Post by Jules on Jan 24, 2012 11:01:01 GMT -4
John Dionysus is sat alone at a table. In front of him is a cup half full of black coffee, in his hands he fiddles with an envelope containing a ticket for Air India flight #LH425 from Boston’s Logan Airport. On the bench, next to John, is a small holdall travel bag. The decision to fly John had brooded over ever since he had been pinned by Donovan Caine on Overdrive. It was a sloppy loss, not because John didn’t believe Caine deserved it, but simply because he knew he could have done more to prevent it.
“More coffee, sir?”
It was the waitress. John nodded and she efficiently and silently re-filled his cup before moving along to the next customer. For two days John sat at home and tried to shake off his melancholy, but to little avail. With three weeks before he was due to appear again on APW television John decided to give himself a break. There was the ring of the bell as a new customer entered. John looked up; a man approached the counter and spoke.
“One coffee to take away please.”
It wasn’t the person he was expecting. His stint in WWA had left John with more money than he expected, a good chunk of which he still possessed. So in an attempt to break his foul mood John contacted a local travel agent and booked the flight; it hadn’t been cheap, but at such short notice what else could you expect. There was another ring of the bell, John ignored this one and continued to ponder the envelope in front of him. He didn’t even notice the person sit down opposite him, and his concentration was broken only by the sound of his voice.
“Hey John.”
It was Vern Wheeler, Dionysus’ agent and the closest thing he had to a genuine friend. Wheeler had called John over the weekend to arrange a meeting, this time Dionysus insisted Wheeler made the journey to Boston; the flight had already been booked.
“So what’s this all about? Why are we meeting at the airport?”
The question was Wheeler’s. He had found it odd that John request a meeting at Boston’s international airport, usually the setting was somewhere a bit more familiar such as Wheeler’s office in Portland, Charlie Continental’s gym, or Dionysus’ home. The holdall next to Dionysus and the envelope now resting on the table between John’s hands had not escaped his agent’s attention.
“You’re the one who called in the meeting,” Dionysus began, “and I thought this was as good a place as any, considering...”
John let that sentence trail off. Wheeler either did not notice the hint, or simply ignored it; either way he decided to get right onto business matters.
“I need you to get a flight to Miami at the end of the week.”
Dionysus’ eyes met Wheeler’s for the first time. He tried to process it – Miami? Why was that significant? Wheeler answered the question for him.
“That’s where Survive & Conquer is taking place.”
Dionysus crooked a smile. Had Vern Wheeler really managed to twist President Jeff’s arm and get him in to the Survive & Conquer match?
“It’s not what you think, or are hoping for. I can’t get you into that Survive & Conquer match.”
Dionysus frowned and scratched his head. Now, why on earth did Vern Wheeler think he would fly all the way to Miami just to sit backstage, soak up the atmosphere and watch a show and a match he could not be a part of?
“I’m not going to do that,” Dionysus said authoritatively, “I’ve got no intention of sitting backstage ‘with the guys’ and twiddling my thumbs all night.”
“You won’t be,” Wheeler paused to create some suspense, “you’ll be competing.”
Dionysus widened his eyes; now, he thought, Wheeler might have something interesting to say.
*
Four days earlier...
Bang!
It was the sound of a swinging door rebounding off the locker room wall. John Dionysus stormed through the frame of the door and slammed the door shut behind him. There was a bottle of water in his hand which he launched across the room against the opposite wall. He was furious. He paced around the room, ruminating on his emotions, repeating the mantra that had helped him through dark days. He realised quickly that he was angry with himself...no, he was angry with himself for being angry...and this made further angry. It was a vicious cycle which he knew he had to break. The mantra was helping, it was calming him down. Then a sound pierced his concentration.
B-rrring!
John searched his holdall and after a few seconds pulled out the offending object. He answered the call in loudspeaker mode.
“Hello”
His said it sharply, his remnants of his anger lodged in his voice box.
“Hey John, are you okay?”
“Vern.”
Dionysus scolded himself for his short tone. Wheeler spoke next.
“I’m watching Overdrive. Unlucky this time, you can’t win them all. Are you ok?”
“Am I okay?” Dionysus was bursting with consternation, “you really do pick your moments to ask stupid questions.”
