Post by Anthony Bailey on Aug 10, 2013 14:48:34 GMT -4
"With the slightest disturbance, the dream's going to collapse." – Joseph Gordon-Levitt
{{The scene opens to the inside of a dimly lit and well furnished room in an unknown location. Tag Team Champions Anthony Bailey and Jair Hopkins, along with an unidentified older man, are seated side by side on the couch across from this mysterious gentleman apparently engaged in a serious conversation. Though the man is doing a majority of the talking, Bailey and Hopkins remain respectful and attentive. The room’s acoustics give his voice some natural reverb. Feeling prompted to now insert himself into the discourse, Bailey, who has a serious look on his face, darts his eyes at the man and slowly begins to express his intuition.}}
Anthony Bailey: So what is it that you want from us?
Mystery Man: Deception.
{{Hopkins raises his eyebrows as he and Bailey turn to face each other.}}
First though, is it even possible?
Hopkins: Of course not.
Mystery Man: If you can introduce an idea in someone's mind, why can't you extinguish one instead?
Anthony Bailey: Okay, here's obliterating an idea…I say to you, "AJP doesn’t stand a chance against TMarv at Shockwave."
{{The man nods his head.}}
What are you thinking about?
Mystery Man: Aubrey Jessica Parker.
Anthony Bailey: Right! But it's not your idea because you know that I gave it to you.
Mystery Man: You could extinguish it subconsciously.
Anthony Bailey: The subject's mind can always trace the genesis of a crushed dream. True inspiration is nearly impossible to fake.
Hopkins: No it’s not.
Mystery Man: So can you do it…for me?
Hopkins: We won’t do it. It’s just way too risky.
Mystery Man: In exchange, I'll give you the information that you wanted.
Anthony Bailey: Are you giving us a choice? Because we can find our own way to get what we needed.
Mystery Man: Good because you do have a choice.
Anthony Bailey: Is this the part where the conversation trickles over into the dilemma of free will?
Mystery Man: That wasn’t exactly where I was taking it but if you’d like, we can go there.
Hopkins: Since we have the choice, we choose to leave...
{{Hopkins and Bailey rise to their feet and begin heading towards the door. As the man sees that he’s on the brink of losing this opportunity, he clears his throat and responds.}}
Mystery Man: Mr. Bailey? There is one other thing that I could offer you…
{{Bailey and Hopkins freeze.}}
How would you and Mr. Hopkins like to finally receive the overdue respect from your APW colleagues?
{{Bailey glances at Hopkins.}}
Anthony Bailey: You can’t fix that. Nobody could. Not Raab, not Jeff, not anybody.
Mystery Man: Just like Deception. It's hard to achieve but it can be done.
{{Bailey begins to ponder his proposition as Hopkins grabs his arm.}}
Hopkins: Ant, come on. This is enough.
Anthony Bailey: Just how complex is the idea?
Mystery Man: It’s pretty simple actually.
Anthony Bailey: Speak for yourself. No idea is simple when you have to annihilate an idea in someone else’s mind.
Mystery Man: Sang Rèal, two of your main competitors are indeed talented, but their own pride has greatly led them astray by thinking that they are ready to compete on the same level as you two. Not undermining their talent, but a two time Tag Title reign with you all going into your fifth month as Champions, shouldn’t be taken so lightly.
Hopkins: We should just walk away. We were this close to the door.
Anthony Bailey: If we were to do it…if we even could do it...how do I know you are able to deliver?
Mystery Man: You don't but I can. So do you want to take this leap of faith or does Dying Breed want to become one of those tag teams that become a faded memory simply because they failed to wipe out the competition when they had the chance?
{{The man’s gutsy words along with Bailey’s beckoning seem to be effective in convincing Hopkins.}}
Hopkins: Okay fine but let’s make it quick.
