06-10-2021, 10:04 PM
Send in the Clown
Chapter 7: Fears Realized
Quite the month or so, wouldn’t you say?
Yes, I know, you have a shit ton of stories and such to go through – the number of participants for the match I am to be involved with is quite massive. You’ll probably have to spend a week or two just to get through it all, and all before tuning in to watch the damn event.
I don’t have to worry about that, you see. Because, mostly, I don’t give a shit about the others. All thirty-nine of them. Stories of drug-problems, stories of relationship problems, people joining cults, people crying for the past or lost ones, people even dying… they don’t really matter to me. And while I would normally, at least, consider the promos in terms of strategy, let’s face it, there’s only one or two people that need to worry about EVERY SINGLE entrant in this match – but I’ll get to that, you’ll see…
The point is that there is only one story that I am concerned with you hearing and understanding in all of this annual clusterfuckity madness and that is my own. My story, starring me and my family: My Marina and my son, Memphis.
With that in mind, you can imagine that I was still feeling rather at odds with my partner/soulmate/lover/wife - so many things to call her – after the events of two and a half weeks ago. Did I feel bad about lying to her? About leaving her in the house thinking she was wrong and had done wrong in kicking me to the ground – literally…
Truthfully? Of course I did. I still do feel bad about it.
I hated lying to her, even if that lie was a lie of omission. Cause that’s what I was doing – lying by omission. She had been right. Of course there was something wrong with my knee. Of course it was a giant bullseye to anyone that found out about it – hell, when I had fought Glory Braddock last, when I was defending the Adrenaline title, she had all but figured it out…
Let me distract for a moment to tell you about that moment…
There we were, in the ring – and I’ll give Glory Braddock all the credit in the world – unlike another certain blonde who’s spend more time whining, crying, and getting in cheap shots because she’s bitter that she couldn’t beat me and take the Adrenaline title from me, this blonde was actually a competent wrestler. And, if I am honest, I realized really quick that she was better than me. Maybe not me in my heyday, when I was untouchable against the likes of Christy Matthews, Jason Zero, Adam Allocco, David Helms and so on, but now? As I was? Yeah, definitely…
To be frank, if anyone is going to win this upcoming battle royale, other than me, it would be her…
But I refuse to have another distract to take away from the distract of the previous line of thought. With a map like that, this train of thought would be in the middle of nowhere and what the hell kind of narrative would that be? So, back to the first distract – fighting Glory. That was a moment I’ll never forget:
Glory had tripped me up, whipped me around – there I was on the mat, looking up at the lights for a moment and my knee, even with the brace on and working as intended, was screaming in pain. I remember moving my head to regard my opponent who, strange enough, had not pressed her current attack on me. It wasn’t until I saw her that I realized why. Her eyes were fixated on my knee… and I could see the gears working in that experienced brain of hers, putting it together and reaching a conclusion I have tried to hide from everyone from the moment I was aware of it.
Now, I don’t know what the record is for ‘number of mental curses in a span of four seconds’, but I truly think I destroyed it in those moments. In that moment, guys, whether you want to believe me or not, I was terrified. How terrified, you may ask? I’ll put it this way: the last time I was this scared, this morbidly frightened, was when my face was on fucking fire!
Immediately, as Glory, like a veteran and skilled-wrestler ought to do, attacked my knee like a shark who had just smelled blood in the water, all I could think about was the world knowing. The world finding out. And people using it…
Because what sounds better for an accolade, people?
“I beat Shilo Valiant and took the Adrenaline title from him”?
Or…
“I retired Shilo Valiant and took him out of SCW for good!”?
What? You think I’m overreacting? Well, let’s take the likes of Syren. You think simply ‘beating me’ would appease her? You think she’d stroll out of bed, get on her blog, and go “I just wanna beat Shilo… Be Totally Jealous!” after everything we’ve been through? Do you think Holly Adams would do that? After taking credit for people she ‘took out of SCW’?
If that were the case, why the FUCK would I have been put through a table last week on Breakdown AFTER the fucking match was over?!
It’s amazing how the SCW Universe, fan and roster member alike, can think. So many of you think that there’s a line you don’t cross or shouldn’t cross. That there’s ‘a way’ to do things.
What a joke!
If that was the way, I would not have scars lining my face. I wouldn’t HAVE these knee problems in the first place and I wouldn’t have to be worried about my career ending every time I entered a ring.
The reason my fears exist is the same reason my scars exist and the same reason my injuries exist. It’s because so many people in SCW aren’t the ‘good people’ you think they are. So many people are far worse than the ‘bad people’ you think they are. When push comes to shove, they will turn on one another and destroy each other to get ahead. It’s why I laugh at the ‘camaraderie’ of such people like Minerva, Konrad and Kandis or the ABC Club – that’s Asher, Holly and Cid, by the way - or the ‘new direction’ of the supposed ‘noble’ Bree Lancaster.
I laugh because while so many of them make these dated jokes about me and my masks – or makeup if you’re as behind the times as Holly is – they are the ones wearing the masks around here, and when push comes to shove, they will tear and rip each other apart the second they get the chance.
I mean, if you don’t believe me, just wait till this Sunday. Watch how alliances will start in the beginning, but as it whittles down to the final few? Watch them all is just fall away and they turn on each other without a second thought, stabbing each other in the back with a smile on their faces – smiles far more grotesque than mine.
Because that’s what Taking Hold of the Flame represents: there being only one: One winner. One new number one contender. One person to go to the show of shows. And, unless you’re a Disney Princess – and hey! We’ve got one! (See?! I can make that joke too! Overused as it is!) - every person in this business, when pushed far enough, will destroy everyone else to get what they want.
Why am I mentioning this now? Honestly? Mostly because it fits to my story, but also because… truthfully? You will find very little of these elements regarding the majority of those ‘animals’ here. In fact, next to nothing at all. True, I may make a reference to a few of them, but you won’t find me making grand lists, isolating every threat or even something as generic as ‘glossing over every single competitor to avoid sounding boring’.
For some of you that like that, this is your chance to scroll down and see the next person’s ‘efforts’. Trust me, I won’t be offended. Like I said, I don’t care how many people go through this story of mine. This is my story and it’s for my entertainment that I tell it.
But back to the animals and their actions:
Going through that table at Breakdown had also been rough, I won’t lie. I’d like to see someone, other than a whacked out guy like Dillusion or Giovanni actually LIKE going through a table. Even Rachel Foxx was smart enough to go “damn! That hurt!” when it did. As I landed, and just before the pain hit me, I found myself grateful that Marina actually didn’t watch me wrestle anymore….
I always think of Marina.
Ten years we’ve been married. I’ve known her for, at least, twenty years. When I came into SCW, she just came along with me, staying with me through so much of it – every part of it actually – she even was the one that inducted me into the Hall of Fame. She’s been such a part of my life that I couldn’t imagine life without her, though I have had to suffer through that on a few times – please do not ask me to go back to the whole ‘Brother Grimm’, ‘Near and Seek Detectives’ story-telling style… There was a reason I ‘retired’ when I did and that’s a particular story I don’t wish to revisit here any time soon.
But you can understand why my last thoughts would be on Marina as I crashed through that table.
My first thoughts after that, of course, were more mental cursing at the aches and pain that fall brought on. Driving back home was made worse because of the bumpy roads, each jolt and jerk, even on the, supposedly ‘smooth’ highway agitated the bruises in my spine.
But I hadn’t been home since Marina and my confrontation a week prior. I wanted to go back sooner but I couldn’t. I didn’t have the right words.
I know – me, the jester, the Man Who Laughs, the storyteller, the World’s Greatest Showman! PT Barnum Reincarnated! At a loss for words…
It was because I was debating telling her the truth.
Now, if you missed my last chapter in this story, then that won’t mean much to you… or if you’re someone that goes through other people’s stories and promos every week like fanfiction-sluts needing your fix then you might not recall such particular details either. Not going to judge, just saying for those of you that don’t know or recall, I’ll enlighten you.
I had done all I can to hide my injury from my soulmate. The knee, the brace, how the injury was affecting me – every aspect of it. I couldn’t let her know. I didn’t want to let her know. Because if I did, I knew – I just knew – that the first thing she would do is run to Mr. D., call him up and tell him about it and OH! Have I got some things to say to that old man – but I knew that if he had any reason to get rid of me cleanly, without me being able to fight him on it, he would take it.
Marina would have given him that opportunity, even if she didn’t mean to, if she told him. And then I’d be out of SCW once more, back to rotting away on the couch while I waited for death to consume me in a boring, pfft of an ending.
That’s why I hid my injury from her and why everything fell apart in the last chapter. I didn’t want it to. I wanted her to know and be on my side. I wanted her to understand that, yes, I was injured, but I needed to keep going. I needed to keep pushing things forward.