“John, I’m just checking how you’re doing,” Vern responded, pausing between this remark and the next. “I just don’t want you to go and do something stupid.”
“I’m not going to do something ‘stupid’ just because I lost one match.” Dionysus lied; the thought of drowning his sorrows in the nearest bar had crossed his mind. He was glad Wheeler called. He wouldn’t tell him as much, but he was glad he called.
“I’m glad to hear it,” came Wheeler’s reassured response; he had a lot of money invested in John Dionysus, he did not want to see it pissed down the drain of some craphole in Florida. He considered getting on a plane to Boston; he had a feeling his client would need some looking after over the coming fortnight. His thoughts were broken by Dionysus’ voice.
“Are you still there Vern?”
“Yeah, I’m still here.”
“Listen, I am okay. I’m just pissed off that allowed myself to get turned over out there. On top of that, the guy has really done a number of my back.”
The anaesthetic effect of the adrenaline that coursed through his body during matches was wearing off; there was a shooting pain along the length of his spine.
“Don’t beat yourself up about,” Wheeler said as reassuringly as possible, “you know as well as anyone you have to take a beating every now and then. Consider this one part of your learning curve.”
“I know, I know. But I can beat this guy, I know it. I don’t want to take anything away from Caine tonight because he was stronger, quicker, and smarter than I was. I can’t believe I didn’t read that DDT.”
“John, I don’t want you to dwell on this too much. You need to get yourself, cleaned up, get back to Boston and forget about it. Move on and don’t let it happen again.”
“You don’t get it, Vern. It’s not about the loss as such, it’s more than that. I just can’t stand the idea that he thinks he is better than me, that the rest of the locker room thinks he is better than me.”
There is a chuckle from Wheeler.
“I get it now, this is none of your existential crap, this is just pure old fashioned vanity.”
Dionysus blushed to himself; he had always disliked vanity in others, hadn’t he always told himself it was the worst kind of ignorance, after wasn’t life meaningless and all action futile. I guess even Dionysus had to admit to himself he had changed over the past six months.
“Don’t worry about it John,” Wheeler continued, “I think I know how to make this right. Go back to Boston, I’ll speak to you soon.”
They said their goodbyes and terminated the call.
*
John Dionysus was not entirely happy. Vern Wheeler could see this immediately and made an attempt to placate his client.
“John, just hear me out. This is a good piece of business...”
“But Donovan Caine,” Dionysus interjected, “again? I’ve fought this guy twice already – what is the point of this?”
“The point is you are booked to wrestle on pay per view. He beat you last week, caught you out and pinned you to that mat. You’re not in the Survive & Conquer match, there isn’t another TV show for weeks. What are you going to do – sit on a beach for a couple of weeks? That would be fine if I knew you were getting yourself laid or...”
Dionysus gave Wheeler a sharp look; Wheeler smiled and said sarcastically.
“I think it might do you some good. You’re so highly strung all the time.”
Dionysus made to get up and leave, but Wheeler put a hand on across the table to urge him to remain.
“My point is,” Wheeler began, “you go away now and you’ll come back and everybody will have forgotten about you. Trust me on this, if there is any pay per view you want to be part of this is it.”
Dionysus sat back and thought for a while.
“And there is no way of getting me into the Survive & Conquer match?”
“There are better odds on you staying sober if I gave you a bottle of whiskey right now than there is of you getting into that match.”
Dionysus frowned.
“But you’re on the card. And I’ve signed you up for the CWC Ascension tournament.”
“What’s that?”
“Put it this way, do well in Ascension and you’ll be just as noticed as you would if you were in Survive & Conquer.”
“But I am at Survive & Conquer”
“You’re on the card, yes. Jeff faxed me the contract last night. One on one, you and Caine.”
Dionysus paused to think it through. He looked at the envelope in front of him.
“Trust me John,” Wheeler pleaded, “you will not get a better offer. You get to be at the pay per view, and you get to exact a measure of revenge.”
“It’s not revenge that I want.”
“Call it whatever you like, the fact is this guy beat you last week. When Jeff is considering who he is going to push towards Rasslemania, do you really think he is going to be looking at a guy whose last entry was an ‘L’ next to him name?”