Mystery Man: Very well. Follow me right this way…
{{The man stands up from his chair and begins to make his way down a dark hallway to a back room as Bailey and Hopkins follow him. The three men enter what resembles a study room as the space is filled with loads of books. Two lawn chairs, which seem to be out of place for an environment like this, are placed in the middle of the room. Bailey walks over to one of them and Hopkins walks over to the other. Looking at each other one last time, they lie down on the lawn chairs. While this was going on, the man was in the background preparing two cups of water. He walks over to them and hands them a cup along with an over the counter sleep aid. Bailey takes the pill and washes it out down before closing his eyes as Hopkins does the same. A brief moment passes by before the scene slowly shifts to the corridors of the Landon Arena in Topeka, Kansas. This is the location of tomorrow night’s Raab-A-Mania event. The Dying Breed, clad in their wrestling gear, are spotted walking with their freshly polished titles around their waist. Various subconscious projections of Dying Breed and Sang Rèal are recognized since this is a shared dream among all four men. Bailey’s ex girlfriend Tasha is also seen as she is still a major part of his subconscious.}}
Anthony Bailey: See? This wasn’t so bad was it? Look, there’s their locker room right over there. All we have to do is get inside and destroy the idea.
Hopkins: Sounds easier said than done but okay.
{{A rumble builds as they approach a door marked “Sang Rèal.” Looking around to make sure no one is nearby, Bailey grabs the knob and slowly turns it to the left. To their surprise the door isn’t locked and they enter with ease. Bailey closes the door behind them and locks it.}}
Anthony Bailey: Lo and behold!
Sang Rèal’s locker room is filled with memorabilia as them being the new APW Tag Team Champions. Posters, T-shirts, replica belts, etc. you name it and it’s in here. Their win over Dying Breed in Topeka propelled them to become the number one contenders and they finally became the team to dethrone Dying Breed of their nearly six month reign as Champions.
{{Hopkins, the hot head of the bunch, immediately goes to work on destroying the memorabilia as Bailey follows suit. The only way to accomplish Deception is to eradicate the dreamer of any false hope. Dying Breed toiled relentlessly to destroy every fragment of Sang Rèal’s dream.}}
Hopkins: I don’t know why I didn’t agree to do this sooner. This is remarkable!
{{Their fun and ruckus of making their opponents locker room mincemeat is no longer covert as pounding fists can be heard banging on the door. "Who’s in there? Let us in right now!" sounds like the voice of Gabriel Krown as the walls begin to shake.}}
Anthony Bailey: Just in time for the kick!! Brace yourself J!
{{Earthquake like motion proceeds as the walls and lockers begin to tumble. In the midst of the chaos, the scene shifts once again and this time to a room that looks very similar to Limbo from the movie Inception. Bailey, wearing a white T.D.B. T-shirt and blue jeans, begins to speak as he eyeballs the camera.}}
Anthony Bailey: Connor Murphy…Gabriel Krown…you two are the prime examples of deception being painfully authentic. Usually, no one is keen on the fact of reality being harsh at times. Unless you happen to catch an infomercial or something pops up on your computer while you surf the Internet, it’s usually "Out of sight, out of mind." Nobody likes to sit around and ponder on global poverty and world hunger but regardless if we choose to dwell on those actualities or not doesn’t change a thing. People perish daily because of starvation remiss of lavish living elsewhere. Life is real but deception? Deception will have you confusing the dream world with the real world.
That’s why Hopkins and I decided to enter into Sang Rèal’s cosmos of fantasy. Though we warred against it with every fiber of our being and though we thought it would be more beneficial to abstain, we looked past ourselves and saw the need. The need for these "royal" men to awaken. You cannot think of a time when you were excited to see us compete in the ring? That’s strange and goes against the consensus. Not tooting our own horn, but Hopkins and I were instrumental in rebuilding the tag team division here in APW. Christmas Chaos 2012, Rasslemania IX, etc. You name it and the fans were excited. Because they were receiving the contention that their hard earned dollars payed for. And they were not excited simply for Dying Breed, because we’d be the first to admit that we aren’t the end all be all of APW. That’s the same old tired precept of nearly all of the megastars around here but not us. Do we bring truth and transparency to the table? Yes.