In other words: The Show Must Go On…
That. Right there. If you asked me what phrase or logic guides my hand, that would be my answer. “The Show Must Go On”. And I needed my show to go on. I needed it to keep going to give me an ending that I could settle with. I needed some ending that was on my terms. My decision, not something that was thrown together and than left behind by some broken down, obnoxious family that lost sight of what SCW is years ago!
But, lying among the pieces of lumber, looking up at the ceiling again, my brain still not registering the pain – maybe I was semi-unconscious or something or perhaps my nerves had been temporarily suspended from their functions, who could say? But there… I found myself just missing how Marina would be there with me in such moments, checking on me. Or how she’d know how I was feeling cause she watched my matches from home and then would help me recover.
Did you know that I had to recover from my Under the Big Top match with Aaron Blackbourne by myself? Not because Marina was heartless, but because, for the reasons I told you, I couldn’t tell her how much I was hurting. I couldn’t tell her how much pain I was in or how much I needed help. Again, she would have just called the D. family and Sasha, maybe after a talk with ‘daddy-dearest’, would deal me out… they almost had…
But I found myself, perhaps for the first time in all of this, wanting to tell Marina the truth AND planning to do so. Wanting to tell her that I was hurt and that I was scared. Not just wanting to tell her, but making the conscious decision “I am going to tell her”.
Yes, I’m not bullshitting you guys here. I debated it since the fight she and I had, but after Breakdown, I just… I remember distinctly deciding that I was going to tell her. Was I pissed that I had to be put through a fucking table to reach this point? Oh very much so. Was I pissed that I seemed to be headed to ANOTHER round with Holly Adams if I failed to win the battle royale at Taking Hold of the Flame? You bet!
But in the days that followed, as I recovered in Raleigh in a quiet house using AirBnB, I became more and more sure that I could tell her the truth AND convince her not to rat me out to SCW corporate. I knew there had to be a way. The right choice of words, the perfect explanation. Something that would make Marina understand why I needed her, yes, but also how I needed to keep wrestling, at least for a little while longer (we’d reached my one year mark a little ways ago. Thanks for the well-wishes, guys! -_- )
And what was incredible about that – what felt so amazing – was that after I had made my decision… that I was going to tell Marina everything… I felt happy. Maybe a little giddy. Was I worried about her getting angry at me for lying? Sure. Was I worried about her refusing to listen and running to SCW management? Yeah, a little…
But as I told you earlier, I hated this fascade that I had to keep putting on with my soulmate.
I mean, what has been so refreshing for me here in my return to SCW has been the fact that I could do whatever the hell I wanted and just call it as I see it. If I wanted to ‘pretend to be hunted by a masked degenerate’, I could do that! If I wanted to act like a scaredy-cat to point out the glaring problems in how the D. family treat certain talent and conduct business, I could do that! I didn’t have to put on airs or worry about my ‘language’ as a good guy and I didn’t have to be ‘OH SO EVIL!’ as a bad guy for the entertainment.
I was the entertainment, more so than ever before, and I was having more fun than I had in my last years in SCW – part of the reason why I didn’t want it to end. And it was all because I could be honest. I didn’t need to go such extremes as dealing with killers or convicts or whatever the Kings of Shadows created. I didn’t have to live two lives.
I could just… be me. That make sense?
Except… it was almost like everything had gone in reverse. Where I was always me at home in the Kings of Shadows while sometimes ‘playing a part’ for the sake of SCW, now I was being myself (and whatever I wanted to be, whatever entertained me) in SCW and ‘playing a part’ at home.
I wanted to stop all that. I wanted things to be as open and free at home as they had been before and how things were, presently, in SCW. And to do that, I needed to be transparent with Marina.
So, yes, while the ride home was bumpy and uncomfortable on my sore back, there was almost a healthy nervousness in me as I drew closer and closer to my destination – home in Guelph.
Pulling into the driveway, I had to wait inside my car for what felt like an hour, trying to calm my nerves. The clock said it was just becoming evening now, and the sun getting closer to hiding behind the horizon was also an indication of that. The lights were on in the family room, I could see that even through the thin, white blinds that were pulled.
I felt my hands grip and tighten around the steering wheel, the car already having been turned off. The leather caught my skin a little and felt rather nice, so I did again. Fuck, was I nervous. If I could describe the feelings, it felt like I was trying to ask Marina out on a date for the first time, only that time hadn’t been nervous at all…
Okay, let me tell this story! So about three years before I joined SCW (that would be 2006, people), Marina and I were out celebrating my twentieth birthday. Yeah, “The Necro-Merchant’s 20th Birthday Party”, sounds exciting, doesn’t it? Well, the truth is, it was okay. There was a good little party with my friends like Muskrat, Nomas, Femora, and Spider as well as my other friends like…like…
Wow…I don’t remember all of their names… is that what I’ve come to? It’s been so many years since I’ve seen so many of them. Some of them are even dead as far as I know, I know who a few of them are/were… but I can’t recall their names…. I don’t know why that bothers me right now… And yet, much like this upcoming royale, who remembers the ‘supporting players’ years later? Who remembers the guy I eliminated when I won the royale or the top four before that? Who was the iron-person of that year? That’s life – they say ‘don’t forget about the little people who got you where you are’, but it’s so easy to do that! It’s exactly what happens. You get forgotten, lost to the numbers, all your efforts dismissed to time….
But before I get too depressing with that train of thought, back to my party. We had celebrated nicely and everyone had long since gone back to their homes within the Kings of Shadows, except for Marina and I. We were just walking through one of the many tunnels – the safe ones that didn’t lead to the Garden or the Children of Eden. Those were forbidden for the safety of those in the KOS and the Underground.
Actually, hold on…let me change something here so you guys can see this is as a flashback…
There we go! Little indication to make things clear – can’t say I’m not a good storyteller!
“Did you get everything you wanted?” Marina asked me, looking up at me with those soft, brown eyes.
“Mostly.” I replied, trying not to sound as cliché as can be and failing miserably. “I’m not really a materialistic kind of guy.”
Keep in mind, ladies and gentlemen, Marina and I knew the other liked the other. Hell, I found out by stealing one of my favourite scenes from “A Walk to Remember” – no seriously! She was on stage, singing “Only Hope” like Mandy Moore, I was on stage with her, performing for the KOS talent show play, and right at the end, like Shane West (who, I’ve been told I look like – can’t say I see it these days), I swooped in and kissed her.
Now, we hadn’t talked about it for some time, and I can’t believe I was such a dork back then, but she hadn’t pushed me back or screamed in my face or slapped me or anything like that. But, we hadn’t really talked about it since it happened. We had just… I don’t know… went on as if things were normal.
Which was really grating on my nerves. I mean, I made the leap, didn’t I? I kissed her. Wasn’t it partly her responsibility to respond to that, either good or bad?
Or maybe that was my job since I made the first move?
Regardless, at that point in time, walking the tunnels of the Kings of Shadows, I had reached a point in all of this where I had no anxiety in asking her. I, honestly, just wanted to know.
“Man… Two-Zero…” Marina smiled at me. “I can’t wait till I reach that age.”
“Two more years.” I told her. “You won’t even notice it.”
“You say that, but it took forever for me to reach eighteen.”
“Yeah, that’s eighteen years. Twenty is just two now.” I countered, which she replied with a roll of her eyes.
“Got any plans?” she asked suddenly as we turned a corner in our walk, passing the ‘water-basin’ that helped run under Toronto into the streams and rivers (far from the subway stations).
“Plans?” I asked. “Uh…try to take over the world?”
“No, Pinky.” Again, that cute little eye-roll. “I mean, you gotta have plans! A career? Travel?”
At the time, I hadn’t given it much thought. I was already being trained as Spider’s successor as the Necro-Merchant, the old man showing me how to make Necro and how best to distribute it, what sections of Toronto to avoid and how to evade cops and gangs and whatever… it seemed clear to me that little was going to change for me, regardless which decade my life entered.
So, I simply shrugged. “No plans.” I answered.
“You can’t be serious.”
“Marina.” I shook my head. “We’re outcasts. We’re people that the upper world shunned and threw down here to be forgotten. I don’t have a true education and no one really wants to hire a street-rat. I’ve lived here and I’m pretty sure I’ll die here like several others will, and I’m cool with that.”
“I…” she stopped for a moment, trying to collect her thoughts. To clarify, I hadn’t meant to sound pessimistic or discouraging to her when I had said that. I didn’t see anything wrong with living and dying in the Kings of Shadow. We were a community onto ourselves, in my opinion, much better than the world up there.