Dionysus knew he was right. If he was going to make any sort of impression it would need to be now, it would need to be a Survive and Conquer, it would need to be against Donovan Caine. Dionysus made his mind up and gave Wheeler his answer.
“Any advice on how to beat the ‘king of the dead’?”
Wheeler thought it through, and answered with a wry smile.
“Don’t you use a silver bullet or something?”
*
Promo.
Here we go again.
Donovan, it’s you and me once again treading water together in an APW ring. What has transpired between us so far I can’t quite find the correct description for. Is it rivalry? Well no more so than healthy competition between two athletes. It’s certainly not a rivalry in the ordinary sense of a professional wrestling rivalry. I feel no more animosity towards you than I do to anyone else on the roster; you have nothing that I desire for myself; you haven’t wronged me in any way – so I ask myself where is the rivalry here?
If anything it seems to me to merely a rivalry of convention or circumstances. One way of looking at things is to say that we’ve both been a bit unfortunate to begin our APW careers in the shadows of Survive & Conquer, and I can’t help the feeling that for now we are both no more than an afterthought.
I must confess I wasn’t exactly enamoured by the prospect of this match. We’ve done it twice before, and in this business that is, after all, entertainment I’m not sure exactly what it is we can offer the fans of APW a third time around, at least, that is, something they haven’t already seen before. But then, you did pin me on Overdrive last week. That certainly puts us a position where something is as yet undecided.
I am taking nothing away from you Donovan, last week you managed to get the rub on me, you exposed a weakness and you beat me. Fair and square, you were the better man on the night. While such an event is hardly powerful enough to inspire hatred or animosity, it does present me with a difficulty that fate, it seems, has provided the opportunity to address. Namely, are you better than me? Last week you were, but the week before that it was my hand raised in victory. So all square, the demand for a third and decisive match pertains.
When I came to APW I was desperate to be involved in the Survive & Conquer match. Throughout my whole wrestling career I have struggled and scrapped to find my way to the big leagues. My lack of success was due in no small part to problems of my own creation, but now I am motivated by the nagging feeling that at the age of 36 my time in this ring is short, combined with the determination not to be just another washed up veteran who couldn’t make good on his talent. There is a little sympathy in the world for the downtrodden addict, irrespective circumstances, and there is even less sympathy in the wrestling industry. I have no friends to do me favours, so now I’ve got to rely on regular hard work and the creation of my own opportunities. To my mind the Survive & Conquer match offered me that. After all, where else in this business do you get to compete against 85 other wrestlers from such a wide field of promotions? Could there be any better way to put your name on the wrestling map than to stand stall and win the Survive & Conquer match?
But, alas, some things are just not meant to be. However, there is usual a silver lining to every cloud, and the silver lining here is our match Donovan; our match at one of the biggest and most important pay-per-view events in this industry.
Donovan, nowadays I’m trying my best to find the positive in situations I am initially cool about, and the positive here is twofold. First of all, I have the opportunity to compete at Survive & Conquer, and considering the global audience for this event that is no mean thing. Second of all, I have an immediate opportunity to rectify an error made last week. I can tell you quite honestly that taking opportunities that present themselves has never been my forte; for much of my life I have bemoaned the lack of opportunities that have come my way, always complaining that I had been dealt a bad hand, while everyone else was walking around with their own personal royal flush.
It is an obvious psychological response to blame others, or bemoan your own bad luck, but it is a psychological flaw, it is swings against the very momentum of natural selection and the rule of natural law that dominates every single cell that exists in this universe. It took me some time but now I realise that people were not simply given a better ‘hand of cards’, but they created the hand they finished with from what they have been dealt.
I’ve been in this business a long time and I’ve seen people competing in the ring who have no right to compete in that ring according to the cards they were dealt; I see people who are champions who have no right to be champions according to the cards they were dealt. However, the fact is these people didn’t take the path I took of looking at that bad deal and shrugging, then making excuses when their chips were low; they grafted, and they fought, and they found a way to make their own opportunities.
That is exactly how I need to look at things here in APW, take every moment and every match as an opportunity to help me get to where I want to be. So if another match with you Donovan is necessary and it is on pay per view then that is an opportunity I have to try and take.
