Post by James Nightingale on May 20, 2020 19:49:55 GMT -5
Last week on Metal…
Nightingale lays on the outside of the ring, having been struck with a Frog Splash from the much larger opponent in Giggles!. He shakes off the cobwebs and climbs to his knees. He diverts his attention to the ring just as Giggles! nails Sarah Lacklan with The Grand Finale. He tries to pull himself up onto the apron, his legs struggling to hold him upright. He musters all his strength to climb through the ropes, but his efforts were all in vain, the referee hand strikes the third count, the match is over.
Nightingale bows his head in disappointment, and slides back out of the ring, his breathing deep as his heart pounds away. He stands in the aisleway, cutting a sad figure as he watches the large clown celebrating with his father, Ringmaster Isaac Barnum. Giggles! notices his beaten foe watching over him, he waves at Nightingale and smiles with his creepy grin, Nightingale laughs and nods at Giggles!, showing him a sign of respect. He finally turns and walks up the ramp, however out of the corner of his eye he catches sight of a familiar face, someone from his past. He double-takes for a second, not sure if a blow to his head during the previous encounter had scrambled his mind. When he tried to refocus on the familiar face, he was gone. Nightingale quickly scans around, but nothing, he had gone. Nightingale finally exits to the back, confused, had his eyes deceived him?
Nightingale walks out of the shower, a towel wrapped around his waist, his body ravaged in scars as a result of a long violent career. He goes to his bag and pulls out a photo of his ex-wife and children. He sits and reminisces about past happiness, but then quickly remembers the endless pain he caused them, destroying their happy memories. The locker room door opens and in walks Irina Ivanova.
“You didn’t see Male Changing Room on the door?”, Nightingale quipped sarcastically.
“Don’t worry, I’m not shy.”, responds the Metal General Manager. “Despite the defeat tonight, you impressed me. You know how three-way matches go James, you turn your back for three seconds and the match is over.”
“Cheers for the reminder, that wasn’t the atonement I was seeking.”, Nightingale responds disappointingly.
“You may not have got your atonement, or whatever you were looking for, but you did impress me.”, says Irina, “Now snap out of your pity party because next week you get to seek atonement against a seven-foot demon.”
Irina leaves the changing room, Nightingale slumps back against his locker.
“Awesome, I’m in the mood for a fight, Pastor Andrew Terry thinks he’s raised some demon to carry out his bidding, little does he know he will be face to face with the biggest monster out there - me!”
Nightingale's Home - Later that week...
Nightingale sits inside his house, staring into the roaring fire in the fireplace, deep in his thoughts. He takes a sip of his favourite Jack Daniels, and then slides a cigarette out of its packet and places it in his mouth. Just as he is about to light it he hears a voice.
“How many times have I told you those bloody things will kill you kid.”, spoken in a thick English accent.
Nightingale lights up the cigarette, stands and turns to face the direction where the voice came from.
“So, my eyes didn’t deceive me, it was really you at Metal?”, Nightingale replies calmly.
“Yes it was, I’ve always wanted to watch my star student in action, it’s great to finally see you perform in a big American promotion”, the man says proudly.
Nightingale takes a final drag of his cigarette and flicks it into the open fire, he then walks over to the man. “Come here you bastard and give me a hug.”
Both men share a loving brace, much akin to that of a father and son who haven’t seen each other in years.
“John fucking’ Shelby”, Nightingale says jokingly, “How many years has it been?”
“Over eighteen years now kid”, John replied, “Too long. I caught word after you left the business that you became a nurse? And settled down with Ali and had a couple of kids?”
“Yes I did,", Nightingale replies in a sad demeanour, “I had quite the life going for me.”
“So you can imagine my surprise when one of my students started telling me about this “Angel of Death” guy in Action Wrestling, running round gouging an actor's eye out with a shard of glass! Choking out some actress in the squared circle!”, says John, “Imagine my face when I turned on the TV and it was you, James Harrison, quite possibly the most naturally gifted prospect to come out of the United Kingdom!”
Nightingale walks away from John, back over to the fire, he crouches down and stares into the burning flames. “I got lost John, I lost my way. Something terrible happened at work, a patient, a friend, Robert.”, Nightingale pauses, the painful memory causing him for a moment whilst he remembers, “He died in my care, when he needed me the most I failed.”