Up there, people killed one another for the slightest bit of success. They took from others whatever they wanted, regardless of what it cost the other person. Murder, rape, destruction – there was no place for it in the K.O.S (I thought at the time) – only existing in the realm of the Garden with Ian Ryper, the Death Merchant. Was it so bad if I stayed in this world and became a leader of it like Spider did? I didn’t see it that way. To me, it was something to be proud of. Helping others find a home when the world had abandoned them? Saving people that needed sanctuary…
“I don’t believe that.” Marina had finally chosen her words. “I think there’s more out there for me… for you too.”
She looked at me then, I’ll never forget. There was such conviction in her eyes, an earnestness that I simply could not ignore. It was captivating. And whether I believed her or not, I still moved in, my lips finding hers again. Not exactly smooth but I never said I was Casanova, did I?
This time around, she seemed far more ready, her arms wrapping around my neck to hold me firm to her (even though I was the stronger of us). We stood there, just outside of the basin area – I won’t go into the details of the kiss, I am not Chad Evans or Ace Marshall bragging about such intimate moments, so…
Marina was the first one to break the kiss, which seemed fair, pulling back a little to slowly smile at me. “What the hell took you so long to kiss me again?”
“Me?!” I asked with a laugh.
“Yeah!” she countered. “You kissed me first.”
“So? That mean I have to do it again? By logic’s standard, it would have been your turn.”
“Fine.” She shrugged before puling me back in for another kiss, this one shorter than the last but no less sweet.
“We good?” she asked.
“Yeah, except I want to ask you on a date.” I replied.
“Okay.”
“Okay?” I raised an eyebrow. “As in you’ll date me?”
“Okay as in ‘ask me on a date’.”
I remember laughing at that and even pushing her away a bit so I could pretend to be annoyed. “You’re just literally trying to drag this out.”
“No, it’s just that I have plans too!” she countered. “And if I’m going to have a boyfriend, I want to be asked properly.”
“Fine.” I huffed, turning my head to look at her. “Will you go on a date with me?”
She appeared to give it some thought but… long story short? She said ‘yes’.
And welcome back to present-time-storytelling-kinda. I had to smile at that memory as I’ve described it to you. And for those of you keeping up with me, you know that the rest was history. Still, it was good to have this memory in my mind, giving me the confidence and positive emotion to get out of the car, close the door behind me and enter the house.
To my surprise however, when I called out for Marina, she did not respond. I did hear movements approaching me, but it belonged to Becky, Memphis’ babysitter.
“Hello, Mr. Valiant.” The short, spiky blonde hair girl offered with a smile. “Back from work?”
“Hi Becky.” I answered, before quickly adding. “Yeah… long drive. Marina isn’t home?”
“Nope. She said she had a meeting with one of her clients.”
I could only nod at that, excusing Becky and sending her home now that I was here to look after Memphis, who was eating his spaghetti-os at the kitchen table. Seeing me, he gave a wave hello and a ‘Hi, dad!’.
“Hey, kiddo.” I smiled. “Your mom still at work?”
He gave a nod. “Becky let me play video games after my homework. I got to level four on Super Mario 3D world!”
“Good for you…” I smiled, though I wasn’t sure why I was saying that. Still, as the only parent in the house, I stayed with him as he finished his dinner, played his games for another hour or so, before heading to bed.
Marina still hadn’t come home.
Now, before you go off on your theories because I know ONE of you is gonna go “seriously?! Adultery? That’s where he’s going with this story to make it interesting? The old ‘wife is cheating on me’ angle? How cliché!” relax. I’m not going to be so cliché. Marina wasn’t out somewhere cheating on me, I was confident in that.
That woman had the chance to cheat on me more times than I can remember, and had some damn good reasons to do so, especially lately. But in about fifteen or so years, she never strayed from me or I from her. Just how it was. I’d say it was love but you wouldn’t believe me, but, hey, fuck you – it was love.
Still, I didn’t want to go to bed and sleep, despite being tired, until I had spoken to her about my injury -confessed about my mistakes, if you will. Mostly because, if I didn’t right then and there, I might wake up the next morning and change my mind…
So, I poured myself some black tea that I got from the cupboard, but as I reached up for the cup, my back – still feeling the effects of that table crash landing, decided to make its presence known, complaining about the long ride home being crammed in that small, blue 2010 Ford Fiesta.
My tea temporality forgotten, I looked into the cupboards where we usually kept the ‘safe’ medication, looking for some aspirin or advil to help take the edge off. Sadly, none could be found – which I assumed was my fault because I was the one using them for my knee like they were candy. Yeah, that’s right, I’m admitting that I fucked up and should have gotten more from Shopper’s before I came home, okay?
But! There was hope that came to me in a flash of memory! Because I remembered that Marina kept a bottle of advil in our ‘office room’, the room she and I had committed specifically to an office space, mostly for her because… well… what was I going to use one for? Can’t really wrestle over a large desk…
I mean you can… but not for SCW… and not in public.
Anyway, I had seen Marina get a bottle of advil from her drawer in the study before. It would have to do for this case and I could buy some more for her and the cupboard next time I went out.
My mind made up, I walked the few steps needed to reach that side of the house and enter the room, turning on the appropriate lights as I passed. Immediately, I spotted the folders on top of the table, the potted plant in the corner, and the faint lights from her computer, still on.
Her drawer was easy to find. It just needed me to go around the desk to where she sat. Helping myself to a seat, if only to support my back for a moment, I pulled open the drawer, my eyes immediately setting on the bottle that rolled to the end thanks to the momentum of my pulling it open. My eyes quickly spied the ‘advil’ label on the bottle and, just as quickly, I popped out two tablets and swallowed them roughly, not caring over the fact that I didn’t have water to help me (Yeah… don’t say I’m not tough. More impressive than running the royale from straight to finish, Shilo Valiant can swallow his pills WITHOUT needing a drink to do it! THAT deserves to be under my name on the Hall of Fame page!).
As my body settled and I waited for the medication to kick in, I stayed in the chair, hearing the ticking of the clock in the room. After about fifteen or so minutes, I contemplated testing my back to see if the advil was working, as well as moving to the family room to watch some Netflix like ‘Lucifer’’s latest season. As I was about to move out of the chair, though, my eyes spotted a folder in the pile on Marina’s desk (three were the usual off-brown/orange colors, but the one that caught my eyes was different). It was pitch-black with a red string tying it shut.
Immediately, my mind starting racing with fun ideas of what was in the envelope. Were the CRA trying new methods to encourage people to pay their bills? Instead of ‘final notices’, we go with ‘black envelopes’. That sounded so much more effective and creative to me. Or! Or! Maybe it was a doctor! Pirates use to give ‘the black spot’ to other pirates and sailors to warn them their death was coming. A doctor could do that! Oh, but then Marina or me would have death nearby and that wasn’t fun to think about.
Maybe! Maybe! Maybe this was one of her clients inviting her to a black-tie affair and the black envelope matched the choice of attire they wanted.
Around the eighth or ninth guess, which involved a black trampoline birthday party invite or a Tim Burton Movie Marathon from one of Memphis’ friends, I decided to just fuck it and check anyway. Reaching out to take it with my hand, I carefully removed it from the pile and untied the red string that kept it sealed. With a swift hand, I pulled out the papers to read the page…
And nearly dropped the papers and envelope when I saw the bold heading at the top of the page.
Divorce Agreement
With my name scribbled there… next to Marina’s….
Yeah… remember when I said this thing wasn’t going to get a little cliché? I lied. Cliffhanger….
************************************************
The camera opens to darkness for a few seconds before a spotlight suddenly shines, illuminating a single spot, where a rather simple chair is placed. The sound of steps are heard as Shilo Valiant walks into the spotlight and takes a seat on the chair. He wears black pants, a brown shirt, and no mask. Rather, there is nothing of Shilo’s appearance that would even remotely suggest ‘The Man Who Laughs’. If anything… it appears to simply be Shilo Valiant.
He tilts his head to the left, and then to the right, his eyes locked on the audience he wishes to address, before he smiles and finally speaks…
I have a message for someone…
Yes. That’s right. You won’t be seeing merry-go-rounds or masks right now. You won’t hear dark noises like children laughing or glass breaking. That’s not for today.
Today… no effects. No magic. Put simply, this is a heart to heart that I must have with a particular blonde woman in SCW… and no, it certainly is not that Twitter-troll, Holly Adams. Much as she has no true respect for me and all I’ve done for her, I will not waste any more time speaking of her here.
No… Taking Hold of the Flame – the road to Rise to Greatness – deserves my attention far more. It deserves far better than that. And no one in all of SCW, past or present or future, understand and appreciate that more than me. Which is why I need to have this heart to heart with that special someone…
…
…
…
Hello, Zoe…
I know, you would probably rather I call you ‘Syren’ when talking about work, right? But come on, Zoe… you and me? The history we’ve had? The history we’ve made together? I’m sure we’re beyond the point of such things. After all, you are more than allowed to call me ‘Shilo’, are you not?