Taking that opportunity means, Donovan, that I have to beat you at Survive & Conquer, but here is the rub – can I really do it? Last week you beat me in a one-on-one contest, my victory came in a triple threat, and that changes things. The theory is that when you are totally focussed on me you without distractions you proved to be the better man. I can’t release the memory of you reversing the Event Horizon and then driving my head into the mat. If that happens again then it will probably be enough. You will beat me. You will put me Six Feet Under.
That may turn out to be the case, and if it is it is, I’ll be the first to congratulate you. But herein is the difference maker. Last week I probably thought I had your number, I thought I had you worked out and that I could counter your every move. As it turned out I was proved wrong. Now, Donovan, you can make no mistake about it, I am bringing my full armoury to Miami, and with it a bucket load of determination and intensity, and it will all be directed at you.
Can we really say the same thing about you?
For weeks now your focus seems to be elsewhere. I am merely a stepping stone for you as your cross the river to your real goal. Well beware my friend, stepping stones can be precarious things. Misjudge one or let your concentration slip and I’m afraid you’re getting wet. You seem to be hell bent on some mission to uncover some conspiracy or wrongdoing, and your chief antagonist is C.J. Gates. I certainly not going to be presumptuous to making any claims about Gates, he is the Undisputed Champ around here, that in itself carries more than a modicum of respect, but I will forewarn you that right now Gates is the least of your problems.
This is the part where I tell you I’m going to batter and bruise you, right? Well I’m sorry to disappoint, but just isn’t my style. I am a competitor and an athlete. Right now my goals extend way beyond some trivial notion of retribution, and I’m no sadist. I’m not in this business to hurt, maim and kill careers. Besides all that, how do you kill the ‘king of the dead’? Kill you, I don’t need to do that, all I need is to keep your shoulders pinned to that mat for three seconds. I’ve no pretentions to being a zombie killer.
Whatever your problem is with Gates, your so-called evil patriarch, that day will come but right now your only problem is me. I don’t have the power of the voice of God, and I can’t profess that he has ever spoken and granted to me some ‘Manifest Destiny’, but I do have a crusade of my own. It’s probably not as noble or as divinely inspired as yours, and I certainly can’t claim I’m a stalker who preys on the sins of wrongdoers and gains nourishment from retribution alone. However, as humble a crusade as it is it lacks none of the character and importance of your own – you see, I’m trying to save my soul.
Opportunity knocks.
“More coffee, sir?”
It was the waitress. John nodded and she efficiently and silently re-filled his cup before moving along to the next customer. For two days John sat at home and tried to shake off his melancholy, but to little avail. With three weeks before he was due to appear again on APW television John decided to give himself a break. There was the ring of the bell as a new customer entered. John looked up; a man approached the counter and spoke.
“One coffee to take away please.”
It wasn’t the person he was expecting. His stint in WWA had left John with more money than he expected, a good chunk of which he still possessed. So in an attempt to break his foul mood John contacted a local travel agent and booked the flight; it hadn’t been cheap, but at such short notice what else could you expect. There was another ring of the bell, John ignored this one and continued to ponder the envelope in front of him. He didn’t even notice the person sit down opposite him, and his concentration was broken only by the sound of his voice.
“Hey John.”
It was Vern Wheeler, Dionysus’ agent and the closest thing he had to a genuine friend. Wheeler had called John over the weekend to arrange a meeting, this time Dionysus insisted Wheeler made the journey to Boston; the flight had already been booked.
“So what’s this all about? Why are we meeting at the airport?”
The question was Wheeler’s. He had found it odd that John request a meeting at Boston’s international airport, usually the setting was somewhere a bit more familiar such as Wheeler’s office in Portland, Charlie Continental’s gym, or Dionysus’ home. The holdall next to Dionysus and the envelope now resting on the table between John’s hands had not escaped his agent’s attention.
“You’re the one who called in the meeting,” Dionysus began, “and I thought this was as good a place as any, considering...”
John let that sentence trail off. Wheeler either did not notice the hint, or simply ignored it; either way he decided to get right onto business matters.
“I need you to get a flight to Miami at the end of the week.”
Dionysus’ eyes met Wheeler’s for the first time. He tried to process it – Miami? Why was that significant? Wheeler answered the question for him.