John walks towards Nightingale and puts a hand on his shoulder.
“From that moment I was never the same,” Nightingale continued, “From the following morning I heard these voices, it was The Matriarch, she infiltrated my psyche at my most vulnerable moment. She corrupted me, made me into that fucking monster you saw in Action Wrestling. I was plummeted into darkness, rage and anger coursing through my veins. I couldn’t stand the sight of Ali and the kids,”, Nightingale face constricts at the thought of the pain he must have caused them, ”I just fucking ran away from them, without a word. I slipt out into the night and never went home. I left the life Ali and I had worked hard for behind and I just walked away. I was completely under The Matriarch’s thrall, and I defaulted to the one thing I could do which I was the best at, the one thing I could feed my blood lust without being thrown inside a prison cell, by returning to the sport you taught me in John, professional wrestling.”
“I always knew you would come back to this one day kid”, John replied, “Maybe not under these circumstances, but you were too bloody good just to walk away when you did. So what are you doing now? I arrived at that Alpha Pro show to try and save you, ya know, straighten you out, just like I did when I plucked you off the streets and put you in my gym all those years ago. But you were different, when I looked into your eyes, I didn’t see the rage and anger I had seen when I watched you in Action Wrestling, no it was like I was looking at James Harrison again.”
Nightingale reaches over for his cigarettes and pulls out another, lighting it off the fire in front of him, taking a long drag. “The Matriarch’s grip on me started to loosen up. She couldn’t control me like she did before. She would try to counsel me, she would give me my next target, but I started becoming defiant, I don’t have a fucking clue what happened. Maybe it was the old me fighting back? Maybe it was fucking God, I have no idea, but I know I have broken away from the mad bitch and that it is me in control once again. I’ve been given another chance in life John, and another chance in this business.”
John laughs to himself, “Yes you fucking have son, you’ve got yourself a Wikipedia page, you know you’ve made it in this business when you get a damn Wikipedia page.”
Nightingale laughs as well, “Fucking hell John, you always make a joke out of everything. I’ve just given you a heavy monologue on how my life’s turned to shit and the only thing you’ve taken from that is I’ve got a Wikipedia page?”
“You know me kid, we have to make chicken salad out of chicken shit”, responds John, “So what about Ali and the kids, are you planning on going home?”
“Not Now”, responds Nightingale sternly, “I’ve fucked up their lives enough, the last thing they need now is this monster gate crashing their lives, plus Ali has a good thing going too at the minute, I wouldn’t want to distract her from what she’s got on.”
“She is making a name for herself,” says John, “You know I trained her? She came to me a few years ago.”
“I guessed you’d trained her’, replied Nightingale, “She moves like you in the ring”.
“Anway that’s enough of this pity party”, John says sternly, “We’ve got work to do, you're 0-1 in APW, if you skulk around in the dark bitching about your past you're gonna be 0-2 after Monday. Do you know who you have next week?”
“The Demon Abaddon”, Nightingale says calmly.
“You sound confident of the win there kid?”, replies John. “Did you see him in the Hardcore Title Contendorship Eliminator on Metal a couple of weeks ago?”
“Yes I did,” says Nightingale, “I watched the big bastard from the crowd, he looked impressive, eliminating Richter and Rose, but fell short to Soul Reaver.”
John laughs again to himself, “Short probably ain’t the most appropriate word kid, they are both giants, it’s good to see you're still doing your homework, always prepared.”
“It doesn’t really matter how tall you are though when your flat on your back”, Nightingale fires back quickly, “Sure I may struggle to hoist his fat ass up in my cradle piledriver, but I can sure as hell take his back and choke his ass out, it doesn’t matter how big and scary you are, your brain needs oxygen. If I latch in under his chin and squeeze hard enough, his carotid artery will not pump the blood to his brain, then the big demon will become very sleepy and go tumbling down.”
Nightingale gets up from the fire, he grabs his glass and downs the contents, and paces around his lounge. “So now what John, now that you’ve seen I’m not a crazy motherfucker anymore, are you leaving? Are you satisfied? Is your conscience clear now you know that you haven’t helped put a dangerous monster on the streets?”
“I see you can still be a prick kid,”, John laughs to himself, “Na I’m gonna stick around for a while, I figured you could use your old coach to keep you focused on the road ahead, keep you on the straight and narrow.” He holds out his hand to Nightingale.
