Post by Johnny Rebel on Jun 5, 2013 21:17:27 GMT -4
Rebel Rousing #14: "Circles"
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Chicago County Regional Courtroom
Chicago, Illinois
June 2nd, 2011
"Now, when we get inside the courtroom, you're probably going to want to let me do all of the talking. I've worked with judge Mason before, and he owes me a favor or two, so, let's try and keep your sarcastic quips to a minimum."
Agent Williams, hand picked by the True Expert's Inner Council to be personally responsible for keeping Johnny Rebel out of trouble, was already peeved that he'd have to spend his afternoon down at the local courthouse defending Rebel, where another one of his shenanigans had gone incredible wrong.
"Me? Be sarcastic? That doesn't sound like me... in the slightest!"
“You know the rules. You do your best to keep your foot out of your mouth and I’ll continue to fight for you. Otherwise, they’re going to keep you locked up and only allow you out under direct supervision for APW events. You don’t want two guards following you around constantly, do you?”
“It would be convenient to have somebody nearby to hand me a roll of toilet paper under the door…”
"I'm serious, Johnny, we're going to have to deal with this like adults, something I'm sure you've experienced at least once in your life. There is a ton of money riding on you showing up on Overdrive this week. Evan Envi isn't going to lay down and hand you the Overdrive Championship! You know the investors are drooling at the thought of you wearing individual gold again..."
The thought of walking away from Thursday evening as a three-time Overdrive champion was about the only thing that would cause Rebel to tighten up and behave.
"You know I've won the belt a couple of times already. There hasn't been a more decorated champion than Johnny Rebel in the APW... and I'm not a stranger to charging through seemingly unstoppable mountains to obtain it, either! Biggs and Kurt Noble, two names that are synonymous with APW, and both former Undisputed Champions, have one thing in common: they lost their Overdrive Championships to Johnny Rebel!"
Rebel temporarily beamed with pride. The Overdrive Championship had been carried by some of the most tremendous wrestlers in the history of the business, and Rebel's name was one of the few listed twice.
"You know what would have been more impressive?" Agent Williams asked to a confused Johnny Rebel, whose head was tilted sideways, racking his brain to figure out what could be more impressive than two Overdrive title reigns! "If maybe you would have continued the path of those two men..."
"What do you mean?" Rebel scratched the side of his head. "After Biggs lost the Undisputed Championship, he spent the majority of his time unsuccessfully chasing C.J. Gates to try and get the belt back. When he realized that he didn't have a snowball's chance in Hades, he put together the most useless tag-team in the history of the APW, The Studmuffins, which if you will recall, I single handedly took their tag championships!"
"Single handedly? The only thing you've done single handedly lately is botch your own revisionist history!"
"Whatever!" Rebel scoffed. "Then there was Kurt Noble, who couldn't win the big match if it was handed to him in pill form on a silver platter! That guy was one kick in the knee away from crawling around the desert for the rest of his life. He may have held the Undisputed Championship for a few weeks... but in the grand scheme of things, Noble was nothing more than a pawn for President Jeff!"
"Either way," Williams chuckled loudly. "They both held the big one... something you've failed to do in your APW career."
"Low blow!"
"Sometimes the truth hurts, doesn't it? I can't see for the life of me why these investors still see something in you that cause them to back up their box trucks and dump massive piles of cash on you! RassleMania 8? You failed. You let a peg-legged Kurt Noble upstage you and walk away with the championship in his possession. Survive and Conquer? I didn't know how it was possible... but you actually fared worse than the previous year! The Expert's Tournament? You were a stepping-stone for Terry Marvin as he completely bypassed you and everyone else in the APW to become the most legendary wrestler on the planet."
"It was the referees fault! I swear I had that match in the bag!"
"You can't win the big one, kid, there isn't any shame. You're career has officially reached the part where it continues in circles where there is no beginning and no end. That winning streak you put together on arrival to the APW? A distant memory. Your Overdrive and Tag-Team championship reigns? Nobody remembers that! In a what-have-you-done-for-me-lately world, simply put, you're a homeless wannabe that is trying to shove his foot through the crack to make sure the garage door doesn't shut him out!"
