Post by Danica Kane on Mar 15, 2020 21:04:30 GMT -5
Act I:
Graveyards at night are a bad cliche for a woman like me, a mud and marble maze of regimented headstones branded with trite messages, mostly from vaguely connected relatives burdened with money and a genetic short straw. As I wander among the memorials I realise how many of them are ill kept and overgrown. Weeds coiled around ‘heartfelt messages’, exposing their betrayal. Sincerity is fleeting it seems; easily snuffed out with time.
“You can add ambition to that list if you’re conversing about The Enforcers. They started out as a team conceived through circumstance; two opposites bolted together by WCF’s 2019 Tag Team League Tournament to create a Frankenstein hybrid of The Pack and The Thickness. A strange Zim Quilla, Poon Guinea mutation that never had a desire to frequent the other’s vicinity before, unless to beat the tar out of each other...which they did only a few months previously at the company’s December ONE event. Cut to a few months later and suddenly Odin Balfore and Alex Richards were on the same page; not because of mutual respect but due to necessity. They’ll tell you otherwise of course, especially after claiming victory in the Tournament’s final, but the whole endeavour was for one thing, and one thing only, for the victor with the winning pin to take a shot at the WCF World Heavyweight title...to climb the mountain and hold that shiney strap at the federation’s version of Kingdom Come.”
“The weeks leading up to the London PPV saw Odin and Alex in single’s action. Neither teamed with the other again. The Enforcers dissipated. The partnership became null and void. Because it wasn’t a Tag Team after all, it was simply two men on the same trajectory that needed the other to get close to that Heavyweight belt. In the end, Alex ended up closer. At Kingdom Come, Alex Richards overcame the odds and defeated Bonnie Blue. He held aloft a title that had eluded him for years, then the sky fell in.”
“WCF folded under his watch. He was the face of the company, the bannerman for the entire federation. But it never worked out. After nearly twenty years, the WCF was gone, and it was down to Alex Richards to turn out the light, forever cementing his place as the death knell for an entire generation of wrestling history. The WCF died on his watch, and that stain marked his career forever. Now Alex he’s a strong man, a gifted fighter, but twenty years is a death sentence few could shake, a walk along a green mile with no end. And eventually it’s a stigma that takes its toll.”
“To his credit, Alex soldered on after Endgame; but the “archduke of self delusion” could only convince himself he belonged in the main event for so long before slipping down the card. It’s been a slow crawl into obscurity for Alex, and nothing epitomizes that descent into the shadows like his abysmal run in Action Wrestling.”
“Imagine yourself as a former world champion, now reduced in 2020 to abused dog's body and perpetual caddy, whimpering at the heels of a glorified cruiserweight with a bare minimum grasp of the English language. Alex Richards, the man who climbed that mountain, who Odin Balfore dragged to the summit, now a muted “Man Friday” to a skinny fat meth head named Dandy Divito. Think about that hell for a second, now let’s add up all that week to week Monday Night Clash embarrassment, sprinkle in some “A-Dick” as a nickname to further the humiliation. Then finally, we multiply the pain by a thousand fold inside a House of Blues oven as Alex’s big blow off match at last friday’s AW XIII:Chicago, the fight that's supposed to reboot Alex’s flagging career, the match that’s supposed to emancipate the archduke...ends with a defeat to that half toad meth head.”
“Oh, and all it took to snatch victory for Dandy was a low blow from Yazmin and a roll up for the win. After years of struggling, crawling hand over fist into the spotlight, all it took was a split second mistake for Alex Richards to slide all the way back down into the curtain jerker helter skelter. Just a simple misdirection and a punch to the crotch. While somewhere, out there among the tombstones, the spirit of Chelsea Armstrong is weeping for her Pantheon brother. Not for long though, because myself and Red have something extra special planned for Richards, something we at Red Wedding like to call the “Extinction Level Event”. A trip to the electric chair, followed by a shot of poison and then all tears stop. The pain is finally euthanized. And eventually, the memory of Alexander Richards will subside. Fade and become dust.”
“Rest in peace archduke. Or as Dandy so eloquently put it…”
Dandy DiVito: Fuck you, Alex!
