Post by Jules on Jun 27, 2013 19:24:30 GMT -4
Book III: Nemesis
Chapter III
Lenny was early. There was a lack of bodies in the bar to determine that. Jimmy was on shift, so Lenny headed straight to the bar.
“Alright, bruv!”
Jimmy plopped a beer down in front of Lenny, who took a long swig.
“Long time no see, Len,” Jimmy said. Jimmy was Irish, born and raised England’s north, but now fully Americanized. He came to America back in the 80s seeking his fortune as a Yuppie, but barman was a long way from Wall Street millionaire. This bar had been Lenny’s regular drinking hole when he first arrived in New York.
“Who’s been in the last half hour?”
Jimmy looked at Lenny puzzled; it was an odd question.
“Couple of guys over there at the pool table came in about half an hour ago. Rest of them are regulars, been camped all day. You expecting someone?”
Lenny nodded.
“So how’s Cher? She still busting your balls on a regular basis?” Jimmy asked with a dry laugh.
“Woman’s prerogative, right?”
“Some shit like that.”
“And you? Any luck with the birds?”
“You know me, barman never tells.”
“That means you haven’t been laid since I was last here.”
Jimmy chuckled nervously.
“This is a prime spot, bruv. You got the opportunity to pour drinks down these middle class types and fuck ‘em raw in the back,” Lenny said as a matter of fact. “I tell you, bruv, if I were in your shoes I’d be up to my nuts in guts every night of the week.”
“Then just pop them in a cab and send ‘em on their way.”
“You got the know-how, bruvva, you just don’t have the tools,” Lenny mocked.
“You know that call that shit rape these days?”
“Yeah, and we’re supposed to believe the filth, the politicians, and the fucking bankers are the honest ones, right?”
A silence descended; Lenny supped at his beer as Jimmy wiped down the bar.
“I got a contract offer to work another show.”
“I saw it, bro,” Jimmy said, tossing the rag to one side. “Cher wants you to take it?”
“She thinks it would be safer. She’s worried about this Victor Hades geezer.”
“He’s a mean sonofabitch.”
“So everybody keeps saying like I’m some fucking schoolboy virgin.”
“You got see it from her position, Len.”
Lenny looked at Jimmy inquisitively.
“You’re out there week after week, putting your body on the line.”
“Correction, bruv: I’ve been putting bodies in intensive care.”
Jimmy smiled awkwardly.
“Be that as it may, she’s got to be sitting in your apartment worrying her pretty little ass about whether you’re going to make it in one piece; and that’s just the level of competition so far.”
“What’s that mean?”
“Victor Hades is a different level.”
“I know,” Lenny said, before adding with sardonically, “I’m told he’s the Hannibal Lecter of professional wrestling.”
Jimmy laughed at the reference.
“He’s a few levels of crazy alright.”
Another silence squeezed between them. Jimmy replaced Lenny’s empty beer as the latter looked transfixed in thought.
“You think I can take him?”
“Hades?” Jimmy gave himself a couple of seconds to think. “I guess it’s not a question of whether you can beat the man; it’s whether you believe you can bring enough of you back to call yourself Lenny.”
Lenny gave Jimmy with foreboding look.
“For a man like Hades the scalp is more than just the win,” Jimmy answered unreassuringly.
“Hello brother!” Lenny turned and there stood his brother, Benny Lansbury. Like a good, astute barman Jimmy surreptitiously slid a second beer onto the bar and made himself scarce.
“Don’t tell me,” Lenny started, “you’re on another ‘holiday’. When PC Plod is having a knees up all the time no wonder the crime rate is so high in London.”
“I suppose you’d know all about that,” Benny smiled. “But I’m here on business this time.”
“So what’s that got to do with me? I thought we were done.”
“We found Jack Parish’s body,” Benny replied without emotion. “Somebody fished it out of the Thames.”
“Thanks for the intel; I’ll remember to send his family flowers for the funeral,” Lenny retorted coldly.
“Seems you’re not surprised.”
“Thing about slags like that, they have an unhappy habit of turning up in over their head. He was a cunt, I’ll lose no sleep over his death.”
“Because you knew about it?”
“Is that an accusation?”
“We know you were one of the last people to see him alive.”
“I’m glad you recognise he was alive at that point.”
“What happened? We know you boxed him the night he disappeared.”
“What usually happens: he gave me some lip, I smashed him spark out, then I took home a nice wedge. Easy night’s work.”
“And that was it? You didn’t happen to get rough with him like-”
“Like I did with you,” Lenny taunted. “Nah, not like that. He was a slag who got what he deserved, and all he deserved, from me, which was a bloody good thrashing. But he never ratted me out and never tried to do me like you did.”
