open. It's gleaming design intermixed with blood for the first time. Baptised in bedlam and anarchy.
The Battle Standard has been STOLEN. Sixteen pounds of precious metal, laced with the heartbeat of the universe: glimmering with an unnatural vibrancy of ethereal blue steel composite. Sixteen pounds of hope, driven away. Scores lie dead. The first shots fired. The title's infamy, now assured.
ACT II: WAKE UP CALL
I hear the gunshot as I pretend to sleep. Her face is no more. Gone. Marjorie-Edith Carmichael, 48 years old. A dishevelled woman now at peace with her husband, Henry, son, Thomas, and daughter, Roxanne. No hell to worry about, no self-inflicted wound can jail her soul forever, not this time, not since this was hell to her all along. The here and now, a twisted algorithm that adds up to the same conclusion over and over again. A simple, unavoidable answer: we are not the good guys. We're the planet's jailer's. It's owners. Whether we like it or not. The people watch us perform because they have to. No choice. No escape. We inject them with an inoculation each week to keep the madness at bay. Our violence keeps the monsters inside in check. Compliance is mandatory. Those that refuse?
Those that refuse? I don't know what happens to them. Perhaps there's a system of “Re-education camps” dotted around the country, where all the malcontents and the intellectuals with a voice are treated to bouts of systematic, Orwellian torture: brainwashed either into the ground, or dumped drooling on a highway with a lobotomised scar etched across their forehead. That huge, looming boot, smashing down on their freedom forever. I wonder, do we gather up the objectors like cattle? Throw them on trains? Gas them? Castrate them? What the fuck am I fighting for?
There, can you hear it?
BANG!
She's just shot herself again. That image; on infinite repeat. Only this time the noise that accompanies it is not from the dream; this time it originates from the real world as a towering shape stands over me. Velvet red dressing gown; monogrammed with gold letters, stern face, reading glasses hanging from the tip of that unmistakably Jewish nose. It's grandfather. It's Buddy Roman, New York times in hand, ready to strike me again.
Buddy Roman: Wake up, son. I need some privacy.
I climb off my hammock suspended over the bath. Maybe one day, “my parents” will let me have a fucking bedroom.
As I leave my restroom/sleeping quarters, I receive a text on my smart phone. It's Spencer Adams. The World Title has been stolen. P.S. Delete text.
PLOP!
Thanks Grandfather, I couldn't have said it better myself.
ACT III: PLAY DEAD
The warehouse beckoned. That familiar blue, rusting Datsun of Grandfather's trundled along the disorderly, jittery express-way as we managed to hit an assault-course of hurriedly set up F.C.B. checkpoints after F.C.B. checkpoints. It was like a scene from “The Spy who came in from the cold”. Machine-guns and granite expressions draped in black fascistic body armour greeted us. The procedure was always the same, we would reach a checkpoint, show our papers, then move on a few meters only to face the process all over again. All the while, the sky would be baking our coked out vision with searing blues and explosive yellows. Buddy was squinting as his eyes narrowed and snarled at the sun, his huge frame intently cramped behind the diminutive steering wheel, it's tiny dimensions conceived exclusively for drivers built in a faraway land. The shape, shifted in his seat now as anger bubbled conspicuously beneath the surface. He muttered something about Omega along the way, then handed me a trading card from the murky depths of the glove compartment; it was one of those limited edition “Ted-Sol Industry” creations. All shiny and sleek and out to dazzle.
As we weaved through traffic, I flipped the card over in my hand and casually checked the stats on the back: I decided to read my findings out aloud to cheer up the old man but he cut me off at the pass, as was his way.
Crow McMorris: Name...
Buddy Roman: Mister-supa-dupa-unstoppable-hero-man. Power: Good at everything. Can't lose. Can't falter. Because he's so fucking good. Hates Superman, because he has a weakness to kryptonite, and that's so lame, G. Created the Earth in five days, just to piss off that gentile God. Got rid of all the Dinosaurs, so that his pet clone Dino would be worth more on e-bay. Flushed out all his organs and replaced them with gold and diamonds, just because he could. Flies, unaided, but chooses not to; because he wants to give back to the ordinary folks, like Batman and the Flash. Comes now from a mythical kingdom where all known diseases are cured. Each year in “Maratopian-land”, they invite all the dying kids from the third world orphanages to occupy human zoos for a week, just so they can be paraded to their little, spoiled Maratopian kids to remind them just how lucky their annoying asses are. Then, they send all those little dead AIDS boys and girls back home in crates marked: “broken” and ask for their money back.