“That’s where Survive & Conquer is taking place.”
Dionysus crooked a smile. Had Vern Wheeler really managed to twist President Jeff’s arm and get him in to the Survive & Conquer match?
“It’s not what you think, or are hoping for. I can’t get you into that Survive & Conquer match.”
Dionysus frowned and scratched his head. Now, why on earth did Vern Wheeler think he would fly all the way to Miami just to sit backstage, soak up the atmosphere and watch a show and a match he could not be a part of?
“I’m not going to do that,” Dionysus said authoritatively, “I’ve got no intention of sitting backstage ‘with the guys’ and twiddling my thumbs all night.”
“You won’t be,” Wheeler paused to create some suspense, “you’ll be competing.”
Dionysus widened his eyes; now, he thought, Wheeler might have something interesting to say.
*
Four days earlier...
Bang!
It was the sound of a swinging door rebounding off the locker room wall. John Dionysus stormed through the frame of the door and slammed the door shut behind him. There was a bottle of water in his hand which he launched across the room against the opposite wall. He was furious. He paced around the room, ruminating on his emotions, repeating the mantra that had helped him through dark days. He realised quickly that he was angry with himself...no, he was angry with himself for being angry...and this made further angry. It was a vicious cycle which he knew he had to break. The mantra was helping, it was calming him down. Then a sound pierced his concentration.
B-rrring!
John searched his holdall and after a few seconds pulled out the offending object. He answered the call in loudspeaker mode.
“Hello”
His said it sharply, his remnants of his anger lodged in his voice box.
“Hey John, are you okay?”
“Vern.”
Dionysus scolded himself for his short tone. Wheeler spoke next.
“I’m watching Overdrive. Unlucky this time, you can’t win them all. Are you ok?”
“Am I okay?” Dionysus was bursting with consternation, “you really do pick your moments to ask stupid questions.”
“John, I’m just checking how you’re doing,” Vern responded, pausing between this remark and the next. “I just don’t want you to go and do something stupid.”
“I’m not going to do something ‘stupid’ just because I lost one match.” Dionysus lied; the thought of drowning his sorrows in the nearest bar had crossed his mind. He was glad Wheeler called. He wouldn’t tell him as much, but he was glad he called.
“I’m glad to hear it,” came Wheeler’s reassured response; he had a lot of money invested in John Dionysus, he did not want to see it pissed down the drain of some craphole in Florida. He considered getting on a plane to Boston; he had a feeling his client would need some looking after over the coming fortnight. His thoughts were broken by Dionysus’ voice.
“Are you still there Vern?”
“Yeah, I’m still here.”
“Listen, I am okay. I’m just pissed off that allowed myself to get turned over out there. On top of that, the guy has really done a number of my back.”
The anaesthetic effect of the adrenaline that coursed through his body during matches was wearing off; there was a shooting pain along the length of his spine.
“Don’t beat yourself up about,” Wheeler said as reassuringly as possible, “you know as well as anyone you have to take a beating every now and then. Consider this one part of your learning curve.”
“I know, I know. But I can beat this guy, I know it. I don’t want to take anything away from Caine tonight because he was stronger, quicker, and smarter than I was. I can’t believe I didn’t read that DDT.”
“John, I don’t want you to dwell on this too much. You need to get yourself, cleaned up, get back to Boston and forget about it. Move on and don’t let it happen again.”
“You don’t get it, Vern. It’s not about the loss as such, it’s more than that. I just can’t stand the idea that he thinks he is better than me, that the rest of the locker room thinks he is better than me.”
There is a chuckle from Wheeler.
“I get it now, this is none of your existential crap, this is just pure old fashioned vanity.”
Dionysus blushed to himself; he had always disliked vanity in others, hadn’t he always told himself it was the worst kind of ignorance, after wasn’t life meaningless and all action futile. I guess even Dionysus had to admit to himself he had changed over the past six months.
“Don’t worry about it John,” Wheeler continued, “I think I know how to make this right. Go back to Boston, I’ll speak to you soon.”
They said their goodbyes and terminated the call.
*
John Dionysus was not entirely happy. Vern Wheeler could see this immediately and made an attempt to placate his client.
“John, just hear me out. This is a good piece of business...”