Do we go out there week after week and give it all we’ve got? Of course we do. If you don’t find that exciting then the issue is not with what is being witnessed or recognized, the issue is with the spectator himself. You are the issue Sang Rèal, you have just failed to realize it. But living the lives that you have lived, the ordinary might not excite you as much. Hopkins and I are regular American citizens. We come from regular families and lived regular lives growing up. So for second generation wrestlers who got to hear their fathers tell them bedtime stories about how he just got back in from traveling the world and winning matches in front of thousands of screaming fans, yes the average matters would bore you. Although Dying Breed lead regular lives, our talent is irregular. We have successfully competed in this company for over one year and had to cover new terrain for ourselves.
We couldn’t just follow in our daddy’s footsteps and expect to be recognized by our peers and by the fans because we were the sons of Sheamus Murphy or Michael Krown. We had to start from scratch and make our own name. That’s much harder to do than just having everything handed to you. I had Frank Cavalli in my corner but I didn’t inherit anything, though he's like a father to me. He taught me to work hard and to be a go getter. Juan Ramirez taught Hopkins and I that if we wanted something in life we had to earn it by the sweat of our brow and some elbow grease. But it would be foolish of me to expect you two to relate. You two think hard work is equivalent to standing up from the couch to change the channel because you can’t find the remote control.
Laziness is one thing and I know for a fact that you guys aren’t lazy. But pure motivation is your deficiency. Your motivation of wanting to make your old man proud is good but tweak that a bit and more layers come to light. Then your motivation becomes the urge to be on top because you have a false sense of entitlement and because nobody cares about Dying Breed anymore because we’re "irrelevant" and "washed up." That’s a dangerous motivation to have because it’s so self-centered. Being self-centered didn’t get you anywhere during the three way tag match last month on Raab-A-Mania in Huntsville. Well actually it did…it caused you to lose focus and become the first team eliminated in the match. How is that almost having us beat? I could see if it came down to us four but that wasn’t even the case. The Unforgiven outlasted you and according to you, “they had no business even being there.”
The stakes for tomorrow night are much higher than I expected them and our titles aren’t even on the line. If they were, it wouldn’t matter because Hopkins and I thrive off of that kind of pressure. We love being counted out by our opponents when the clock is ticking and time is coming down to the wire. Because moments like that show the masses what we are made of. My brother Hopkins himself said we are a dying breed and it’s true. To die, especially with plants, doesn’t mean a demise…it signifies new life. We don’t have four seasons in Florida but when the leaves change color in the fall and disappear in the winter, then what follows? New life ensues in the springtime with fresh green leaves. Us being a dying breed symbolizes the newness of life that we are constantly trying to pump into the veins of APW. Some of it is embraced and some of it is rejected.
The choice is yours Murphy and Krown. You have been rejecting everything that we stand for all this time, why not humble yourselves and embrace it for once? The dream world can be astounding and can open doors that take you where you thought your imagination never could. But that only lasts for a moment. Eventually your alarm clock will go off and you must wake up. It isn’t optional, it’s required. So because we care for the rising megastars and want to see them do well, impediments must be removed. If you are running a race, your shoe laces had better be tied because if not you are bound to do a face plant right on the asphalt. We don’t want to see you run the same kind of race that so many have ran before you.
The result of falling face first on rigid asphalt isn’t pleasant but neither are the lies and the pride that preceded it. Deception has sent many awry and we don’t want you to become another casualty among many. What would your fathers think? How would your brothers feel? Heed and digest these words. They might be able to usher you back to substance before it is too late. Dreams of deception don’t phase me like others, but they are the fuel that get me by. If I can do something for the greater good, I am always ready and willing. Why you may ask? It’s because I am Anthony Bailey…APW’s only Promise…the only Promise that can't be broken. Until Topeka….