If Agent Williams job was to pump Rebel up, he wasn't doing a very good job, but sometimes, the truth was painful. Rebel had accomplished everything in the APW that one could possibly dream of! He successfully captained APW to a victory at CWC's Supremacy and gave the organization bragging rights from now until eternity as the best organization on the planet!
"You really think that people don't see me as a threat any longer?"
Rebel didn't thrive off of the empty compliments of others, and quite frankly, he couldn't give a left testicle about the opinions of anybody but his own. Relevancy is something that everybody wants to maintain for as long as possible but perhaps Rebel should start questioning his own.
"Do you really need to question that when Stefan Raab is running around and considering himself the biggest dickhead in APW? If I remember correctly, that was a title that used to be applied to you, but someone else has taken up that mantle. You know, Stefan Raab, who was buried by Biggs on Asylum just this week, by the guy who you just told me couldn't hack it any longer! But don't worry, I'm sure they'll find you a place against Mr. Dangerous next week on Overdrive. You had your chance just like the other former Overdrive champions and you couldn’t deliver. I’m starting to wonder if you aren’t a lost cause."
The doors to the courtroom swing open and a police officer motions that it’s there turn in front of the judge. Rebel, who is still handcuffed around the wrists and ankles, is dragged by two police officers, while Agent Williams grabs his briefcase and follows behind.
“Remember… not a word!”
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Outside of Wrigley Field
Chicago, Illinois
June 4th, 2011
"You're here for one purpose this afternoon: pick-up any and every piece of trash! If I see you slacking, I won't have any qualms sending you back on that armored van to the correctional facility! Do you understand?"
The motley crew in orange jumpsuits mumble and groan as they're each handed a pair of gloves and a trash bag. In the middle of the line is Johnny Rebel, with beads of sweat already beginning to form on his forehead, and his unkempt beard beginning to resemble a dead animal nearly covers his face.
"I've especially got my eye on you, sonny!"
The foreman pokes Rebel in the chest with the butt-end of his nightstick and points in the opposite direction. Rebel had been sentenced to 400 hours of community service and he'd be constantly monitored until he completed his service. He was frustrated but at least he'd be housed at the correctional facility until his work was finished. It wasn't much but it was shelter and a somewhat warm meal three times a day.
The sun was bearing down on them, and Rebel, who had spent the previous few weeks braving the elements, was starting to lose his cool. He continued mumbling underneath his breath, probably speaking nonsense, as he went about his business placing trash inside the provided bag.
"One day, I'm going to find Maggie Kent and I'm going to give her more than a hot-dog show... she might even get the onions!"
"You probably shouldn't talk like that. If they hear you making threats, they'll be sure to add more time to your sentence.
A rather smallish man paced behind Rebel, frantically filling his bag, and nearly running circles around the APW megastar.
"Um, thanks?" Rebel wasn't sure if he was asking or telling. "But I think I can handle my own. These guys aren't anything more than Rent-A-Cops with a high powered stungun attached to their hips. Without that, they're nothing! If I wanted to walk out, I'd hand in my bag and wouldn't think twice about it... but since I don't really have anywhere to go, I might as well pick up a little trash. Why do you care anyway?"
"My name is Dallas Willard," he said. "I'm a big fan."
Rebel suddenly found himself welling up with pride. These were his kind of people - the rule breakers, the falsely accused, and those who didn't really give a rip what society thought of them. Ever since Rebel's return to the APW, there weren't many fans spurring him on, so, he reveled in the chance of meeting someone who identified with him.
"A fan! How about that. You want me to sign your forehead?"
"I don't think that'd be a very good idea. If they knew that either one of us had a pen, they'd surely have that taser out and prepared to shoot about a million volts through one of us. Just standing next to you is a privilege in itself!"
The foreman wasn't pleased with the two conversing while on the job and shouted from a distance.
"Hey, you two pansies, quit fraternizing, and get back to doing your civic duty! You owe me four hundred hours!"