It is good to be talking to you, Zoe. It really is. I mean, you’re one of the few people in my career that’s is still here. Aside from the ‘in and out’ oldies like Josh Hudson and David Helms, you’re one of the few that’s remained…
And given the things that have occurred recently on my show – given how the game has been set here for the entertainment, I felt that I needed to break that silence between you and I. And put quite simply, Zoe, I did so because I had to. I just… couldn’t ignore you anymore like I have since I came back over a year ago.
Yes, that’s how I’ve lasted longer than David Helms, you see. Where he was dumb enough to try and change you, appeal to you, and even try to knock some sense into you, I haven’t wasted my time or energy on such a fruitless endeavours. I’m not like those people, Zoe. I know you. You’ve always been a selfish bitch, in it only for yourself. Not caring about how you did it, as long as you got what you wanted. Honestly, I don’t know why so many people are so mad at you for the things you’ve done.
Cause what did they fucking expect?!
How many years as it been the same schtick with you? You form a group, you have them solve your problems, you stand on the mountain as World Champion for awhile – “BLAH BLAH, BE JEALOUS, BLAH BLAH!” - until someone comes along and knocks you off the mountain. It was boring back then when it was Infamous and it’s boring as hell now when it’s, again, Infamous… so I don’t get why people are so mad that you’ve not changed. Leopards can’t change their spots. Zebras can’t change their stripes. You’re a boring parasite and I’m the greatest showman in all of SCW. That’s who we are.
And since I am such an entertainer and with our history… I felt compelled to finally speak to you, Zoe, because… after the last few months of having to endure your whining, I felt like someone needed to be your ‘voice of reason’. The ‘reality check’ that CHBK can’t seem to be for you these days.
See, Zoe, I don’t think you understand the position you are in with this royale. Oh, I’m well aware that you are the number one entrant into the Taking Hold of the Flame battle royale – and I also get how you would find that ‘unfair’ or ‘unreasonable’ being so picked. I heard you screaming about it when Old Man Captain D announced it…
Thing is, Zoe… dear Zoe… was that as I was watching that particular moment on Breakdown a few weeks ago… I found myself wanting to just shake you, yell at you, and then hit you in the head with something.
Because how fucking stupid can you be?
Do you not understand how lucky you are, Zoe? How fortunate you are? Think about it! Before he went to Gavin Taylor to make him number two, before he signed off on giving Katie Steward a goddamn segment based on a workout for this royale main event – who the fuck put that idea into his head?! – Drachey-boy pointed you out first. Prominently! He made the first THOTF announcement all about you! He made the royale all about you!
Oh come on! We’re all showmen in our own right here. And from one such showman, easily the greatest showman, I can tell you it couldn’t be more obvious! Because I didn’t get a segment. I didn’t even get the chance to MENTION anything about entering the royale! But the BOSS OF SCW goes out of his way to point you out.
Heh…
He’s made this whole road to RTG about you, Zoe! You’re the selling point! You’re the draw! Like a big name on the marquee to sell tickets to a movie, D. wanted you as the focus for this year’s forty-person royale.
And who can blame him? From the beginning, it’s been the same plan for you, hasn’t? Get that eighth world title win! Beat Jason Zero’s record! Make more history! Be untouchable! That’s what you’ve wanted, right?
And while you think our captain is trying to stop you, you fail to see how he is setting you up to succeed.
What a story! How ‘entertaining’! I can see it now!
Syren fights through thirty-nine other people to become the 2021 Taking Hold of the Flame battle royale! She claws her way through the majority of the SCW roster! No one can stop her! And then… on the grandest stage of them all! On the grandest stage SCW possesses, on the most special of nights… Rise to Greatness, Syren achieves the impossible, either beating the unbeatable Cid Turner or ‘setting things right’ against the woman that sole the contendership from her in the first place, Selena Frost! Either way, Syren stands tall! Syren breaks the record that has stood for well over a decade! What a story!
And yet…
The crowd boos…
The crowd hates…
The fans jeer…
They call bullshit…
They are not entertained…
Do you know why that is, Zoe? Do you know why no one – no one fan – has gotten behind this story that’s been crammed down our necks from the beginning? No, it’s not because we’re all jealous. It’s because of something you and the grand Mr. D. – in his little ‘vacay’ from SCW - fail to grasp.
The one thing the audience hates more than anything is being told what to do. What to watch. Who to get behind.
And every season, the D. family try it, especially with the old man’s fondness for nostalgia! Oh come on, Zoe! You know it as well as I do. Every time a ‘legend’ crawls out from whatever hole they came from, there’s the D. family, no doubt prompted by the matriarch getting a jolly for ‘the good ol’ days’, to hand them everything!
James Evans
Ace Marshall
Kelcey Wallace
David Helms
Ravyn Taylor
And of course you…
That’s me going back almost six years, Zoe. You want to know how many main-events at RTG were involved such names? Such nostalgic reminders of the early 2000s and 2010s? Five out of six! Five out of six of some icon or legend or nostalgic act that – ‘somehow’ – managed to be in the right place and right time… And if things go the way they seem to, it’ll be six out of seven… either you or Cid will make it so…
Do you understand now, Zoe? It’s as plain as the blonde in your hair! Mr. D. has made you the focus of THOTF with his choices – even giving you a free pass by making Gavin Taylor your first opponent – talk about an easy moment to look tough, right?
That’s what Mr. Dracheywch wants. That’s what you want. You with another World title reign and him another RTG main event one of his ‘legends of old’. More the same…
And neither of you deserve it.
You don’t, Zoe. You believe you are overdo for your plan? Overdo for another ‘moment of proving you’re the best in the world’? What is this? The ninth or tenth time you’ve been given that chance by the D. family? More than any other wrestler in SCW today! Katya, Sasha, O.? They’ve all handed you everything time and time again to the point where they are ready to bury the entire roster just for you. O. buried Bree for your ‘justice’, Katya buried all SCW for you, and Sasha buried Sienna just to give you ‘time off’ to hide from an injury!
Just so Syren can be world champion again and again and they can get the buy-out rate they THINK they will get at RTG.
Another Rise to Greatness with Syren there, didn’t we have that two years ago?
Another World title reign for Syren… didn’t you have two of them like a year or two ago?
My point is, Zoe, is that, while you may be getting set up for a great comeback – a great payoff to your grand ‘destiny’/’plan’, paid for my the D. family, it is all for naught.
Because I am here in this royale.
Now, that might not mean much to you at this moment, but let me tell you why this is an issue this time around. This time around, I am not just interested in winning the royale. I am not just interested in entertaining myself.
I am interested in ensuring you – you specifically – do NOT win this royale. Now, while I could give you the details about that here and now… I still have a second promo planned, so I’ll hold off a little on that…
But failure is in your future, Zoe. Not just failure because of me, but failure because you can’t succeed here. Quite simply, it’s because you’re not me.
See, I know your ego will make you try and make it all about you, just like O. has done so, and I know your ego will try and defy what I am saying. I know your ego will make you more dangerous than any other wrestler that enters the ring, proclaiming ‘destiny’ and ‘fate’ or whatever reason they have for being in the royale. But, even so, when it comes to me… let’s face it, you’re still haunted by that one night, aren’t you? The night that established me as the true ruler of Rise to Greatness and established my place haunting your mind every moment we reach this time of year.
Rise to Greatness X.
You, the greatest of all time, taken down by me. Denied the Rise to Greatness moment that you never had and haven’t had since. But that’s how it’s always been with us, hasn’t it, Zoe? I mean, you’ve been following my steps your entire career, haven’t you? I was the World tag-team champion, you followed me through that. I was the World Champion before you and because of me, you became world champion, and now? I ran through the entire royale from start to finish so you just have to, don’t you?
Don’t worry, Zoe, I’m not taking this personally where you are concerned. You’re merely a pawn in a more powerful person’s game. You’re just the key piece that’s being used to try and erase me from SCW history and keep me from my rightful place. Try and erase the entertainment because they can’t control it or me. You’re just the ‘nostalgic flavour of the year’ because anyone is better than Shilo Valiant, right?
But, like I said, the reason why this whole plan will fail is because you are you… and not me.
You do not possess the same passion and drive I do, Zoe. You don’t possess the anger, the frustration, and the bitterness of many years of watching your legacy get swept under the rug. You don’t possess the stamina to defy such odds because you’ve never had to.
Not once in your entire career have you had to overcome odds deemed ‘impossible’. You’ve always had someone there, holding your hand and saving your ass. Me? Besides the royale? Well, look at my face.