“You broke the law, Lenny! You’re a criminal: it’s my job to lock up scum like you.”
Lenny’s face flashed with rage, but then it relaxed and turned to a smile.
“And there it is.”
“What?”
“Truth. You always thought you were better than me.”
“I am better than you, little brother. How can you sit there and be so proud about who you are, what you do?”
“Nah, that’s not it. This isn’t about my pride, bruv; this all about you and your shame about what you are: a Mountford boy.”
“I’m not going to apologise for wanting to be better, for wanting to be something more than a drug dealer or a petty gangster.”
Lenny smirked with malice.
“You think because you got a badge it makes you better, it makes you somebody? You’re no better than me, bruv, and you know that; it’s just that badge legitimizes what you do. You beat up some mug and its justice; I do it and I’m a thug, a criminal.”
“I uphold the law; it’s completely different to what you do.”
“Nah, you do what you would usually do, except you got that bit of metal to hide behind. You shame me and you shame our family, bruv. Not because you’re filth, because I could take that. But you think you’re better than all of us, like you’ve got more worth than even your own blood because you got a badge and a uniform, and you think that means you got rights to lean on me.”
Benny bowed his head.
“Well I ain’t some piece of shit you can rump and take liberties with. I know who you are Benny: you’re as vicious as any gangster on the street, except you’re sly because you sing one song and act out another. Your pride gives you no honour, and that’s makes you filth in my eyes.”
“And your so-called honour- what’s that worth?” Benny spat back.
“Everything I got in this life I earned. I never pretended to be something I’m not, and if I felt someone needed to be taken down a peg or two I did without hiding behind a fucking badge or any fucking system. Yeah, I’m proud of that.”
“Why- because you’re The Guv’nor?” Benny taunted with derision.
“Because I’m The FUCKING Guv’nor!” Lenny spat back with venom. “Now get the fuck out of here because you got nothing on me, and if you persist I’m sure Mr. FBI would love to hear about the Limey piece of shit pig who’s sniffing around without jurisdiction.”
Benny nodded, knowing he’d lost this round. He offered Lenny his hand.
“Leave it out!” Lenny spat with a curl to his lips, “Now FUCK OFF YOU CUNT!”
Lenny returned to his beer.
*
From the archives of Action Packed Wrestling: The Guv’nor’s Gab (transcript #19)
I’ve got a confession to make: I love America.
However, for a long time I thought the Yanks were a bunch of overweight, Bible-bashing, racist, noisy, annoyingly optimistic bunch of morons who sit around all day guzzling Coca-Cola and watching Hollywood cobblers.
Well I was wrong.
I had to come to America to find that out. The truth is nobody is as embracing as you Yanks. We hear all this ‘Land of Opportunity’ patriotism all the time across the Pond, and a lot of the time we just laugh at you about it. But it’s true, it really is. America is truly a country where merit counts, know what I’m saying?
Look at me. Back in England I’m a scally, a chav, scum of the earth. Not because of who or what I am- because of where I was born. That’s how they define people like me in England: I was born on a council estate in one of the toughest parts of London; my father left when I was a nipper, leaving my dear old ma, God bless her soul, to raise three kids on her own; I didn’t do so well at school and I never did what the straights would call an ‘honest day’s work’ because I wouldn’t bust my guts like a slave for some cunt running a factory who cut the cream of my labour for himself. Because of this the elite in England call me a drain on society, a cause of ‘Broken Britain’.
Nevermind that my old ma never took a penny off the state that wasn’t her right as a parent; and she always put in her fair share. That lovely woman worked three jobs for sixteen years, and she brought us up well: to respect our elders, to take care your own, never to take more than your due, to remember your community and where you came from. If there was ever the touch of God on this planet it was the smile and the charm of my mother, but when she died the State didn’t pay a fucking penny to allow her a dignified burial. She left this Earth with nothing to her name but years of toil, and the State didn’t give a shit about her.
But as soon as one these aristocratic types in the Royals cops a bit of heartburn, he’s surrounded by the best doctors in the land. That’s England: a place where your worth in this life is determined by the place you born, not the merit of your actions.
Now listen, I ain’t portraying myself as some angel here. I know I’ve done bad things in my life, and when my time comes I’m ready to square that off with my maker and take the consequences. But I never took from anyone who never had it coming, and my business never interfered with the lives of innocents. My dealings were always with the underworld, and everyone in that world knew the score. I’ve done things that would turn people’s stomachs, but I’ve always been a man of respect and honour; I’ve always lived by the principle that every person gets their due.