That's Jay Fucking Omega. The man that can't lose The man with time travel, yet won't stop “9-11”, or Hitler, or “1he Wav3”; because there's some unwritten law that dictates that he's only allowed to have fun with time travel, not accomplish anything. And that, my boy, is why Jay Omega cannot be allowed to win the World heavyweight title, because if he does; what do you suppose he'll do with it?
I flip that card over in my hand as I look up and see a mid morning Chicago sky buzzing with armed choppers and a city populated with cowering, frightened citizens. Thee back down at that shit eating grin that Jay just loves to plaster across his face.
Crow McMorris: He'll take it for a jaunt around the universe. He'll rub that gold into the face of Mork and Mindy and Captain Kirk and Doctor Who, then he'll misplace it at the beginning of creation, while us “ordinary Folks” are back here among the shit, carrying on with the struggle. The little people, with the little lives, trying to unravel the mess our world has woven itself into; a world Jay Omega never gave a shit about in the first place. Because back in Utopia where he was hatched, they teach their kids never to worry about the scum that inhabit the ninety nine, point nine percent of the planet. Because they're the “other people”, the genetically inferior slobs that had to be born out of a womb, that had to go to school and get a real job, and marry, and watch their dreams slip away as they make sacrifices for their kids.
Buddy Roman: Exactly, look at me now! Look at my sacrifice!
Crow McMorris: Erm...yeah. Thanks, Gramps. Appreciate that.
Buddy Roman: You're a burden to me, Grandson. But one with promise. And it's that faint slither of promise that has gotten you this far. This Sunday is Lazarus, the rising of the dead. The time of Vincent “Buddy” Roman (and also Crow) The moment when once again, The Shape will be the proud parent of another champion. Who else will be able to claim this, to understand this achievement? To revel with me in this halcyon day of joy? No one, because only Buddy Roman can do this. Only The Shape has the drive and the determination to take a withering, cowering Scarecrow; and make him a man. A coked up Zombie death machine that bulldozers without remorse through competition like paper. That's the reality of it all. I am the mind of this operation; you boy, are the execution. These feelings of humanity you cling onto, these ghosts that haunt all those redundant dreams of yours, that make you imperfect. I forgive them. I forgive with the knowledge that I will one day eradicate them. Because even with these bizarre imperfections of humanity you cling onto, you are still my Grandson. my project, you remain allowed (by my humble self and good graces) to travel with me now; as Grandfather and student, and that is the difference we have over the entire world. The difference that annihilated that deluded mongoloid former arch nemesis, that utter waste of space named, Wade Moor, when the world and it's pet parakeet said you couldn't triumph. The difference when you destroyed your own Father, ZMAC; and stood victorious; just to prove to me that you could be ruthless. That you were ready to learn from your Grandfather.
Crow McMorris: I pinned Dustin Beaver, I wouldn't have pinned my own...
Buddy Roman: Wouldn't you? Think about that day; then tell me again how you would never have pinned your own father for the belt.
I flipped the card, over and over as cop sirens roared past. The sound of gunfire invading my senses. Edith. Her face: gone. Some one need to step up. To take charge. To lead the line with the belt and fix this world. To bleed out the poison that's infected the veins of the system. I live in a crippled world. A world on it's knees struggling to stand but can't. I can't save this world with noble intentions and a handshake. I need my Grandfather. I need to be ruthless. Edith was right, this is MY WORLD. Just as it's Jay's but unlike Jay Omega; I'll take charge, I'll take responsibility for it. I'll fix what's broken. Even If I have to tear the Omega Man limb from fucking limb to do it.
Crow McMorris: You know Gramps, you're wrong.
Buddy's face starts it's short journey to beetroot red; until I finish the sentence.