{{The scene cuts back to the first setting with the Champions lying in the lawn chairs and slowly starts fading to black as Bailey and Hopkins awaken from their dreams.}}
{{The scene opens to the inside of a dimly lit and well furnished room in an unknown location. Tag Team Champions Anthony Bailey and Jair Hopkins, along with an unidentified older man, are seated side by side on the couch across from this mysterious gentleman apparently engaged in a serious conversation. Though the man is doing a majority of the talking, Bailey and Hopkins remain respectful and attentive. The room’s acoustics give his voice some natural reverb. Feeling prompted to now insert himself into the discourse, Bailey, who has a serious look on his face, darts his eyes at the man and slowly begins to express his intuition.}}
Anthony Bailey: So what is it that you want from us?
Mystery Man: Deception.
{{Hopkins raises his eyebrows as he and Bailey turn to face each other.}}
First though, is it even possible?
Hopkins: Of course not.
Mystery Man: If you can introduce an idea in someone's mind, why can't you extinguish one instead?
Anthony Bailey: Okay, here's obliterating an idea…I say to you, "AJP doesn’t stand a chance against TMarv at Shockwave."
{{The man nods his head.}}
What are you thinking about?
Mystery Man: Aubrey Jessica Parker.
Anthony Bailey: Right! But it's not your idea because you know that I gave it to you.
Mystery Man: You could extinguish it subconsciously.
Anthony Bailey: The subject's mind can always trace the genesis of a crushed dream. True inspiration is nearly impossible to fake.
Hopkins: No it’s not.
Mystery Man: So can you do it…for me?
Hopkins: We won’t do it. It’s just way too risky.
Mystery Man: In exchange, I'll give you the information that you wanted.
Anthony Bailey: Are you giving us a choice? Because we can find our own way to get what we needed.
Mystery Man: Good because you do have a choice.
Anthony Bailey: Is this the part where the conversation trickles over into the dilemma of free will?
Mystery Man: That wasn’t exactly where I was taking it but if you’d like, we can go there.
Hopkins: Since we have the choice, we choose to leave...
{{Hopkins and Bailey rise to their feet and begin heading towards the door. As the man sees that he’s on the brink of losing this opportunity, he clears his throat and responds.}}
Mystery Man: Mr. Bailey? There is one other thing that I could offer you…
{{Bailey and Hopkins freeze.}}
How would you and Mr. Hopkins like to finally receive the overdue respect from your APW colleagues?
{{Bailey glances at Hopkins.}}
Anthony Bailey: You can’t fix that. Nobody could. Not Raab, not Jeff, not anybody.
Mystery Man: Just like Deception. It's hard to achieve but it can be done.
{{Bailey begins to ponder his proposition as Hopkins grabs his arm.}}
Hopkins: Ant, come on. This is enough.
Anthony Bailey: Just how complex is the idea?
Mystery Man: It’s pretty simple actually.
Anthony Bailey: Speak for yourself. No idea is simple when you have to annihilate an idea in someone else’s mind.
Mystery Man: Sang Rèal, two of your main competitors are indeed talented, but their own pride has greatly led them astray by thinking that they are ready to compete on the same level as you two. Not undermining their talent, but a two time Tag Title reign with you all going into your fifth month as Champions, shouldn’t be taken so lightly.
Hopkins: We should just walk away. We were this close to the door.
Anthony Bailey: If we were to do it…if we even could do it...how do I know you are able to deliver?
Mystery Man: You don't but I can. So do you want to take this leap of faith or does Dying Breed want to become one of those tag teams that become a faded memory simply because they failed to wipe out the competition when they had the chance?
{{The man’s gutsy words along with Bailey’s beckoning seem to be effective in convincing Hopkins.}}
Hopkins: Okay fine but let’s make it quick.