That’s something England could never give, not because I am person lacking merit, but because I’m working class scum; I’m cannon fodder for the elite to use and abuse. That’s why I never agreed to be part of their system. Fuck ‘em, they don’t deserve my respect and they don’t deserve my esteem; especially when politicians and bankers rip food from the mouth of our children every day.
But in America, you people just embraced me. I admit I was worried at first: I thought you Yanks would see me as some mouthy Limey upstart without all the airs and graces you expect from a ‘proper’ Englishman. But you never did that. You accepted me, you saw my merits and accepted my faults. In my heart I’ll always be an Englishman, but now I consider America my home.
You’re probably asking yourself: why has The Guv’nor suddenly gone all political?
Yeah, it ain’t my usual way; usually the politicians can stick it all up their arse. But there is a simple point: I love America because it rewards merit, without concern for who you are or where you came from.
APW is no different. I love this company because in my short time here I see that it rewards merit; it gives opportunities to people who deserve them. Look at Jeff, he’s a fucking moose-eater, but he’s never preferred Eskimos as his champions. It’s the best person for the job- whoever they are. They even let na Englishman born on a council estate become their North American Champion.
Of course the problem with a system that rewards merit is that every slag going thinks they’ve got some. It’s a little a bit exaggerated in the professional wrestling where every slag on the roster is given a microphone and a camera to pour their bile into the world.
Just look at all the ‘episodes’ we get on a weekly basis: slag after slag on a microphone telling the world how great he or she is; how he or she deserves this or that. Yeah, there’s plenty of talkers in this business. But for a lot of them that’s all it is: talk. At the end of the fucking day this business isn’t the Harvard debating society; it’s a war between bloodthirsty wolves. Your merit isn’t in how well you woo the audience; it’s about how badly you can smash the slag who’s trying to take you down. I’ve proved time and time again that’s where my merit lies. For 98 days I’ve been doing it as the North American Champion, and you know what: in the history of Meltdown nobody has done it better than The Guv’nor.
So you can understand me when it pisses me off that this relic from the past, Victor Hades, gets on a mic and talks about my merit, or lack of it in his eyes, when he’s done less than the water boy in the past three years.
Victor, bruv, I know we haven’t been introduced, mostly because for all that testosterone you pump into your veins you just haven’t got the balls to back it up, but I’m The Guv’nor. In the words of Tony Montano ‘say hello to my little friends’. That’s right, bruv, you and these two evil fists are about to get closely acquainted.
But before we get to dance I understand you want to talk this out. Normally I’m not one for all that emotional heart to heart business, but I understand these things are important to women before they get fucked. Tell me Vic, is it true that the good doctor jammed those electrodes right up your arsehole and you begged for MORE! MORE!
Sorry Vic, was that too soon, bruv?
Victor, I copped your latest promotional video and behind all the hot air I discerned one really relevant thing: you don’t think I’m worthy.
I’m not going to say this surprises me, after all it’s not like anybody else hasn’t questioned my legitimacy as not just the champ, but as THE NUMBER ONE DRAW on Meltdown. Do you know what happened to all of those mugs, bruv: they all got their arse beat and all of them fucked off elsewhere.
I’ve already covered your legacy, and I’m cool with it. The thing is I don’t think you’re just some bum Sienna found in the back, turned over to wardrobe and said ‘make him a star’. I know you HAD pedigree. Whether I still think you do is beside the point. What isn’t is that for 98 days I’ve lived, breathed, and BLED the North American Championship. I have proven my merit time after time after time after time and then some. In doing so I’ve faced a proper liquorice allsorts: from some of the biggest bottom-feeding no-good bastards unfit to tie Mr. Dangerous’ boots to challengers who made me question myself, my own abilities and my own standards.
But whoever it was there was always one common denominator: respect. For The Championship and its prestige; for the company because it gave me a chance when no-one else would; for the fans who pay their hard earned wedge to watch me go to work. Whether or not I think you’ve got what it takes, my commitment and my respect will remain unflinched. I will prepare with the same kind of dedication that I always have, from the Rasslemania ladder match to the greatest challenge of my career inside the steel cage; I didn’t get here, I didn’t earn the merit of being ‘the best’, because I took short-cuts or used somebody else for a leg-up. Whether you, Victor, will usurp those moments as that greatest challenge remains to be seen, but I’m making no assumptions about it.
So like a hard-working tart you apply all that make-up, purse those lips, clench your buttocks, whatever you do to prepare for THE GAME you’re on, and most of all keep telling yourself you’re the scourge you think you can be, or the prestige you think the title lacks.