Crow McMorris: Not about me...yeah, I would have pinned my father. No doubt. No, you're wrong about Jay Omega. He's not even close to being perfect. Look around you now; look at all this shit. Reality has never touched a Jay Omega, and it never fucking will, cause he's a bubble boy; soft and gentle to the touch. Hardcore Maniac my ass; he thinks that Casey Jones gig he likes to drop means anything? Nigga, get real. If it did, how come each belt he's won, he's had to drop due to injury? United States Championship: dropped due to injury. Hardcore title: dropped due to injury. If he's this unstoppable, unkillable superhuman machine, why does he keep floundering? I don't think he left Maratopia because he was bored, Gramps. I think he left he because he was dumped in a crate marked: Inferior. And kicked off the island. He's driftwood; hooking up with Polar and Bonnie because he can hid his imperfections beneath their talents. Conceal his imperfections as he shimmers and shakes across someone else's stage. Jay Omega is nothing but a Polar Phantasm stage hand. A nameless dancer in a chorus line. An extra in someone else's universe, he's there guest star at best. He's a good man at heart. But he's not cut out for this; to born to lead like he thinks. That's the fate of a champion, Gramps. Not a fate Jay's proven to be able to handle in the past if truth be known. But one I will face and except; the same way Nattie Ice did. The same way Bobby Cairo did. But leading from the front. By taking back what is ours. What was always ours. I don't care if Jay's at the office or not when we arrive. All I know is that this Sunday is about my time. My rising. My title. Now, lets see if this thing can do thirty.
Smoke plumes from the engine as we hit twenty eight miles per hour. I get a rap on the knuckles for my hubris and end up pushing the cold blue Datsun the rest of the way there. Nothing like inferior craftsmanship to bring a zombie back down to earth.
ACT IV: MISSION STATEMENT
“Jay Omega” and I sit to one side, with Buddy Roman shadowing proceedings, the shape is hugging the shadows of the crow's nest, it's elevated position situated high above the Warehouse's main stage. Below us rests the ring; while surrounding us in a horse shoe shape are rusting containers of various sizes and dimensions. This place used to be the printing depot for the Chicago times before the internet made paper and ink obsolete. If you listen closely , you can still hear the truth bleed out onto the pages, back when journalism was a craft; not a crime.
Buddy is starring now at our hosts, his narrow eyes darting suspiciously between the “Three Wise Men” that have gathered here today. These management style office chairs Spencer has provided us don't feel so sturdy upon inspection, they're cheap office stock. Plastic and forgettable. I casually twirl the “Ted-sol” trading card of Omega between my nicotine stained fingertips as I watch Spencer shift nervously opposite in his office chair. He always did have a problem facing me. Maybe it was because Betty Adams had a poster of me naked on her bathroom wall. One of those Rolling Stone covers that where considered edgy at the time. I suppose when you're trying to just take a piss in peace. A framed, signed photo of a naked man with a huge dong can be somewhat off putting.
I take a drag on my cigarette and give Spence a thumbs up. He looks away. It's funny to see Spencer squirm, but he's a good man so I don't make a song and dance about it. That's Omega's sideshow; and he's welcome to it. Ain't ya Omega?
I look through two cigarette burns in the card where Jay's eyes used to be. I can see right though; so, just like the real thing then. I'm thinking about burning a third hole for a little pinky but I doubt the thing would be able to stand the weight.
By contrast, Atreau is standing, actually, make that pacing; his heavy footprints leave concave prints of rage in the cheap rug they're collectively discovered. Benjamin is all business today. He's foregone the suit; harking back to the old days when he used to wrestle and make himself a treacherous nightmare to face. I can't help but think back to those days, before I was active within the Federations; watching Benjamin turn on Odin Balfore. The look of utter shock within the Norse Tank's eyes. Now I wonder how I can trust this man pacing like a caged animal in front of me. The answer is probably, “I can't”, but I'm backed into a corner now with time slipping away. Choices are a luxury I no longer have.
Leaning, standing, then leaning again is a twitchy, nervous John Gable (Tom Ford bespoke suit, shined up winkle-pickers, slicked back, black hair) adjusts his aviator shades for the ninth time that minute while counting down those precious seven hundred and twenty five seconds he has left until his scheduled pitch meeting across town with the Weinstein's, those savours of cinema who will airlift his middling budget / indie darling ass out of town, and whisk him away from this ill fated enterprise. After all, what the world really needs now, is a sequel to “The Room”.
Benjamin breaks the silence, as I knew he would. He puts away his mobile and exhales.
Benjamin Atreau: We can't wait for Jay to show. He's not answering my calls. We need to get on with this! Spencer?