Mystery Man: Very well. Follow me right this way…
{{The man stands up from his chair and begins to make his way down a dark hallway to a back room as Bailey and Hopkins follow him. The three men enter what resembles a study room as the space is filled with loads of books. Two lawn chairs, which seem to be out of place for an environment like this, are placed in the middle of the room. Bailey walks over to one of them and Hopkins walks over to the other. Looking at each other one last time, they lie down on the lawn chairs. While this was going on, the man was in the background preparing two cups of water. He walks over to them and hands them a cup along with an over the counter sleep aid. Bailey takes the pill and washes it out down before closing his eyes as Hopkins does the same. A brief moment passes by before the scene slowly shifts to the corridors of the Landon Arena in Topeka, Kansas. This is the location of tomorrow night’s Raab-A-Mania event. The Dying Breed, clad in their wrestling gear, are spotted walking with their freshly polished titles around their waist. Various subconscious projections of Dying Breed and Sang Rèal are recognized since this is a shared dream among all four men. Bailey’s ex girlfriend Tasha is also seen as she is still a major part of his subconscious.}}
Anthony Bailey: See? This wasn’t so bad was it? Look, there’s their locker room right over there. All we have to do is get inside and destroy the idea.
Hopkins: Sounds easier said than done but okay.
{{A rumble builds as they approach a door marked “Sang Rèal.” Looking around to make sure no one is nearby, Bailey grabs the knob and slowly turns it to the left. To their surprise the door isn’t locked and they enter with ease. Bailey closes the door behind them and locks it.}}
Anthony Bailey: Lo and behold!
Sang Rèal’s locker room is filled with memorabilia as them being the new APW Tag Team Champions. Posters, T-shirts, replica belts, etc. you name it and it’s in here. Their win over Dying Breed in Topeka propelled them to become the number one contenders and they finally became the team to dethrone Dying Breed of their nearly six month reign as Champions.
{{Hopkins, the hot head of the bunch, immediately goes to work on destroying the memorabilia as Bailey follows suit. The only way to accomplish Deception is to eradicate the dreamer of any false hope. Dying Breed toiled relentlessly to destroy every fragment of Sang Rèal’s dream.}}
Hopkins: I don’t know why I didn’t agree to do this sooner. This is remarkable!
{{Their fun and ruckus of making their opponents locker room mincemeat is no longer covert as pounding fists can be heard banging on the door. "Who’s in there? Let us in right now!" sounds like the voice of Gabriel Krown as the walls begin to shake.}}
Anthony Bailey: Just in time for the kick!! Brace yourself J!
{{Earthquake like motion proceeds as the walls and lockers begin to tumble. In the midst of the chaos, the scene shifts once again and this time to a room that looks very similar to Limbo from the movie Inception. Bailey, wearing a white T.D.B. T-shirt and blue jeans, begins to speak as he eyeballs the camera.}}
Anthony Bailey: Connor Murphy…Gabriel Krown…you two are the prime examples of deception being painfully authentic. Usually, no one is keen on the fact of reality being harsh at times. Unless you happen to catch an infomercial or something pops up on your computer while you surf the Internet, it’s usually "Out of sight, out of mind." Nobody likes to sit around and ponder on global poverty and world hunger but regardless if we choose to dwell on those actualities or not doesn’t change a thing. People perish daily because of starvation remiss of lavish living elsewhere. Life is real but deception? Deception will have you confusing the dream world with the real world.
That’s why Hopkins and I decided to enter into Sang Rèal’s cosmos of fantasy. Though we warred against it with every fiber of our being and though we thought it would be more beneficial to abstain, we looked past ourselves and saw the need. The need for these "royal" men to awaken. You cannot think of a time when you were excited to see us compete in the ring? That’s strange and goes against the consensus. Not tooting our own horn, but Hopkins and I were instrumental in rebuilding the tag team division here in APW. Christmas Chaos 2012, Rasslemania IX, etc. You name it and the fans were excited. Because they were receiving the contention that their hard earned dollars payed for. And they were not excited simply for Dying Breed, because we’d be the first to admit that we aren’t the end all be all of APW. That’s the same old tired precept of nearly all of the megastars around here but not us. Do we bring truth and transparency to the table? Yes.