Make no mistake about it, Zoe, with your skills and your friends, your plan – and the plan of O. – you will get you far. Very well. You may very well be the iron woman of the royale, Zoe, but what will that mean in five years? In ten years? What will that mean when the RTG spotlight passes you by for a more deserving and entertaining person… because the only person that matters in this royale war, Zoe… is the winner!
And as soon as my music hits, as soon as I come down to the ring, all those dreams and plans of yours…gone. It will be the beginning of the end for you, Zoe. Because I will be the one person you can’t overcome. The one person you and your friends can’t figure out. Because, when push comes to shove, Zoe, just like under the spotlight of RTG X, I will overcome you.
And like I said, it’s not a personal thing for me where you are concerned, Zoe. It’s not. You’re just in the way of what I want – what’s owed to me. Because I’ve read the ‘script’ Mr, D. is trying to shove down people’s throats – lawyers aren’t exactly subtle, you know. I’ve seen spoilers of what he wants for RTG… and I don’t like it. I don’t like my place in his ‘plan’.
I’m not interested in season 9 of ‘Syren is the world champion’. That show’s been going downhill since 2016. I’d much rather see ‘Shilo Valiant regains his spot in the Rise to Greatness main event after eight long years’. I’d rather see ‘Shilo Valiant makes history as the first person to win the Taking Hold of the Flame battle royale twice!”. Doesn’t that sound like a much more entertaining comeback story to tell? And who knows better than me about entertaining comeback stories?
So, Zoe, I just wanted to give you a heads up about this. At Taking Hold of the Flame, I am going to burn your ‘plan’ and the boss’ ‘script’. Just gonna chuck it into a burning trash can. I’m going to assume the role of director and we are going to tell MY story… MY way.
And where you were destined to be the ‘leading lady’ in all of this, Zoe? You will be recast to a more suitable role. Not as the lead. Not as the winner. Not as the number-one contender… but quite simply…
You will be the woman… that makes me laugh…
The camera slowly fades on the grinning Shilo before fading entirely to black…
Chapter 7: Fears Realized
Quite the month or so, wouldn’t you say?
Yes, I know, you have a shit ton of stories and such to go through – the number of participants for the match I am to be involved with is quite massive. You’ll probably have to spend a week or two just to get through it all, and all before tuning in to watch the damn event.
I don’t have to worry about that, you see. Because, mostly, I don’t give a shit about the others. All thirty-nine of them. Stories of drug-problems, stories of relationship problems, people joining cults, people crying for the past or lost ones, people even dying… they don’t really matter to me. And while I would normally, at least, consider the promos in terms of strategy, let’s face it, there’s only one or two people that need to worry about EVERY SINGLE entrant in this match – but I’ll get to that, you’ll see…
The point is that there is only one story that I am concerned with you hearing and understanding in all of this annual clusterfuckity madness and that is my own. My story, starring me and my family: My Marina and my son, Memphis.
With that in mind, you can imagine that I was still feeling rather at odds with my partner/soulmate/lover/wife - so many things to call her – after the events of two and a half weeks ago. Did I feel bad about lying to her? About leaving her in the house thinking she was wrong and had done wrong in kicking me to the ground – literally…
Truthfully? Of course I did. I still do feel bad about it.
I hated lying to her, even if that lie was a lie of omission. Cause that’s what I was doing – lying by omission. She had been right. Of course there was something wrong with my knee. Of course it was a giant bullseye to anyone that found out about it – hell, when I had fought Glory Braddock last, when I was defending the Adrenaline title, she had all but figured it out…
Let me distract for a moment to tell you about that moment…
There we were, in the ring – and I’ll give Glory Braddock all the credit in the world – unlike another certain blonde who’s spend more time whining, crying, and getting in cheap shots because she’s bitter that she couldn’t beat me and take the Adrenaline title from me, this blonde was actually a competent wrestler. And, if I am honest, I realized really quick that she was better than me. Maybe not me in my heyday, when I was untouchable against the likes of Christy Matthews, Jason Zero, Adam Allocco, David Helms and so on, but now? As I was? Yeah, definitely…
To be frank, if anyone is going to win this upcoming battle royale, other than me, it would be her…
But I refuse to have another distract to take away from the distract of the previous line of thought. With a map like that, this train of thought would be in the middle of nowhere and what the hell kind of narrative would that be? So, back to the first distract – fighting Glory. That was a moment I’ll never forget:
Glory had tripped me up, whipped me around – there I was on the mat, looking up at the lights for a moment and my knee, even with the brace on and working as intended, was screaming in pain. I remember moving my head to regard my opponent who, strange enough, had not pressed her current attack on me. It wasn’t until I saw her that I realized why. Her eyes were fixated on my knee… and I could see the gears working in that experienced brain of hers, putting it together and reaching a conclusion I have tried to hide from everyone from the moment I was aware of it.
Now, I don’t know what the record is for ‘number of mental curses in a span of four seconds’, but I truly think I destroyed it in those moments. In that moment, guys, whether you want to believe me or not, I was terrified. How terrified, you may ask? I’ll put it this way: the last time I was this scared, this morbidly frightened, was when my face was on fucking fire!
Immediately, as Glory, like a veteran and skilled-wrestler ought to do, attacked my knee like a shark who had just smelled blood in the water, all I could think about was the world knowing. The world finding out. And people using it…
Because what sounds better for an accolade, people?
“I beat Shilo Valiant and took the Adrenaline title from him”?
Or…
“I retired Shilo Valiant and took him out of SCW for good!”?
What? You think I’m overreacting? Well, let’s take the likes of Syren. You think simply ‘beating me’ would appease her? You think she’d stroll out of bed, get on her blog, and go “I just wanna beat Shilo… Be Totally Jealous!” after everything we’ve been through? Do you think Holly Adams would do that? After taking credit for people she ‘took out of SCW’?
If that were the case, why the FUCK would I have been put through a table last week on Breakdown AFTER the fucking match was over?!
It’s amazing how the SCW Universe, fan and roster member alike, can think. So many of you think that there’s a line you don’t cross or shouldn’t cross. That there’s ‘a way’ to do things.
What a joke!
If that was the way, I would not have scars lining my face. I wouldn’t HAVE these knee problems in the first place and I wouldn’t have to be worried about my career ending every time I entered a ring.
The reason my fears exist is the same reason my scars exist and the same reason my injuries exist. It’s because so many people in SCW aren’t the ‘good people’ you think they are. So many people are far worse than the ‘bad people’ you think they are. When push comes to shove, they will turn on one another and destroy each other to get ahead. It’s why I laugh at the ‘camaraderie’ of such people like Minerva, Konrad and Kandis or the ABC Club – that’s Asher, Holly and Cid, by the way - or the ‘new direction’ of the supposed ‘noble’ Bree Lancaster.
I laugh because while so many of them make these dated jokes about me and my masks – or makeup if you’re as behind the times as Holly is – they are the ones wearing the masks around here, and when push comes to shove, they will tear and rip each other apart the second they get the chance.
I mean, if you don’t believe me, just wait till this Sunday. Watch how alliances will start in the beginning, but as it whittles down to the final few? Watch them all is just fall away and they turn on each other without a second thought, stabbing each other in the back with a smile on their faces – smiles far more grotesque than mine.
Because that’s what Taking Hold of the Flame represents: there being only one: One winner. One new number one contender. One person to go to the show of shows. And, unless you’re a Disney Princess – and hey! We’ve got one! (See?! I can make that joke too! Overused as it is!) - every person in this business, when pushed far enough, will destroy everyone else to get what they want.
Why am I mentioning this now? Honestly? Mostly because it fits to my story, but also because… truthfully? You will find very little of these elements regarding the majority of those ‘animals’ here. In fact, next to nothing at all. True, I may make a reference to a few of them, but you won’t find me making grand lists, isolating every threat or even something as generic as ‘glossing over every single competitor to avoid sounding boring’.
For some of you that like that, this is your chance to scroll down and see the next person’s ‘efforts’. Trust me, I won’t be offended. Like I said, I don’t care how many people go through this story of mine. This is my story and it’s for my entertainment that I tell it.
But back to the animals and their actions:
Going through that table at Breakdown had also been rough, I won’t lie. I’d like to see someone, other than a whacked out guy like Dillusion or Giovanni actually LIKE going through a table. Even Rachel Foxx was smart enough to go “damn! That hurt!” when it did. As I landed, and just before the pain hit me, I found myself grateful that Marina actually didn’t watch me wrestle anymore….
I always think of Marina.
Ten years we’ve been married. I’ve known her for, at least, twenty years. When I came into SCW, she just came along with me, staying with me through so much of it – every part of it actually – she even was the one that inducted me into the Hall of Fame. She’s been such a part of my life that I couldn’t imagine life without her, though I have had to suffer through that on a few times – please do not ask me to go back to the whole ‘Brother Grimm’, ‘Near and Seek Detectives’ story-telling style… There was a reason I ‘retired’ when I did and that’s a particular story I don’t wish to revisit here any time soon.
