03-10-2019, 11:05 AM
OOC Not as long as I had intended, but I told the story I needed to tell.
“Katya… Sasha… I wanted to address you two specifically before any sort of nonsense gets into your heads about where I stand and what I am going to be doing inside the Thunderdome. This is my first Thunderdome match, as both of you may be aware. And while this will be the first time I step into the vaunted structure, you both must be aware of my history in big matches under the Supreme Championship Wrestling banner. You must know of the blood that has been shed both from and by me. You must be aware of my value to your company represented in that bloodshed… in the flesh I have burned to enrich… you.
Thirteen years ago, your father signed me to my first SCW contract. A 23-year-old kid was what he thought he was going to get, someone who was capable of great things. Someone who could make an indelible mark on the company and the business itself. Someone who would not shy away from the more extreme aspects that the industry had held close to its heart. What he did not expect at that time was that he would be signing someone capable of ripping that very heart out. What he thought was the “Hellbound Messiah”, a typical wrestling nickname, ended up being The Devil Himself. To summarize, your father made a deal with the Devil.
Sounds ominous, does it not?
And since signing that deal with the Devil, I had paid back exponentially. My blood. My sweat. My burning flesh. It has all gone into your father’s bank accounts. It has provided a roof over your head. It has put food on your table. It has enabled you to seek higher education so that you, too, might someday be in the position of your father… to make your own deal with the Devil.
And then Katya… you had to go and throw it all away. Tell me, have you been honest with your sister? Have you told her your grand design? How you – under the instruction of Alexander Desoubrais, I am certain – decided to have my home raided? How you had myself and my followers committed to psychiatric care? How you sought not to destroy the Devil, but to reprogram him so that you might be able to use him for your own nefarious schemes? You and your sister may be due for a conversation. You may wish to include your father in that conversation, for it is in your betrayal that I find new life. In your actions, I find that your fathers deal with the Devil moves one step closer to consecration.
You see, before my little foray into the institution, The Devil Himself was simply a moniker. It was a representation of what I am and what I believe… the great opposer, standing against the Lord’s will and way. But it is here that I have discovered the truth. It is not some moniker. It is not a representation… it is simply who I am.
You, Katya, have allowed that to become truly illuminated, and for that I thank you. But it is for that reason I simply cannot allow you to take control of Supreme Championship Wrestling. Nor can I allow you, Sasha, to claim the head of the table. It is time for me to collect on your fathers end of the deal. It is time to give the Devil his due. It is time to give me SCW.”
~~~~~~~~~~~
“Once upon a time, I knew Eden,” Damian began his current “therapy” session with a startlingly cold revelation. The Doctor, who had once been contracted by Katya D. to break the spirit of The Devil Himself, turning him into an unwitting wild card for her cause only to be turned by the charismatic leader for his own purposes, stared at him dumbfounded.
“Eden?” she said quizzically. “As in the Garden of Eden from the Bible?”
Damian waved off that thought immediately. “No no no…” a snicker creeps out of his mouth. “That book treats it as some idyllic location. It is not that at all. Eden is all up here…” Damian points to his temple.
“I don’t understand,” the Doctor responds.
“Nor do I expect you to,” Damian dismissively says. “The very concept of paradise has become so polluted in modern society that I would not expect your simple mind to be able to fully comprehend it as an actuality. It is all so very different from that.”
“Can you describe it to me?” she asked, genuinely interested in what he would have to say. Damian grins.
“Paradise was always designed as a psychological state of being,” Damian begins. “Other belief structures call it “zen” or “nirvana”… something where there is an absolute oneness with the universe around you. It is only through oneness that one can know paradise. The idea that it is a physical location is simply…”
“Silly?” she asks. Damian looks to the Doctor, nodding his head.
“Sure,” he responds, giving her something. “You can call it “silly”, if that is what you require to properly understand. Because humans cannot comprehend beyond the physical realm, they consider paradise to be a location of absolute bliss, failing to consider the one constant of our existence.”
“Which is?”
“The propensity we have to ruin things for others,” Damian says in a matter-of-fact manner. He wasn’t wrong, either, which the Doctor nods in agreement with. Western civilization has been built upon reaching higher, regardless of who one has to step on the get there. “I am not certain whether or not you have noticed, but humanity can be truly rotten to one another. The pursuit of one’s own goals at the expense of another’s is one of our longest-held traditions. Why else would you think that paradise would be unattainable?”
“I guess I never really thought about it,” the Doctor replied. Damian had this tendency to turn these sessions around, to stop being the patient and star being Doctor himself. Before this would be where she called in security to sedate him and return him to his room, but since Damian’s hostile takeover, she was left with no alternative to be let it happen and see where it goes.