"That guy is a real jerk, isn't he?" Rebel called the kettle black. "I have half a mind to flip that guy upside down, shove him in the trashcan and send him swimming up the river! Apparently, he doesn't know who I am and that I'm going to be Overdrive champion in less than a few days! Speaking of which, I've got to get on a plane..."
"Don't you think you ought to be worried about what's happening in the APW at the moment before you start thinking about Evan Envi?" Dallas commented. "Surely, you've got a plan."
"What do you mean a plan?"
"It seems that the entire locker room is poised to pick sides. Everywhere you look there is a new faction or alliance sprouting up and if you don't make a choice soon, you're going to end up being left behind cleaning up the slop with Buckson Gooch! You have the League, the Sindicate and whatever Level-One's little group of lackies is calling themselves these days. You don't want to be left out of the loop, do you?"
Rebel was conflicted. He hadn't noticed but it seemed that he was suddenly left out in the open and in danger of being the lone wolf in an organization that was banding together. Rebel was used to fighting off large groups without any help behind him. He'd only really paired with two other megastars in his illustrious APW career and both of them ended with his trusted ally putting a boot to the back of his head.
"What good is it going to be if they are just eventually going to turn on me and leave me out in the cold? I tried pairing with Blade on the road to RassleMania and turns out he was only using me to gain a spot in the Undisputed Championship match. You know how the story went when Level-One and I started working together. He got what he was after: the tag championships and when I wasn't an option for him any longer, he tried to bury me! These factions will run their course and when all of the dust settles, I'll be sitting pretty all by my lonesome!"
"That's tomfoolery and you know it! Nobody ever survives on their own in the midst of an uprising. If you think that Envi's cronies aren't going to interject themselves on Thursday evening and probably cost you the Overdrive championship than you've lost your marbles."
"Believe me, I need someone like Evan Envi watching my back about as much as I need food poisoning on a hot summer day!"
"Well, you could stand to lose a few pounds..."
"Hey! You better watch it or it's going to be you going for that swim instead of the correctional officer! I may not have a taser but I'll put a charge in you..."
"That's the gayest thing I've heard all day."
Rebel prepares to pounce but turns his back to the correctional officer standing at attention. He scoops up his trash bag and goes back to work but as soon as he has an opening, surely, he'll strangle the life out of the pip-squeak.
"You can get mad at me all you want but the fact remains - you're going to be paddling up creek without an ores if you don't go out and find someone to watch your back. Think about all the major players in the APW and who they had watching out for them. Everybody loved C.J. Gates, the whole roster would have bent over backwards for the chance to kiss his rear. Kurt Noble had Chris Hart doing his bidding constantly and never had to worry about someone sneaking up behind him. Terry Marvin had Level-One and the Sindicate playing bodyguard and he's in the midst of the longest run in APW history it seems like. And you? Well, you couldn't buy a friend."
Maybe the little guy was right and the key to getting back in control of the APW was to have a team watching his back. He was a little late to the party and there wasn't much to choose from at-the-moment but that didn't matter, he was officially a free agent.
"You make a lot of sense."
"What in tarnation are you talking about? Boy, I've watched you ramble on and on for the past thirty minutes with an empty trash bag! If you don't get to work, I'm going to send you packing faster then you can say Chicago Cubs!"
The correctional officer was suddenly standing over top of Johnny and there wasn't anyone else in sight. Dallas was gone and Rebel was jawing with the air between them.
"Where'd he go?" Rebel asked the officer. "He was just standing right here!"
"Where'd who go?"
"That little schmuck, Dallas! He's probably scared of you and took off towards the woods."
"There ain't nobody here named Dallas, son, I think you're starting to see things. I told ya' that I'd have my eye on ya' and I have been. You've been talkin' to yourself for the past hour! Get to work!"
Rebel seemed confused. How could that be? He spent the past thirty minutes dissecting his immediate future in APW with somebody that didn't exist? Perhaps Rebel was starting to lose his marbles. Sleeping under the sky and going days between meals was starting to take it's tole on him. One thing was for sure, however, that Envi was successfully playing mind-games with Rebel before Overdrive even began, and for that, Johnny was in serious trouble.