“But Donovan Caine,” Dionysus interjected, “again? I’ve fought this guy twice already – what is the point of this?”
“The point is you are booked to wrestle on pay per view. He beat you last week, caught you out and pinned you to that mat. You’re not in the Survive & Conquer match, there isn’t another TV show for weeks. What are you going to do – sit on a beach for a couple of weeks? That would be fine if I knew you were getting yourself laid or...”
Dionysus gave Wheeler a sharp look; Wheeler smiled and said sarcastically.
“I think it might do you some good. You’re so highly strung all the time.”
Dionysus made to get up and leave, but Wheeler put a hand on across the table to urge him to remain.
“My point is,” Wheeler began, “you go away now and you’ll come back and everybody will have forgotten about you. Trust me on this, if there is any pay per view you want to be part of this is it.”
Dionysus sat back and thought for a while.
“And there is no way of getting me into the Survive & Conquer match?”
“There are better odds on you staying sober if I gave you a bottle of whiskey right now than there is of you getting into that match.”
Dionysus frowned.
“But you’re on the card. And I’ve signed you up for the CWC Ascension tournament.”
“What’s that?”
“Put it this way, do well in Ascension and you’ll be just as noticed as you would if you were in Survive & Conquer.”
“But I am at Survive & Conquer”
“You’re on the card, yes. Jeff faxed me the contract last night. One on one, you and Caine.”
Dionysus paused to think it through. He looked at the envelope in front of him.
“Trust me John,” Wheeler pleaded, “you will not get a better offer. You get to be at the pay per view, and you get to exact a measure of revenge.”
“It’s not revenge that I want.”
“Call it whatever you like, the fact is this guy beat you last week. When Jeff is considering who he is going to push towards Rasslemania, do you really think he is going to be looking at a guy whose last entry was an ‘L’ next to him name?”
Dionysus knew he was right. If he was going to make any sort of impression it would need to be now, it would need to be a Survive and Conquer, it would need to be against Donovan Caine. Dionysus made his mind up and gave Wheeler his answer.
“Any advice on how to beat the ‘king of the dead’?”
Wheeler thought it through, and answered with a wry smile.
“Don’t you use a silver bullet or something?”
*
Promo.
Here we go again.
Donovan, it’s you and me once again treading water together in an APW ring. What has transpired between us so far I can’t quite find the correct description for. Is it rivalry? Well no more so than healthy competition between two athletes. It’s certainly not a rivalry in the ordinary sense of a professional wrestling rivalry. I feel no more animosity towards you than I do to anyone else on the roster; you have nothing that I desire for myself; you haven’t wronged me in any way – so I ask myself where is the rivalry here?
If anything it seems to me to merely a rivalry of convention or circumstances. One way of looking at things is to say that we’ve both been a bit unfortunate to begin our APW careers in the shadows of Survive & Conquer, and I can’t help the feeling that for now we are both no more than an afterthought.
I must confess I wasn’t exactly enamoured by the prospect of this match. We’ve done it twice before, and in this business that is, after all, entertainment I’m not sure exactly what it is we can offer the fans of APW a third time around, at least, that is, something they haven’t already seen before. But then, you did pin me on Overdrive last week. That certainly puts us a position where something is as yet undecided.
I am taking nothing away from you Donovan, last week you managed to get the rub on me, you exposed a weakness and you beat me. Fair and square, you were the better man on the night. While such an event is hardly powerful enough to inspire hatred or animosity, it does present me with a difficulty that fate, it seems, has provided the opportunity to address. Namely, are you better than me? Last week you were, but the week before that it was my hand raised in victory. So all square, the demand for a third and decisive match pertains.
When I came to APW I was desperate to be involved in the Survive & Conquer match. Throughout my whole wrestling career I have struggled and scrapped to find my way to the big leagues. My lack of success was due in no small part to problems of my own creation, but now I am motivated by the nagging feeling that at the age of 36 my time in this ring is short, combined with the determination not to be just another washed up veteran who couldn’t make good on his talent. There is a little sympathy in the world for the downtrodden addict, irrespective circumstances, and there is even less sympathy in the wrestling industry. I have no friends to do me favours, so now I’ve got to rely on regular hard work and the creation of my own opportunities. To my mind the Survive & Conquer match offered me that. After all, where else in this business do you get to compete against 85 other wrestlers from such a wide field of promotions? Could there be any better way to put your name on the wrestling map than to stand stall and win the Survive & Conquer match?