“I did not expect you to,” Damian says, dismissing the Doctor’s personal reach for growth. “Paradise is the ideal. Everything thinks that if it was attained, there would be no more struggles, no more issues. Everything would become bliss. We do not want to admit that it is in our very nature to resist the ideal… the bliss.”
“I’m sorry, Damian,” The Doctor appeared as disingenuously contrite as a government leader embroiled in a scandal. She wasn’t sorry for interrupting him rudely, or for attempting to change course. She was sorry that she had allowed Damian enough rope to change it in the first place by indulging his questions. Damian knew this. He nodded his head. He was disrespected. “What does this have to do with Eden?”
“Everything,” Damian sits up, surety in his eyes as he turns to face the Doctor. “It has everything to do with Eden. Eden is everything. It is the light at the end of all of our tunnels… the final destination. Some call it heaven. But what it is truly is a reacquaintance with what should have been our birthrights from the beginning.”
“But if you’re truly ‘The Devil’,” the Doctor counters. Damian was not a fan of her tone, and his eyes shifted to show this. “Then you are responsible for denying humanity Eden. Why do you now sit and act like it’s something we should want?”
A grin curls onto Damian’s lips. “Because, my sweet Doctor…” he begins. The term “sweet” coming from his lips left the Doctor feeling a sense of unease. “I was doing nothing more than what was expected of me. What is the Devil if not a force of opposition to what you think you believe? Am I truly to blame if my opposition inspires someone to take their own path?”
“Are you being rhetorical?” the Doctor asks. Damian snickers.
“Perhaps,” he begins. “Perhaps I see the world differently than most. But look at you. You could have walked away at any time. Told Katya D. that the plan was off and she would have to find someone else. Instead you continue to take her money and carry on with the facade of anything productive. Which tells me one of two things… One: That you simply do not respect her. You are simply taking her money while she remains blissfully unaware.”
“And the second?” Damian grins.
“You are keeping me on a string, dangling along with no intention of betraying your word to Katya, hoping to use my own hubris against me,” Damian responded. The Doctor could only look on in shock. Damian’s confidence was telling.
“And what if it is that?” she asks, concern welling over her. Damian only grins again.
“Then you will be met with disappointment yet again,” he says. “Katya will tumble under her own two feet regardless. It is foretold, after all.”
“Foretold?”
“Spoilers,” Damian says, a coy smirk on his face. “But I have now found Eden once more. I have found the road home. I have found Wonderland.”
The Doctor simply doesn’t answer. She had heard the term “Wonderland” before within the hallways of her psychiatric ward. But Damian’s eyes appeared to widen upon the mere utterance of the word. It disturbed her, filling her with dread. But Damian was lost in a euphoric trance....
The scene shifted.
~~~~~~~~~~~
“Tactical Warfare. 16 people going to war for four separate causes, determined to forever alter Supreme Championship Wrestling, replacing it with an image far different than the one that had preceded it. The tension is palpable. The hype has reached a fever pitch. And when the final bell has been rung, bringing the match to its conclusion, there will be one path illuminated for all to see.
The path to Wonderland.
I know some find it strange. Seeing me standing on the side of Wonderland rather than simply trying to burn the entire fucking world to the ground must be unsettling for those who have cast me as this Saturday morning cartoon supervillain. So why on Earth would I align with such a force as Wonderland? Why would I seek to eradicate the evil of the Lizard Kingdom and institute such a Hedonistic order?
Simple: It is Eden.
I have been condemned for generations… centuries… since the dawn of time as the serpent responsible for casting humanity out of Eden. And yes… the irony behind a serpent standing in opposition to the Lizard Kingdom is not lost on me, but bear with me. I have been accused of costing humanity Eden… so why now do I stand poised to bring it back? I suppose, in some way, it’s a form of restitution. I ripped you from it, and now wish to reconcile by bringing it back. But while you look at the questions, trying to decipher my motivations, I want you instead to do something else.
I want you to look to beyond that. I want you to look beyond the endgame and look to the journey itself. Tactical Warfare… the first time I have been in the vaunted structure. Whatever narrative others try to foist upon you, you need only look at the structure itself to know that the stakes are secondary. The aftermath is not important. Regardless of what the puppeteers want you to understand, the irrevocable change coming out of this match will not belong to the the winning side. It shall be in the scars held upon our bodies. It will be in the MANGLING of the Beauty Factory… in the utter MISERY of Dark Fantasy…
In the Streets being met with the stark realization that they cannot have everything that their hearts desire.
So many people think they have the necessary tools to get ahead. They believe that they are the key to success and will do whatever is necessary to prove it. Alas, that is what shall be their undoing, for we in Eden… in Wonderland… exist as that little taste of chaos in a structured system, a means to upset the system. The victor? That is unimportant. You cannot escape the Wonderland. You cannot escape Eden. You need only lay down and accept what is forthcoming. The Lizards shall fall.