“As Alex’s embers rise though, what of the man whose left behind? What of the twenty one year veteran, the Norse Tank, Odin Balfore? Perhaps cremation is still a sore subject; after all when you have to witness your own father’s service locked in prison chains that does something to a mind. Splinters the grey cells you might say. I know you’re off your game, Balfore. FPV might be a “Man Made God '' but you were forged in the fires of Asgard. You’re hundreds of years old. You skinned the pelt right off the back of Fenris. You’ve liberated island nations, fought cyborg armies and surfed down volcanos. You’ve lived brighter than a thousand lives and yet, here you are, out of the AW world title scene, adrift, with only the humbled shell of Alex Richards for company. How the truly mighty have fallen.”
“W A L T E R (does he space his name like that so he can remember it?) really did a number on you, didn’t he? I don’t think anyone has hurt you like that before, to stab so close to home; to plunge the knife that deep. I tried to speak with Mister Navarro to see if I could offer my assistance in getting a murder case together against ol’ Walt but he “respectfully” declined. I’ve ran into Kurt a few times, he’s never been a fan of my methods. Such a clean, upstanding young man he is though. Grounded. Methodical. You’re going to need Navarro’s support in the coming weeks I imagine after Red Wedding knocks you out of this competition; he’ll be your only anchor to stop that damaged, fractured psyche of yours from spinning completely off planet.”
“You really should inspect that id of yours, Balfore. I see Lissie Hope living inside rent free. Hope’s made herself at home in your head, trashed the trophy cabinet and left the toilet seat up. Last Monday’s Clash might have been your last genuine shot at the Heavyweight belt this year and you know it. Joey Flash is back on the scene with that preposterous finishing move of his. As good as you are Odin, you’re no Alexander (the great, not Richards dummy) the world is not yours to conquer. The AW title...a distant memory.”
Behind me I hear low drum beats, a slow procession is approaching.
“Now Odin you have to stand on the sidelines with your idiot Thor brats and watch Adelaide Ainsworth battle FPV, then the inevitable Joey Flash play, then? Who knows? Maybe a long, protracted spell looking up from the mat at former AW world champion, Lissie Hope. All the while knowing that when it comes to strong women in this business, we’re not intimidated by size or reputation. Gods do not phase us. You can run the maths all you want but wrestling is about using your opponent's mass and size against them. And since The Enforcer’s combined weight is seven hundred and twenty five pounds that's a lot of leverage for us crimson daughters to play with. Oh and this week, just for fun? I might even do some star presses on your pinned ass as Silk counts the one two three. Just to let a certain Six God know that I’m watching and paying attention and that one day, I’ll add his name to the list, right next to yours and Richards. Because the Red Wedding is under way, the guests have arrived. And now? It’s time to get this ceremony underday...with a funeral.”
A team of six pallbearers dressed head to toe in black carry a coffin towards a freshly dug grave. A solemn drummer boy plays a slow, appropriate percussion as the pine box is lowered. I observe the procedure with a smile on my face. A moment later a nonchalant wave from my hand signals for the casket to be opened before reaching its destination, inside is the trophy for the WCF Tag Team League Tournament, or at least a close approximation. The Enforcer’s names are engraved on the base.
“A place like this is a great leveller, Odin. It reminds you that no matter what stride you’re in, your run can end real quick. Not everyone here saw it coming, they turned a corner thinking about tomorrow, but tomorrow never came. It was snatched away from them. Forced from their grasp. And no matter how they tried to impose their will on time, time had other ideas. The clock keeps on ticking, And now, here I am.”
I take the trophy in my hands and crumple the gold plate between my fingertips with relative ease. I allow the mangled steel to slip from my grasp as the coffin is lowered all the way now into the earth. I close my eyes and whisper an incantation as.
The coffin bursts into flames.
“Let the ashes rise and grace the halls of Valhalla. For The Enforcers are...no more.”
Act II:
“You can always turn me If I start to sniffle”
Red Riot stood in her wrestling attire while we occupied space beneath the bowels of the Nassau Coliseum, the dressing room was small but functional.
“You wouldn’t want that” I replied as I fixed my knee pad
“How do you know what I’d want?”
“Because you just spent three hours on skype talking to your family, Red. That’s how I know. People like me don’t connect to anyone. It doesn’t work. We social distance as a way of life because it keeps us safe, and it keeps you safe. This whole pandemic, it’s like the door to my world is slightly ajar and you get a peep inside. Study the view, but don’t take another step.”
“And what If I choose to?”
“Then you’ll cross a line you can’t uncross. You’ll end up stranded and out of control. Still undecided?”
“I’ll try that mask now.”
“Yeah, good call.”
She was starting to trust me, small steps I guess. Gaining trust while we skip over the corpses of giants.