But you can understand why my last thoughts would be on Marina as I crashed through that table.
My first thoughts after that, of course, were more mental cursing at the aches and pain that fall brought on. Driving back home was made worse because of the bumpy roads, each jolt and jerk, even on the, supposedly ‘smooth’ highway agitated the bruises in my spine.
But I hadn’t been home since Marina and my confrontation a week prior. I wanted to go back sooner but I couldn’t. I didn’t have the right words.
I know – me, the jester, the Man Who Laughs, the storyteller, the World’s Greatest Showman! PT Barnum Reincarnated! At a loss for words…
It was because I was debating telling her the truth.
Now, if you missed my last chapter in this story, then that won’t mean much to you… or if you’re someone that goes through other people’s stories and promos every week like fanfiction-sluts needing your fix then you might not recall such particular details either. Not going to judge, just saying for those of you that don’t know or recall, I’ll enlighten you.
I had done all I can to hide my injury from my soulmate. The knee, the brace, how the injury was affecting me – every aspect of it. I couldn’t let her know. I didn’t want to let her know. Because if I did, I knew – I just knew – that the first thing she would do is run to Mr. D., call him up and tell him about it and OH! Have I got some things to say to that old man – but I knew that if he had any reason to get rid of me cleanly, without me being able to fight him on it, he would take it.
Marina would have given him that opportunity, even if she didn’t mean to, if she told him. And then I’d be out of SCW once more, back to rotting away on the couch while I waited for death to consume me in a boring, pfft of an ending.
That’s why I hid my injury from her and why everything fell apart in the last chapter. I didn’t want it to. I wanted her to know and be on my side. I wanted her to understand that, yes, I was injured, but I needed to keep going. I needed to keep pushing things forward.
In other words: The Show Must Go On…
That. Right there. If you asked me what phrase or logic guides my hand, that would be my answer. “The Show Must Go On”. And I needed my show to go on. I needed it to keep going to give me an ending that I could settle with. I needed some ending that was on my terms. My decision, not something that was thrown together and than left behind by some broken down, obnoxious family that lost sight of what SCW is years ago!
But, lying among the pieces of lumber, looking up at the ceiling again, my brain still not registering the pain – maybe I was semi-unconscious or something or perhaps my nerves had been temporarily suspended from their functions, who could say? But there… I found myself just missing how Marina would be there with me in such moments, checking on me. Or how she’d know how I was feeling cause she watched my matches from home and then would help me recover.
Did you know that I had to recover from my Under the Big Top match with Aaron Blackbourne by myself? Not because Marina was heartless, but because, for the reasons I told you, I couldn’t tell her how much I was hurting. I couldn’t tell her how much pain I was in or how much I needed help. Again, she would have just called the D. family and Sasha, maybe after a talk with ‘daddy-dearest’, would deal me out… they almost had…
But I found myself, perhaps for the first time in all of this, wanting to tell Marina the truth AND planning to do so. Wanting to tell her that I was hurt and that I was scared. Not just wanting to tell her, but making the conscious decision “I am going to tell her”.
Yes, I’m not bullshitting you guys here. I debated it since the fight she and I had, but after Breakdown, I just… I remember distinctly deciding that I was going to tell her. Was I pissed that I had to be put through a fucking table to reach this point? Oh very much so. Was I pissed that I seemed to be headed to ANOTHER round with Holly Adams if I failed to win the battle royale at Taking Hold of the Flame? You bet!
But in the days that followed, as I recovered in Raleigh in a quiet house using AirBnB, I became more and more sure that I could tell her the truth AND convince her not to rat me out to SCW corporate. I knew there had to be a way. The right choice of words, the perfect explanation. Something that would make Marina understand why I needed her, yes, but also how I needed to keep wrestling, at least for a little while longer (we’d reached my one year mark a little ways ago. Thanks for the well-wishes, guys! -_- )
And what was incredible about that – what felt so amazing – was that after I had made my decision… that I was going to tell Marina everything… I felt happy. Maybe a little giddy. Was I worried about her getting angry at me for lying? Sure. Was I worried about her refusing to listen and running to SCW management? Yeah, a little…
But as I told you earlier, I hated this fascade that I had to keep putting on with my soulmate.
I mean, what has been so refreshing for me here in my return to SCW has been the fact that I could do whatever the hell I wanted and just call it as I see it. If I wanted to ‘pretend to be hunted by a masked degenerate’, I could do that! If I wanted to act like a scaredy-cat to point out the glaring problems in how the D. family treat certain talent and conduct business, I could do that! I didn’t have to put on airs or worry about my ‘language’ as a good guy and I didn’t have to be ‘OH SO EVIL!’ as a bad guy for the entertainment.
I was the entertainment, more so than ever before, and I was having more fun than I had in my last years in SCW – part of the reason why I didn’t want it to end. And it was all because I could be honest. I didn’t need to go such extremes as dealing with killers or convicts or whatever the Kings of Shadows created. I didn’t have to live two lives.
I could just… be me. That make sense?
Except… it was almost like everything had gone in reverse. Where I was always me at home in the Kings of Shadows while sometimes ‘playing a part’ for the sake of SCW, now I was being myself (and whatever I wanted to be, whatever entertained me) in SCW and ‘playing a part’ at home.
I wanted to stop all that. I wanted things to be as open and free at home as they had been before and how things were, presently, in SCW. And to do that, I needed to be transparent with Marina.
So, yes, while the ride home was bumpy and uncomfortable on my sore back, there was almost a healthy nervousness in me as I drew closer and closer to my destination – home in Guelph.
Pulling into the driveway, I had to wait inside my car for what felt like an hour, trying to calm my nerves. The clock said it was just becoming evening now, and the sun getting closer to hiding behind the horizon was also an indication of that. The lights were on in the family room, I could see that even through the thin, white blinds that were pulled.
I felt my hands grip and tighten around the steering wheel, the car already having been turned off. The leather caught my skin a little and felt rather nice, so I did again. Fuck, was I nervous. If I could describe the feelings, it felt like I was trying to ask Marina out on a date for the first time, only that time hadn’t been nervous at all…
Okay, let me tell this story! So about three years before I joined SCW (that would be 2006, people), Marina and I were out celebrating my twentieth birthday. Yeah, “The Necro-Merchant’s 20th Birthday Party”, sounds exciting, doesn’t it? Well, the truth is, it was okay. There was a good little party with my friends like Muskrat, Nomas, Femora, and Spider as well as my other friends like…like…
Wow…I don’t remember all of their names… is that what I’ve come to? It’s been so many years since I’ve seen so many of them. Some of them are even dead as far as I know, I know who a few of them are/were… but I can’t recall their names…. I don’t know why that bothers me right now… And yet, much like this upcoming royale, who remembers the ‘supporting players’ years later? Who remembers the guy I eliminated when I won the royale or the top four before that? Who was the iron-person of that year? That’s life – they say ‘don’t forget about the little people who got you where you are’, but it’s so easy to do that! It’s exactly what happens. You get forgotten, lost to the numbers, all your efforts dismissed to time….
But before I get too depressing with that train of thought, back to my party. We had celebrated nicely and everyone had long since gone back to their homes within the Kings of Shadows, except for Marina and I. We were just walking through one of the many tunnels – the safe ones that didn’t lead to the Garden or the Children of Eden. Those were forbidden for the safety of those in the KOS and the Underground.
Actually, hold on…let me change something here so you guys can see this is as a flashback…
There we go! Little indication to make things clear – can’t say I’m not a good storyteller!
“Did you get everything you wanted?” Marina asked me, looking up at me with those soft, brown eyes.
“Mostly.” I replied, trying not to sound as cliché as can be and failing miserably. “I’m not really a materialistic kind of guy.”
Keep in mind, ladies and gentlemen, Marina and I knew the other liked the other. Hell, I found out by stealing one of my favourite scenes from “A Walk to Remember” – no seriously! She was on stage, singing “Only Hope” like Mandy Moore, I was on stage with her, performing for the KOS talent show play, and right at the end, like Shane West (who, I’ve been told I look like – can’t say I see it these days), I swooped in and kissed her.
Now, we hadn’t talked about it for some time, and I can’t believe I was such a dork back then, but she hadn’t pushed me back or screamed in my face or slapped me or anything like that. But, we hadn’t really talked about it since it happened. We had just… I don’t know… went on as if things were normal.
Which was really grating on my nerves. I mean, I made the leap, didn’t I? I kissed her. Wasn’t it partly her responsibility to respond to that, either good or bad?
Or maybe that was my job since I made the first move?