Spencer Adams nods. He seems troubled to be without Jay. I turn over the Omega card in my hands. Thinking about what Planet Jay might be on today; perhaps he's a peace envoy for a world of living televisions; or he's scouring the universe with that talking dragon of his for the lost manuscripts of Deadwood: season three. None of it matters, because with Jay Omega, all you get is promise, then a scurry of feet, then the Tardis is fired up and he's away. Running, always running. From Canada to Sativa City. From this fractured, imperfect reality to the Imperial Isle of Maritopia.
Benjamin Atreau: Why don't we just gather everyone up? Fuck these Chicago Fight League fuckers and go in with a show of force. Let these fuckers know what we're about!
Not a bad idea. But I hold my tongue as my Grandfather requested.
Spencer Adams: Because that ain't a rescue mission, that's a war. We're hours away from our first PPV; think man! We can't afford to have reprisals on our doorstep! We're still trying to mop up the brain matter from last week. That's not what I signed on for. I am the custodian of this sector. The law of Oh-Seven-Three.
Benjamin Atreau: What, all on your own? I see three owners in this room.
I turn and face my Grandfather, he shakes his head, “No, wait”.
Spencer Adams: I didn't name myself the antidote on a whim. This city is on the brink, we have an MDA psycho as a mayor; our borders are under attack. Our World title is missing. And we don't have our strongest on point to fight for us. Our backs are against the wall, Benjamin. We have to play this cute. We have to use stealth, not brute force.
AH-HEM!
Buddy coughs, his huge frame neatly contained within a navy blue suit; his devious, diabolical mind ticking over as he plays with his signet ring.
Buddy Roman: As the Grandfather and Advocate of my client, Crow McMorris. I feel...annoyed to have to sit here and listen to Betty's baby boy, the House of Ophelia's Section chief incumbent and Eye in the Sky's lest bankable star mumble that their so called “best and brightest” are not in the room. The best IS the brightest. The best IS Crow McMorris. And he wants to know what you people expect of him. Because I am here to assure you, that his interest in this company starts and stops with Wrestling for it. He is not your hero. He is not your messiah. He is not your Jay Omega. Although, it would appear, nether is Jay Omega. My Client is here today to hear what your plans are, leave, then return to training. Which is what my Grandson signed on to do. And nothing more.
Spencer sighs
Spencer Adams: We need him, Crow...
I lean back in my chair. Taking a drag on my cigarette as I do so. A moment passes before I gesture with my hand, waving that Jay Omega card from Spencer Adams gaze towards Buddy Roman's ginger cat smile. Spencer exhales. Now he knows. I don't make a move without Roman.
Buddy Roman: My Grandson is very loyal, Mister Adams. He has devoted his life to my teachings; which if truth be known, has made me very proud. He is a promising project. Not one I am willing to risk without...significant recompense.
Benjamin Atreau: He's dead. He's a fucking Zombie. What's the risk?
Buddy Roman: Oh contraire, Mister Atreau! My Grandson I imagine will be tasked with entering Chicago Fight League territory, that's the Northside of town, ravaged by “1he wav3”, they have crazies there. Rogue cyborgs that hunt human trophies. The mob runs the bank. Everywhere and everyone is a risk. There are fates worse than death even a man who cannot die might face.
“But he'll have that advantage. He'll have death on his side”
I turn and face a ghost from my past; my first instinct is to punch that man to the ground for what he did. But I hold back. I hold back and wait for Buddy to react.
Buddy charges over and throws a devastating uppercut; lifting former Special Agent Donald Mosley off his feet, and out of his boots, as his dishevelled body crashes back down to the floor in a heap. That signet ring of Buddy leaves a stinging mark on the traitor's cheek as Buddy leans over Mosley and spits on the man's floppy, now slightly greying hair.
Buddy Roman: You destroyed my livelihood! You murdered the Federations! Get this pathetic excuse of human filth away! We have no need of him!
Spencer Adams: he's our way in.
Crow McMorris: What? You want me to team...with this?
Donald Mosley dusts himself off and stands. He stares into my dead eyes and smiles.
Donald Mosley: You want to go to hell, I mean. Real hell? Then you're going to need me. Because If we're going to get that belt back. That's the price.
Well, no choice.
Just like always.
To Be Continued.