Tell yourself you are a level above, up there with the likes of Terry Marvin, and continue to look down on me. That your comeback so far isn’t even worth the drip of spunk Terry leaves on Maggie Kent’s chin when he’s finished his work is neither here nor there; I’ll still smash you because nothing pops with greater satisfaction than an inflated ego.
Tell yourself I cannot beat you in any time or any place because that’s exactly what I’ve been fighting against my whole life: I was born in a barrel of shit and it’s always being topped up by ‘the elite’ to make sure I always stink. Your mentality is exactly the system I reject because I’ve paid my dues with interest on top. I deserve to be where I am, I earned it, and right now you being frogmarched into MY main event is exactly the bullshit ‘jobs for the boys’ system I’ve fought since day dot because it told me I was a piece of shit and good for nothing.
I am MADE IN HACKNEY, and while I was never born with a silver spoon in my mouth, bruv, I am the GOLDEN man, and I’m going to tan that hide just like John Wayne.
I am on top because I deserve it.
I will stay on top, because I am the best.
And Victor, bruvva, I will pass this test.
With merit.
End.
From the archives of Action Packed Wrestling: The Guv’nor’s Gab (transcript #19)
I’ve got a confession to make: I love America.
However, for a long time I thought the Yanks were a bunch of overweight, Bible-bashing, racist, noisy, annoyingly optimistic bunch of morons who sit around all day guzzling Coca-Cola and watching Hollywood cobblers.
Well I was wrong.
I had to come to America to find that out. The truth is nobody is as embracing as you Yanks. We hear all this ‘Land of Opportunity’ patriotism all the time across the Pond, and a lot of the time we just laugh at you about it. But it’s true, it really is. America is truly a country where merit counts, know what I’m saying?
Look at me. Back in England I’m a scally, a chav, scum of the earth. Not because of who or what I am- because of where I was born. That’s how they define people like me in England: I was born on a council estate in one of the toughest parts of London; my father left when I was a nipper, leaving my dear old ma, God bless her soul, to raise three kids on her own; I didn’t do so well at school and I never did what the straights would call an ‘honest day’s work’ because I wouldn’t bust my guts like a slave for some cunt running a factory who cut the cream of my labour for himself. Because of this the elite in England call me a drain on society, a cause of ‘Broken Britain’.
Nevermind that my old ma never took a penny off the state that wasn’t her right as a parent; and she always put in her fair share. That lovely woman worked three jobs for sixteen years, and she brought us up well: to respect our elders, to take care your own, never to take more than your due, to remember your community and where you came from. If there was ever the touch of God on this planet it was the smile and the charm of my mother, but when she died the State didn’t pay a fucking penny to allow her a dignified burial. She left this Earth with nothing to her name but years of toil, and the State didn’t give a shit about her.
But as soon as one these aristocratic types in the Royals cops a bit of heartburn, he’s surrounded by the best doctors in the land. That’s England: a place where your worth in this life is determined by the place you born, not the merit of your actions.
Now listen, I ain’t portraying myself as some angel here. I know I’ve done bad things in my life, and when my time comes I’m ready to square that off with my maker and take the consequences. But I never took from anyone who never had it coming, and my business never interfered with the lives of innocents. My dealings were always with the underworld, and everyone in that world knew the score. I’ve done things that would turn people’s stomachs, but I’ve always been a man of respect and honour; I’ve always lived by the principle that every person gets their due.
That’s something England could never give, not because I am person lacking merit, but because I’m working class scum; I’m cannon fodder for the elite to use and abuse. That’s why I never agreed to be part of their system. Fuck ‘em, they don’t deserve my respect and they don’t deserve my esteem; especially when politicians and bankers rip food from the mouth of our children every day.
But in America, you people just embraced me. I admit I was worried at first: I thought you Yanks would see me as some mouthy Limey upstart without all the airs and graces you expect from a ‘proper’ Englishman. But you never did that. You accepted me, you saw my merits and accepted my faults. In my heart I’ll always be an Englishman, but now I consider America my home.
You’re probably asking yourself: why has The Guv’nor suddenly gone all political?
Yeah, it ain’t my usual way; usually the politicians can stick it all up their arse. But there is a simple point: I love America because it rewards merit, without concern for who you are or where you came from.
APW is no different. I love this company because in my short time here I see that it rewards merit; it gives opportunities to people who deserve them. Look at Jeff, he’s a fucking moose-eater, but he’s never preferred Eskimos as his champions. It’s the best person for the job- whoever they are. They even let na Englishman born on a council estate become their North American Champion.