Regardless, at that point in time, walking the tunnels of the Kings of Shadows, I had reached a point in all of this where I had no anxiety in asking her. I, honestly, just wanted to know.
“Man… Two-Zero…” Marina smiled at me. “I can’t wait till I reach that age.”
“Two more years.” I told her. “You won’t even notice it.”
“You say that, but it took forever for me to reach eighteen.”
“Yeah, that’s eighteen years. Twenty is just two now.” I countered, which she replied with a roll of her eyes.
“Got any plans?” she asked suddenly as we turned a corner in our walk, passing the ‘water-basin’ that helped run under Toronto into the streams and rivers (far from the subway stations).
“Plans?” I asked. “Uh…try to take over the world?”
“No, Pinky.” Again, that cute little eye-roll. “I mean, you gotta have plans! A career? Travel?”
At the time, I hadn’t given it much thought. I was already being trained as Spider’s successor as the Necro-Merchant, the old man showing me how to make Necro and how best to distribute it, what sections of Toronto to avoid and how to evade cops and gangs and whatever… it seemed clear to me that little was going to change for me, regardless which decade my life entered.
So, I simply shrugged. “No plans.” I answered.
“You can’t be serious.”
“Marina.” I shook my head. “We’re outcasts. We’re people that the upper world shunned and threw down here to be forgotten. I don’t have a true education and no one really wants to hire a street-rat. I’ve lived here and I’m pretty sure I’ll die here like several others will, and I’m cool with that.”
“I…” she stopped for a moment, trying to collect her thoughts. To clarify, I hadn’t meant to sound pessimistic or discouraging to her when I had said that. I didn’t see anything wrong with living and dying in the Kings of Shadow. We were a community onto ourselves, in my opinion, much better than the world up there.
Up there, people killed one another for the slightest bit of success. They took from others whatever they wanted, regardless of what it cost the other person. Murder, rape, destruction – there was no place for it in the K.O.S (I thought at the time) – only existing in the realm of the Garden with Ian Ryper, the Death Merchant. Was it so bad if I stayed in this world and became a leader of it like Spider did? I didn’t see it that way. To me, it was something to be proud of. Helping others find a home when the world had abandoned them? Saving people that needed sanctuary…
“I don’t believe that.” Marina had finally chosen her words. “I think there’s more out there for me… for you too.”
She looked at me then, I’ll never forget. There was such conviction in her eyes, an earnestness that I simply could not ignore. It was captivating. And whether I believed her or not, I still moved in, my lips finding hers again. Not exactly smooth but I never said I was Casanova, did I?
This time around, she seemed far more ready, her arms wrapping around my neck to hold me firm to her (even though I was the stronger of us). We stood there, just outside of the basin area – I won’t go into the details of the kiss, I am not Chad Evans or Ace Marshall bragging about such intimate moments, so…
Marina was the first one to break the kiss, which seemed fair, pulling back a little to slowly smile at me. “What the hell took you so long to kiss me again?”
“Me?!” I asked with a laugh.
“Yeah!” she countered. “You kissed me first.”
“So? That mean I have to do it again? By logic’s standard, it would have been your turn.”
“Fine.” She shrugged before puling me back in for another kiss, this one shorter than the last but no less sweet.
“We good?” she asked.
“Yeah, except I want to ask you on a date.” I replied.
“Okay.”
“Okay?” I raised an eyebrow. “As in you’ll date me?”
“Okay as in ‘ask me on a date’.”
I remember laughing at that and even pushing her away a bit so I could pretend to be annoyed. “You’re just literally trying to drag this out.”
“No, it’s just that I have plans too!” she countered. “And if I’m going to have a boyfriend, I want to be asked properly.”
“Fine.” I huffed, turning my head to look at her. “Will you go on a date with me?”
She appeared to give it some thought but… long story short? She said ‘yes’.
And welcome back to present-time-storytelling-kinda. I had to smile at that memory as I’ve described it to you. And for those of you keeping up with me, you know that the rest was history. Still, it was good to have this memory in my mind, giving me the confidence and positive emotion to get out of the car, close the door behind me and enter the house.
To my surprise however, when I called out for Marina, she did not respond. I did hear movements approaching me, but it belonged to Becky, Memphis’ babysitter.
“Hello, Mr. Valiant.” The short, spiky blonde hair girl offered with a smile. “Back from work?”
“Hi Becky.” I answered, before quickly adding. “Yeah… long drive. Marina isn’t home?”
“Nope. She said she had a meeting with one of her clients.”
I could only nod at that, excusing Becky and sending her home now that I was here to look after Memphis, who was eating his spaghetti-os at the kitchen table. Seeing me, he gave a wave hello and a ‘Hi, dad!’.
“Hey, kiddo.” I smiled. “Your mom still at work?”
He gave a nod. “Becky let me play video games after my homework. I got to level four on Super Mario 3D world!”
“Good for you…” I smiled, though I wasn’t sure why I was saying that. Still, as the only parent in the house, I stayed with him as he finished his dinner, played his games for another hour or so, before heading to bed.
Marina still hadn’t come home.
Now, before you go off on your theories because I know ONE of you is gonna go “seriously?! Adultery? That’s where he’s going with this story to make it interesting? The old ‘wife is cheating on me’ angle? How cliché!” relax. I’m not going to be so cliché. Marina wasn’t out somewhere cheating on me, I was confident in that.
That woman had the chance to cheat on me more times than I can remember, and had some damn good reasons to do so, especially lately. But in about fifteen or so years, she never strayed from me or I from her. Just how it was. I’d say it was love but you wouldn’t believe me, but, hey, fuck you – it was love.
Still, I didn’t want to go to bed and sleep, despite being tired, until I had spoken to her about my injury -confessed about my mistakes, if you will. Mostly because, if I didn’t right then and there, I might wake up the next morning and change my mind…
So, I poured myself some black tea that I got from the cupboard, but as I reached up for the cup, my back – still feeling the effects of that table crash landing, decided to make its presence known, complaining about the long ride home being crammed in that small, blue 2010 Ford Fiesta.
My tea temporality forgotten, I looked into the cupboards where we usually kept the ‘safe’ medication, looking for some aspirin or advil to help take the edge off. Sadly, none could be found – which I assumed was my fault because I was the one using them for my knee like they were candy. Yeah, that’s right, I’m admitting that I fucked up and should have gotten more from Shopper’s before I came home, okay?
But! There was hope that came to me in a flash of memory! Because I remembered that Marina kept a bottle of advil in our ‘office room’, the room she and I had committed specifically to an office space, mostly for her because… well… what was I going to use one for? Can’t really wrestle over a large desk…
I mean you can… but not for SCW… and not in public.
Anyway, I had seen Marina get a bottle of advil from her drawer in the study before. It would have to do for this case and I could buy some more for her and the cupboard next time I went out.
My mind made up, I walked the few steps needed to reach that side of the house and enter the room, turning on the appropriate lights as I passed. Immediately, I spotted the folders on top of the table, the potted plant in the corner, and the faint lights from her computer, still on.
Her drawer was easy to find. It just needed me to go around the desk to where she sat. Helping myself to a seat, if only to support my back for a moment, I pulled open the drawer, my eyes immediately setting on the bottle that rolled to the end thanks to the momentum of my pulling it open. My eyes quickly spied the ‘advil’ label on the bottle and, just as quickly, I popped out two tablets and swallowed them roughly, not caring over the fact that I didn’t have water to help me (Yeah… don’t say I’m not tough. More impressive than running the royale from straight to finish, Shilo Valiant can swallow his pills WITHOUT needing a drink to do it! THAT deserves to be under my name on the Hall of Fame page!).
As my body settled and I waited for the medication to kick in, I stayed in the chair, hearing the ticking of the clock in the room. After about fifteen or so minutes, I contemplated testing my back to see if the advil was working, as well as moving to the family room to watch some Netflix like ‘Lucifer’’s latest season. As I was about to move out of the chair, though, my eyes spotted a folder in the pile on Marina’s desk (three were the usual off-brown/orange colors, but the one that caught my eyes was different). It was pitch-black with a red string tying it shut.
Immediately, my mind starting racing with fun ideas of what was in the envelope. Were the CRA trying new methods to encourage people to pay their bills? Instead of ‘final notices’, we go with ‘black envelopes’. That sounded so much more effective and creative to me. Or! Or! Maybe it was a doctor! Pirates use to give ‘the black spot’ to other pirates and sailors to warn them their death was coming. A doctor could do that! Oh, but then Marina or me would have death nearby and that wasn’t fun to think about.
Maybe! Maybe! Maybe this was one of her clients inviting her to a black-tie affair and the black envelope matched the choice of attire they wanted.