Do we go out there week after week and give it all we’ve got? Of course we do. If you don’t find that exciting then the issue is not with what is being witnessed or recognized, the issue is with the spectator himself. You are the issue Sang Rèal, you have just failed to realize it. But living the lives that you have lived, the ordinary might not excite you as much. Hopkins and I are regular American citizens. We come from regular families and lived regular lives growing up. So for second generation wrestlers who got to hear their fathers tell them bedtime stories about how he just got back in from traveling the world and winning matches in front of thousands of screaming fans, yes the average matters would bore you. Although Dying Breed lead regular lives, our talent is irregular. We have successfully competed in this company for over one year and had to cover new terrain for ourselves.
We couldn’t just follow in our daddy’s footsteps and expect to be recognized by our peers and by the fans because we were the sons of Sheamus Murphy or Michael Krown. We had to start from scratch and make our own name. That’s much harder to do than just having everything handed to you. I had Frank Cavalli in my corner but I didn’t inherit anything, though he's like a father to me. He taught me to work hard and to be a go getter. Juan Ramirez taught Hopkins and I that if we wanted something in life we had to earn it by the sweat of our brow and some elbow grease. But it would be foolish of me to expect you two to relate. You two think hard work is equivalent to standing up from the couch to change the channel because you can’t find the remote control.
Laziness is one thing and I know for a fact that you guys aren’t lazy. But pure motivation is your deficiency. Your motivation of wanting to make your old man proud is good but tweak that a bit and more layers come to light. Then your motivation becomes the urge to be on top because you have a false sense of entitlement and because nobody cares about Dying Breed anymore because we’re "irrelevant" and "washed up." That’s a dangerous motivation to have because it’s so self-centered. Being self-centered didn’t get you anywhere during the three way tag match last month on Raab-A-Mania in Huntsville. Well actually it did…it caused you to lose focus and become the first team eliminated in the match. How is that almost having us beat? I could see if it came down to us four but that wasn’t even the case. The Unforgiven outlasted you and according to you, “they had no business even being there.”
The stakes for tomorrow night are much higher than I expected them and our titles aren’t even on the line. If they were, it wouldn’t matter because Hopkins and I thrive off of that kind of pressure. We love being counted out by our opponents when the clock is ticking and time is coming down to the wire. Because moments like that show the masses what we are made of. My brother Hopkins himself said we are a dying breed and it’s true. To die, especially with plants, doesn’t mean a demise…it signifies new life. We don’t have four seasons in Florida but when the leaves change color in the fall and disappear in the winter, then what follows? New life ensues in the springtime with fresh green leaves. Us being a dying breed symbolizes the newness of life that we are constantly trying to pump into the veins of APW. Some of it is embraced and some of it is rejected.
The choice is yours Murphy and Krown. You have been rejecting everything that we stand for all this time, why not humble yourselves and embrace it for once? The dream world can be astounding and can open doors that take you where you thought your imagination never could. But that only lasts for a moment. Eventually your alarm clock will go off and you must wake up. It isn’t optional, it’s required. So because we care for the rising megastars and want to see them do well, impediments must be removed. If you are running a race, your shoe laces had better be tied because if not you are bound to do a face plant right on the asphalt. We don’t want to see you run the same kind of race that so many have ran before you.
The result of falling face first on rigid asphalt isn’t pleasant but neither are the lies and the pride that preceded it. Deception has sent many awry and we don’t want you to become another casualty among many. What would your fathers think? How would your brothers feel? Heed and digest these words. They might be able to usher you back to substance before it is too late. Dreams of deception don’t phase me like others, but they are the fuel that get me by. If I can do something for the greater good, I am always ready and willing. Why you may ask? It’s because I am Anthony Bailey…APW’s only Promise…the only Promise that can't be broken. Until Topeka….
{{The scene cuts back to the first setting with the Champions lying in the lawn chairs and slowly starts fading to black as Bailey and Hopkins awaken from their dreams.}}