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"I've officially come full circle in the APW... and Evan Envi is simply another stop on the unbreakable path that I've created for myself."
"It's time to give up your Cinderella act. You waltzed in to the APW and worked your way from nothing up to the North American Championship and eventually made your way to Overdrive, where the Overdrive Championship fell in your lap. You've done your circles in the horse-drawn carriage, but unfortunately for you, the clock is about to strike midnight. The fairy tale is coming to an end and when the clock hits 12, you'll turn in to a pumpkin, and the Overdrive Championship will make a return to it's rightful owner!"
"Everything the Overdrive Championship is today is because I made it that way! All that have come after me have spit on the legacy I created here and it's about time we restore some of the luster that guys like Terry Marvin, Delikado and even you, Envi, are responsible for losing!"
"You're trying your hardest to reach that star that has always been out of reach. You aren't on the level of Johnny Rebel! I'll always be one rung higher on the ladder of success and I'll use your head to propel myself to the next level."
"You remind me a little bit of the president of Ohio State University, Gordon Gee. You run around here making asinine statements about things that you don't know anything about. Once you realize the weight of your idiocy, you'll be forced to "retire" and the whole world will forgot about you in the span of a few weeks! Someone else will come along and take your place... the balance will be restore in the world!"
"Face it, Envi, you can't beat me!"
"You've had your chances to establish your dominance in the APW and each and every time you've come up short. You've padded your stats with forgettable feuds on Meltdown that couldn't have been seen by more than 8 people. I've been rubbing elbows with APW legends and have the record to match! The APW was flooded with serious contenders to that Overdrive championship when I was the champ. Each and every evening, I had another new competitor that could have been a world champion somewhere other than the APW, and I put down all of them without breaking a sweat! You've had to defend your championship against Buckson Gooch and A.C. Smith for crying out loud! Those two wouldn't have enough wins under their belt to reach up and wipe the sweat of my brow!"
"I can't imagine what this might feel like for you knowing that you're going up against one of your idols! I'm sure you probably slept with the Johnny Rebel action figure at night and during the day I'm sure you put it on the shelf next to your pink Power Ranger dolls. I'm sure your walls were covered with Johnny Rebel posters - taking prime real estate over your bed in between Barney the Dinosaur and Winnie the Pooh!"
"Your fascinated with me and if you had your druthers, you'd be Johnny Rebel Jr. and walking around with a chip on your shoulder! I'm pretty sure that when the match was announced for this week that I overheard you singing Vertical Horizon!"
"He's everything you want."
"He's everything you need."
"He's everything inside of you that you wish you could be."
"You claim to be a member of the League of Extraordinary wrestlers but I don't see anything even above average, let alone to consider something extraordinary! You have to actually have accomplished something before you can bestow such a title upon oneself. It takes a tremendous amount of pride and arrogance for someone to take such a leap to label themselves that way... but it just goes to show how out of touch you truly are with reality! You must have been spending too much time with Biggs because you're dangling somewhere in outer space! It's time to bring you back down to Earth!"
"So, here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to pick Lady Overdrive up for our date around 7:30, and then I'm going to take her out for a nice dinner around town. Maybe we'll do a little dancing before I'm standing on her doorstep and invite myself in for a little treat! We'll turn the music up real loud for you..."
"He's everything you want."
"He's everything you need."
"He's everything inside of you that you wish you could be."
"You can cover up your ears with both hands and pretend that you aren't hearing anything but believe me, I'm not one to be quiet when I'm handling my business! And well the bell rings and Nicky Paige is standing in the middle of the ring with her microphone clasped between both of her hands and she screams out my name as the new Overdrive Champion, you can continue to try and drown out the noise, but it'll be too much for you to overcome. You can bring youself up to your knees and slap your face together like the kid from Home Alone but it won't be a dream. It won't be some made up story that you're going to wake up from at any moment."
#SIMPLY
#F'N
#PUT?
"Your worst nightmare will have come true and Lady Overdrive will become a rebel without a cause."