But, alas, some things are just not meant to be. However, there is usual a silver lining to every cloud, and the silver lining here is our match Donovan; our match at one of the biggest and most important pay-per-view events in this industry.
Donovan, nowadays I’m trying my best to find the positive in situations I am initially cool about, and the positive here is twofold. First of all, I have the opportunity to compete at Survive & Conquer, and considering the global audience for this event that is no mean thing. Second of all, I have an immediate opportunity to rectify an error made last week. I can tell you quite honestly that taking opportunities that present themselves has never been my forte; for much of my life I have bemoaned the lack of opportunities that have come my way, always complaining that I had been dealt a bad hand, while everyone else was walking around with their own personal royal flush.
It is an obvious psychological response to blame others, or bemoan your own bad luck, but it is a psychological flaw, it is swings against the very momentum of natural selection and the rule of natural law that dominates every single cell that exists in this universe. It took me some time but now I realise that people were not simply given a better ‘hand of cards’, but they created the hand they finished with from what they have been dealt.
I’ve been in this business a long time and I’ve seen people competing in the ring who have no right to compete in that ring according to the cards they were dealt; I see people who are champions who have no right to be champions according to the cards they were dealt. However, the fact is these people didn’t take the path I took of looking at that bad deal and shrugging, then making excuses when their chips were low; they grafted, and they fought, and they found a way to make their own opportunities.
That is exactly how I need to look at things here in APW, take every moment and every match as an opportunity to help me get to where I want to be. So if another match with you Donovan is necessary and it is on pay per view then that is an opportunity I have to try and take.
Taking that opportunity means, Donovan, that I have to beat you at Survive & Conquer, but here is the rub – can I really do it? Last week you beat me in a one-on-one contest, my victory came in a triple threat, and that changes things. The theory is that when you are totally focussed on me you without distractions you proved to be the better man. I can’t release the memory of you reversing the Event Horizon and then driving my head into the mat. If that happens again then it will probably be enough. You will beat me. You will put me Six Feet Under.
That may turn out to be the case, and if it is it is, I’ll be the first to congratulate you. But herein is the difference maker. Last week I probably thought I had your number, I thought I had you worked out and that I could counter your every move. As it turned out I was proved wrong. Now, Donovan, you can make no mistake about it, I am bringing my full armoury to Miami, and with it a bucket load of determination and intensity, and it will all be directed at you.
Can we really say the same thing about you?
For weeks now your focus seems to be elsewhere. I am merely a stepping stone for you as your cross the river to your real goal. Well beware my friend, stepping stones can be precarious things. Misjudge one or let your concentration slip and I’m afraid you’re getting wet. You seem to be hell bent on some mission to uncover some conspiracy or wrongdoing, and your chief antagonist is C.J. Gates. I certainly not going to be presumptuous to making any claims about Gates, he is the Undisputed Champ around here, that in itself carries more than a modicum of respect, but I will forewarn you that right now Gates is the least of your problems.
This is the part where I tell you I’m going to batter and bruise you, right? Well I’m sorry to disappoint, but just isn’t my style. I am a competitor and an athlete. Right now my goals extend way beyond some trivial notion of retribution, and I’m no sadist. I’m not in this business to hurt, maim and kill careers. Besides all that, how do you kill the ‘king of the dead’? Kill you, I don’t need to do that, all I need is to keep your shoulders pinned to that mat for three seconds. I’ve no pretentions to being a zombie killer.
Whatever your problem is with Gates, your so-called evil patriarch, that day will come but right now your only problem is me. I don’t have the power of the voice of God, and I can’t profess that he has ever spoken and granted to me some ‘Manifest Destiny’, but I do have a crusade of my own. It’s probably not as noble or as divinely inspired as yours, and I certainly can’t claim I’m a stalker who preys on the sins of wrongdoers and gains nourishment from retribution alone. However, as humble a crusade as it is it lacks none of the character and importance of your own – you see, I’m trying to save my soul.
Opportunity knocks.