Long live Eden.”
“Katya… Sasha… I wanted to address you two specifically before any sort of nonsense gets into your heads about where I stand and what I am going to be doing inside the Thunderdome. This is my first Thunderdome match, as both of you may be aware. And while this will be the first time I step into the vaunted structure, you both must be aware of my history in big matches under the Supreme Championship Wrestling banner. You must know of the blood that has been shed both from and by me. You must be aware of my value to your company represented in that bloodshed… in the flesh I have burned to enrich… you.
Thirteen years ago, your father signed me to my first SCW contract. A 23-year-old kid was what he thought he was going to get, someone who was capable of great things. Someone who could make an indelible mark on the company and the business itself. Someone who would not shy away from the more extreme aspects that the industry had held close to its heart. What he did not expect at that time was that he would be signing someone capable of ripping that very heart out. What he thought was the “Hellbound Messiah”, a typical wrestling nickname, ended up being The Devil Himself. To summarize, your father made a deal with the Devil.
Sounds ominous, does it not?
And since signing that deal with the Devil, I had paid back exponentially. My blood. My sweat. My burning flesh. It has all gone into your father’s bank accounts. It has provided a roof over your head. It has put food on your table. It has enabled you to seek higher education so that you, too, might someday be in the position of your father… to make your own deal with the Devil.
And then Katya… you had to go and throw it all away. Tell me, have you been honest with your sister? Have you told her your grand design? How you – under the instruction of Alexander Desoubrais, I am certain – decided to have my home raided? How you had myself and my followers committed to psychiatric care? How you sought not to destroy the Devil, but to reprogram him so that you might be able to use him for your own nefarious schemes? You and your sister may be due for a conversation. You may wish to include your father in that conversation, for it is in your betrayal that I find new life. In your actions, I find that your fathers deal with the Devil moves one step closer to consecration.
You see, before my little foray into the institution, The Devil Himself was simply a moniker. It was a representation of what I am and what I believe… the great opposer, standing against the Lord’s will and way. But it is here that I have discovered the truth. It is not some moniker. It is not a representation… it is simply who I am.
You, Katya, have allowed that to become truly illuminated, and for that I thank you. But it is for that reason I simply cannot allow you to take control of Supreme Championship Wrestling. Nor can I allow you, Sasha, to claim the head of the table. It is time for me to collect on your fathers end of the deal. It is time to give the Devil his due. It is time to give me SCW.”
~~~~~~~~~~~
“Once upon a time, I knew Eden,” Damian began his current “therapy” session with a startlingly cold revelation. The Doctor, who had once been contracted by Katya D. to break the spirit of The Devil Himself, turning him into an unwitting wild card for her cause only to be turned by the charismatic leader for his own purposes, stared at him dumbfounded.
“Eden?” she said quizzically. “As in the Garden of Eden from the Bible?”
Damian waved off that thought immediately. “No no no…” a snicker creeps out of his mouth. “That book treats it as some idyllic location. It is not that at all. Eden is all up here…” Damian points to his temple.
“I don’t understand,” the Doctor responds.
“Nor do I expect you to,” Damian dismissively says. “The very concept of paradise has become so polluted in modern society that I would not expect your simple mind to be able to fully comprehend it as an actuality. It is all so very different from that.”
“Can you describe it to me?” she asked, genuinely interested in what he would have to say. Damian grins.
“Paradise was always designed as a psychological state of being,” Damian begins. “Other belief structures call it “zen” or “nirvana”… something where there is an absolute oneness with the universe around you. It is only through oneness that one can know paradise. The idea that it is a physical location is simply…”
“Silly?” she asks. Damian looks to the Doctor, nodding his head.
“Sure,” he responds, giving her something. “You can call it “silly”, if that is what you require to properly understand. Because humans cannot comprehend beyond the physical realm, they consider paradise to be a location of absolute bliss, failing to consider the one constant of our existence.”
“Which is?”
“The propensity we have to ruin things for others,” Damian says in a matter-of-fact manner. He wasn’t wrong, either, which the Doctor nods in agreement with. Western civilization has been built upon reaching higher, regardless of who one has to step on the get there. “I am not certain whether or not you have noticed, but humanity can be truly rotten to one another. The pursuit of one’s own goals at the expense of another’s is one of our longest-held traditions. Why else would you think that paradise would be unattainable?”
“I guess I never really thought about it,” the Doctor replied. Damian had this tendency to turn these sessions around, to stop being the patient and star being Doctor himself. Before this would be where she called in security to sedate him and return him to his room, but since Damian’s hostile takeover, she was left with no alternative to be let it happen and see where it goes.