Of course the problem with a system that rewards merit is that every slag going thinks they’ve got some. It’s a little a bit exaggerated in the professional wrestling where every slag on the roster is given a microphone and a camera to pour their bile into the world.
Just look at all the ‘episodes’ we get on a weekly basis: slag after slag on a microphone telling the world how great he or she is; how he or she deserves this or that. Yeah, there’s plenty of talkers in this business. But for a lot of them that’s all it is: talk. At the end of the fucking day this business isn’t the Harvard debating society; it’s a war between bloodthirsty wolves. Your merit isn’t in how well you woo the audience; it’s about how badly you can smash the slag who’s trying to take you down. I’ve proved time and time again that’s where my merit lies. For 98 days I’ve been doing it as the North American Champion, and you know what: in the history of Meltdown nobody has done it better than The Guv’nor.
So you can understand me when it pisses me off that this relic from the past, Victor Hades, gets on a mic and talks about my merit, or lack of it in his eyes, when he’s done less than the water boy in the past three years.
Victor, bruv, I know we haven’t been introduced, mostly because for all that testosterone you pump into your veins you just haven’t got the balls to back it up, but I’m The Guv’nor. In the words of Tony Montano ‘say hello to my little friends’. That’s right, bruv, you and these two evil fists are about to get closely acquainted.
But before we get to dance I understand you want to talk this out. Normally I’m not one for all that emotional heart to heart business, but I understand these things are important to women before they get fucked. Tell me Vic, is it true that the good doctor jammed those electrodes right up your arsehole and you begged for MORE! MORE!
Sorry Vic, was that too soon, bruv?
Victor, I copped your latest promotional video and behind all the hot air I discerned one really relevant thing: you don’t think I’m worthy.
I’m not going to say this surprises me, after all it’s not like anybody else hasn’t questioned my legitimacy as not just the champ, but as THE NUMBER ONE DRAW on Meltdown. Do you know what happened to all of those mugs, bruv: they all got their arse beat and all of them fucked off elsewhere.
I’ve already covered your legacy, and I’m cool with it. The thing is I don’t think you’re just some bum Sienna found in the back, turned over to wardrobe and said ‘make him a star’. I know you HAD pedigree. Whether I still think you do is beside the point. What isn’t is that for 98 days I’ve lived, breathed, and BLED the North American Championship. I have proven my merit time after time after time after time and then some. In doing so I’ve faced a proper liquorice allsorts: from some of the biggest bottom-feeding no-good bastards unfit to tie Mr. Dangerous’ boots to challengers who made me question myself, my own abilities and my own standards.
But whoever it was there was always one common denominator: respect. For The Championship and its prestige; for the company because it gave me a chance when no-one else would; for the fans who pay their hard earned wedge to watch me go to work. Whether or not I think you’ve got what it takes, my commitment and my respect will remain unflinched. I will prepare with the same kind of dedication that I always have, from the Rasslemania ladder match to the greatest challenge of my career inside the steel cage; I didn’t get here, I didn’t earn the merit of being ‘the best’, because I took short-cuts or used somebody else for a leg-up. Whether you, Victor, will usurp those moments as that greatest challenge remains to be seen, but I’m making no assumptions about it.
So like a hard-working tart you apply all that make-up, purse those lips, clench your buttocks, whatever you do to prepare for THE GAME you’re on, and most of all keep telling yourself you’re the scourge you think you can be, or the prestige you think the title lacks.
Tell yourself you are a level above, up there with the likes of Terry Marvin, and continue to look down on me. That your comeback so far isn’t even worth the drip of spunk Terry leaves on Maggie Kent’s chin when he’s finished his work is neither here nor there; I’ll still smash you because nothing pops with greater satisfaction than an inflated ego.
Tell yourself I cannot beat you in any time or any place because that’s exactly what I’ve been fighting against my whole life: I was born in a barrel of shit and it’s always being topped up by ‘the elite’ to make sure I always stink. Your mentality is exactly the system I reject because I’ve paid my dues with interest on top. I deserve to be where I am, I earned it, and right now you being frogmarched into MY main event is exactly the bullshit ‘jobs for the boys’ system I’ve fought since day dot because it told me I was a piece of shit and good for nothing.
I am MADE IN HACKNEY, and while I was never born with a silver spoon in my mouth, bruv, I am the GOLDEN man, and I’m going to tan that hide just like John Wayne.
I am on top because I deserve it.
I will stay on top, because I am the best.
And Victor, bruvva, I will pass this test.
With merit.
End.