Nightingale pauses for a moment, “I’m sure there are a few things I can learn from you old man.”
John laughs, “We shall see about that.”
They shake hands, the reformation of a union previously destined for greatness. With his mentor back at his side, Nightingale's potential is limitless.
“Pastor Andrew Terry, what are your motives? You’re a man of the cloth, surely you want to help people, an urge I used to have. What business do you have summoning The Demon Abaddon from the pits of hell to carry out your bidding? Clearly your motives are not for the good of man, you clearly want to cause anarchy and chaos, pain and suffering, but the question is Pastor, have you summoned the correct Demon?”
“You see my name is James Nightingale, and well I too was forged in the pits of hell, well not hell as such, the famously renowned Shelby Pit, known for forging the toughest and baddest professional wrestlers in the United Kingdom. But I ain’t your average wrestler Pastor. I was seduced by a fucking evil spirit, The Matriarch, and trust me she spoke and performed more evil then you can impossibly imagine, it makes the stories in your famous old book look like a child’s novel.”
“So you summoned this demon, Abaddon yeah? You sprinkled some magic dust onto your campfire and said a few nursery rhymes and poof here comes this big, bad demon. Are you sure you haven’t been sampling too much of that communal wine Pastor, and you haven’t just plucked some random from the circus? Is this just Giggles! again with his makeup rubbed off?”
“As I stood in the crowd looking at Abaddon, all I thought was this man is, without doubt, the physical embodiment of a motherfucking demon who surely is hellbent on causing endless amounts of pain and anguish. I meant it felt like it was going to be endlessly painful watching you plod around the ring barely able to bend over as you're so large and lumbrsome. Fortunately my anguish ended when Soul Reaver Jackknifed you to the mat and pinned you one, two, three. You wanna see what someone looks like who is hellbent on causing endless amounts of pain and anguish? You’re looking at him, I may be the size of the average man, but I long had the lust for causing pain and suffering, and I surprisingly was pretty good at it, blinding, disfiguring, choking girls out until they were unconscious, I’ve done it all and got so many t-shirts I could donate them to half of Africa.”
“Pastor I do not know what your intentions are with your large sex / S&M slave but let me tell you what mine are, fucking winning matches. I’m here to win matches, on the way to victory I am looking to put down anyone who you may consider being a menace to society. I’m pretty sure you fit the criteria well. So this is how it’s gonna go down, I am going to roll into Monday Night Metal with my coach John Shelby at my side, we are going to formulate a gameplan, the bell will toll, which signifies the beginning of your demise, I will enter the ring and I will eradicate your stupid looking demon. “
“Abaddon, if you're listening to me, maybe I need to throw some green shit onto this fire and say a few chants to get your attention. I am James Nightingale, “The Angel of Death”, that isn’t a scary name bestowed by myself after looking up some scary words on Google. No it was handed to me by the purest form of evil, The Matriarch, who used me as “her deadliest weapon” eradicating the weak in the name of darkness. I am not someone to be taken lightly, You might be bigger and stronger physically than me, but I have a knack for inflicting pain and torture on anyone, I do not discriminate buddy, you could be a midget or a giant, you all look the same on your back. I’m going to chop you down to size, I’m going to smash your face in, I’m going to choke your ass out. My chokehold has a unique name, it's called Cheyne-Stoking, the term given to someone's breathing type just before they die. Morbid yes but it's quite poignant actually, because when I have my arms tightly around your throat, I will squeeze harder and harder, until your breathing decreases enough until either you die, which might be the easier option if you fail the Pastor, or you slowly wake up with your back on the matt looking up at me having my arm raised in victory.”
“My inner demon is going to be on full display on next week's metal, because simply put, I cannot afford to suffer another defeat so soon after debuting in APW. I talk a big talk, but it’s time for me to back up my claims. I have my coach by my side again, he will keep me focused and prepared. Your pastor will fail you, he will only use you for his own gain. Everything my coach does is for the love of me and my cause, and that’s the big difference.”
“So Abaddon should you be stupid enough to arise from the flames Monday night to face me, be prepared to face something more evil than yourself, someone, who is willing to sink to the depths of hell to go toe to toe with you. And if my plan A and B fail me, I’ll move to plan C, and I'll extinguish the fire in your eyes with a bloody fire extinguisher, and then cave in your skull with it.”