“I did not expect you to,” Damian says, dismissing the Doctor’s personal reach for growth. “Paradise is the ideal. Everything thinks that if it was attained, there would be no more struggles, no more issues. Everything would become bliss. We do not want to admit that it is in our very nature to resist the ideal… the bliss.”
“I’m sorry, Damian,” The Doctor appeared as disingenuously contrite as a government leader embroiled in a scandal. She wasn’t sorry for interrupting him rudely, or for attempting to change course. She was sorry that she had allowed Damian enough rope to change it in the first place by indulging his questions. Damian knew this. He nodded his head. He was disrespected. “What does this have to do with Eden?”
“Everything,” Damian sits up, surety in his eyes as he turns to face the Doctor. “It has everything to do with Eden. Eden is everything. It is the light at the end of all of our tunnels… the final destination. Some call it heaven. But what it is truly is a reacquaintance with what should have been our birthrights from the beginning.”
“But if you’re truly ‘The Devil’,” the Doctor counters. Damian was not a fan of her tone, and his eyes shifted to show this. “Then you are responsible for denying humanity Eden. Why do you now sit and act like it’s something we should want?”
A grin curls onto Damian’s lips. “Because, my sweet Doctor…” he begins. The term “sweet” coming from his lips left the Doctor feeling a sense of unease. “I was doing nothing more than what was expected of me. What is the Devil if not a force of opposition to what you think you believe? Am I truly to blame if my opposition inspires someone to take their own path?”
“Are you being rhetorical?” the Doctor asks. Damian snickers.
“Perhaps,” he begins. “Perhaps I see the world differently than most. But look at you. You could have walked away at any time. Told Katya D. that the plan was off and she would have to find someone else. Instead you continue to take her money and carry on with the facade of anything productive. Which tells me one of two things… One: That you simply do not respect her. You are simply taking her money while she remains blissfully unaware.”
“And the second?” Damian grins.
“You are keeping me on a string, dangling along with no intention of betraying your word to Katya, hoping to use my own hubris against me,” Damian responded. The Doctor could only look on in shock. Damian’s confidence was telling.
“And what if it is that?” she asks, concern welling over her. Damian only grins again.
“Then you will be met with disappointment yet again,” he says. “Katya will tumble under her own two feet regardless. It is foretold, after all.”
“Foretold?”
“Spoilers,” Damian says, a coy smirk on his face. “But I have now found Eden once more. I have found the road home. I have found Wonderland.”
The Doctor simply doesn’t answer. She had heard the term “Wonderland” before within the hallways of her psychiatric ward. But Damian’s eyes appeared to widen upon the mere utterance of the word. It disturbed her, filling her with dread. But Damian was lost in a euphoric trance....
The scene shifted.
~~~~~~~~~~~
“Tactical Warfare. 16 people going to war for four separate causes, determined to forever alter Supreme Championship Wrestling, replacing it with an image far different than the one that had preceded it. The tension is palpable. The hype has reached a fever pitch. And when the final bell has been rung, bringing the match to its conclusion, there will be one path illuminated for all to see.
The path to Wonderland.
I know some find it strange. Seeing me standing on the side of Wonderland rather than simply trying to burn the entire fucking world to the ground must be unsettling for those who have cast me as this Saturday morning cartoon supervillain. So why on Earth would I align with such a force as Wonderland? Why would I seek to eradicate the evil of the Lizard Kingdom and institute such a Hedonistic order?
Simple: It is Eden.
I have been condemned for generations… centuries… since the dawn of time as the serpent responsible for casting humanity out of Eden. And yes… the irony behind a serpent standing in opposition to the Lizard Kingdom is not lost on me, but bear with me. I have been accused of costing humanity Eden… so why now do I stand poised to bring it back? I suppose, in some way, it’s a form of restitution. I ripped you from it, and now wish to reconcile by bringing it back. But while you look at the questions, trying to decipher my motivations, I want you instead to do something else.
I want you to look to beyond that. I want you to look beyond the endgame and look to the journey itself. Tactical Warfare… the first time I have been in the vaunted structure. Whatever narrative others try to foist upon you, you need only look at the structure itself to know that the stakes are secondary. The aftermath is not important. Regardless of what the puppeteers want you to understand, the irrevocable change coming out of this match will not belong to the the winning side. It shall be in the scars held upon our bodies. It will be in the MANGLING of the Beauty Factory… in the utter MISERY of Dark Fantasy…
In the Streets being met with the stark realization that they cannot have everything that their hearts desire.
So many people think they have the necessary tools to get ahead. They believe that they are the key to success and will do whatever is necessary to prove it. Alas, that is what shall be their undoing, for we in Eden… in Wonderland… exist as that little taste of chaos in a structured system, a means to upset the system. The victor? That is unimportant. You cannot escape the Wonderland. You cannot escape Eden. You need only lay down and accept what is forthcoming. The Lizards shall fall.
Long live Eden.”