Around the eighth or ninth guess, which involved a black trampoline birthday party invite or a Tim Burton Movie Marathon from one of Memphis’ friends, I decided to just fuck it and check anyway. Reaching out to take it with my hand, I carefully removed it from the pile and untied the red string that kept it sealed. With a swift hand, I pulled out the papers to read the page…
And nearly dropped the papers and envelope when I saw the bold heading at the top of the page.
Divorce Agreement
With my name scribbled there… next to Marina’s….
Yeah… remember when I said this thing wasn’t going to get a little cliché? I lied. Cliffhanger….
************************************************
The camera opens to darkness for a few seconds before a spotlight suddenly shines, illuminating a single spot, where a rather simple chair is placed. The sound of steps are heard as Shilo Valiant walks into the spotlight and takes a seat on the chair. He wears black pants, a brown shirt, and no mask. Rather, there is nothing of Shilo’s appearance that would even remotely suggest ‘The Man Who Laughs’. If anything… it appears to simply be Shilo Valiant.
He tilts his head to the left, and then to the right, his eyes locked on the audience he wishes to address, before he smiles and finally speaks…
I have a message for someone…
Yes. That’s right. You won’t be seeing merry-go-rounds or masks right now. You won’t hear dark noises like children laughing or glass breaking. That’s not for today.
Today… no effects. No magic. Put simply, this is a heart to heart that I must have with a particular blonde woman in SCW… and no, it certainly is not that Twitter-troll, Holly Adams. Much as she has no true respect for me and all I’ve done for her, I will not waste any more time speaking of her here.
No… Taking Hold of the Flame – the road to Rise to Greatness – deserves my attention far more. It deserves far better than that. And no one in all of SCW, past or present or future, understand and appreciate that more than me. Which is why I need to have this heart to heart with that special someone…
…
…
…
Hello, Zoe…
I know, you would probably rather I call you ‘Syren’ when talking about work, right? But come on, Zoe… you and me? The history we’ve had? The history we’ve made together? I’m sure we’re beyond the point of such things. After all, you are more than allowed to call me ‘Shilo’, are you not?
It is good to be talking to you, Zoe. It really is. I mean, you’re one of the few people in my career that’s is still here. Aside from the ‘in and out’ oldies like Josh Hudson and David Helms, you’re one of the few that’s remained…
And given the things that have occurred recently on my show – given how the game has been set here for the entertainment, I felt that I needed to break that silence between you and I. And put quite simply, Zoe, I did so because I had to. I just… couldn’t ignore you anymore like I have since I came back over a year ago.
Yes, that’s how I’ve lasted longer than David Helms, you see. Where he was dumb enough to try and change you, appeal to you, and even try to knock some sense into you, I haven’t wasted my time or energy on such a fruitless endeavours. I’m not like those people, Zoe. I know you. You’ve always been a selfish bitch, in it only for yourself. Not caring about how you did it, as long as you got what you wanted. Honestly, I don’t know why so many people are so mad at you for the things you’ve done.
Cause what did they fucking expect?!
How many years as it been the same schtick with you? You form a group, you have them solve your problems, you stand on the mountain as World Champion for awhile – “BLAH BLAH, BE JEALOUS, BLAH BLAH!” - until someone comes along and knocks you off the mountain. It was boring back then when it was Infamous and it’s boring as hell now when it’s, again, Infamous… so I don’t get why people are so mad that you’ve not changed. Leopards can’t change their spots. Zebras can’t change their stripes. You’re a boring parasite and I’m the greatest showman in all of SCW. That’s who we are.
And since I am such an entertainer and with our history… I felt compelled to finally speak to you, Zoe, because… after the last few months of having to endure your whining, I felt like someone needed to be your ‘voice of reason’. The ‘reality check’ that CHBK can’t seem to be for you these days.
See, Zoe, I don’t think you understand the position you are in with this royale. Oh, I’m well aware that you are the number one entrant into the Taking Hold of the Flame battle royale – and I also get how you would find that ‘unfair’ or ‘unreasonable’ being so picked. I heard you screaming about it when Old Man Captain D announced it…
Thing is, Zoe… dear Zoe… was that as I was watching that particular moment on Breakdown a few weeks ago… I found myself wanting to just shake you, yell at you, and then hit you in the head with something.
Because how fucking stupid can you be?
Do you not understand how lucky you are, Zoe? How fortunate you are? Think about it! Before he went to Gavin Taylor to make him number two, before he signed off on giving Katie Steward a goddamn segment based on a workout for this royale main event – who the fuck put that idea into his head?! – Drachey-boy pointed you out first. Prominently! He made the first THOTF announcement all about you! He made the royale all about you!
Oh come on! We’re all showmen in our own right here. And from one such showman, easily the greatest showman, I can tell you it couldn’t be more obvious! Because I didn’t get a segment. I didn’t even get the chance to MENTION anything about entering the royale! But the BOSS OF SCW goes out of his way to point you out.
Heh…
He’s made this whole road to RTG about you, Zoe! You’re the selling point! You’re the draw! Like a big name on the marquee to sell tickets to a movie, D. wanted you as the focus for this year’s forty-person royale.
And who can blame him? From the beginning, it’s been the same plan for you, hasn’t? Get that eighth world title win! Beat Jason Zero’s record! Make more history! Be untouchable! That’s what you’ve wanted, right?
And while you think our captain is trying to stop you, you fail to see how he is setting you up to succeed.
What a story! How ‘entertaining’! I can see it now!
Syren fights through thirty-nine other people to become the 2021 Taking Hold of the Flame battle royale! She claws her way through the majority of the SCW roster! No one can stop her! And then… on the grandest stage of them all! On the grandest stage SCW possesses, on the most special of nights… Rise to Greatness, Syren achieves the impossible, either beating the unbeatable Cid Turner or ‘setting things right’ against the woman that sole the contendership from her in the first place, Selena Frost! Either way, Syren stands tall! Syren breaks the record that has stood for well over a decade! What a story!
And yet…
The crowd boos…
The crowd hates…
The fans jeer…
They call bullshit…
They are not entertained…
Do you know why that is, Zoe? Do you know why no one – no one fan – has gotten behind this story that’s been crammed down our necks from the beginning? No, it’s not because we’re all jealous. It’s because of something you and the grand Mr. D. – in his little ‘vacay’ from SCW - fail to grasp.
The one thing the audience hates more than anything is being told what to do. What to watch. Who to get behind.
And every season, the D. family try it, especially with the old man’s fondness for nostalgia! Oh come on, Zoe! You know it as well as I do. Every time a ‘legend’ crawls out from whatever hole they came from, there’s the D. family, no doubt prompted by the matriarch getting a jolly for ‘the good ol’ days’, to hand them everything!
James Evans
Ace Marshall
Kelcey Wallace
David Helms
Ravyn Taylor
And of course you…
That’s me going back almost six years, Zoe. You want to know how many main-events at RTG were involved such names? Such nostalgic reminders of the early 2000s and 2010s? Five out of six! Five out of six of some icon or legend or nostalgic act that – ‘somehow’ – managed to be in the right place and right time… And if things go the way they seem to, it’ll be six out of seven… either you or Cid will make it so…
Do you understand now, Zoe? It’s as plain as the blonde in your hair! Mr. D. has made you the focus of THOTF with his choices – even giving you a free pass by making Gavin Taylor your first opponent – talk about an easy moment to look tough, right?
That’s what Mr. Dracheywch wants. That’s what you want. You with another World title reign and him another RTG main event one of his ‘legends of old’. More the same…
And neither of you deserve it.
You don’t, Zoe. You believe you are overdo for your plan? Overdo for another ‘moment of proving you’re the best in the world’? What is this? The ninth or tenth time you’ve been given that chance by the D. family? More than any other wrestler in SCW today! Katya, Sasha, O.? They’ve all handed you everything time and time again to the point where they are ready to bury the entire roster just for you. O. buried Bree for your ‘justice’, Katya buried all SCW for you, and Sasha buried Sienna just to give you ‘time off’ to hide from an injury!
Just so Syren can be world champion again and again and they can get the buy-out rate they THINK they will get at RTG.
Another Rise to Greatness with Syren there, didn’t we have that two years ago?
Another World title reign for Syren… didn’t you have two of them like a year or two ago?
My point is, Zoe, is that, while you may be getting set up for a great comeback – a great payoff to your grand ‘destiny’/’plan’, paid for my the D. family, it is all for naught.
Because I am here in this royale.
Now, that might not mean much to you at this moment, but let me tell you why this is an issue this time around. This time around, I am not just interested in winning the royale. I am not just interested in entertaining myself.
I am interested in ensuring you – you specifically – do NOT win this royale. Now, while I could give you the details about that here and now… I still have a second promo planned, so I’ll hold off a little on that…
But failure is in your future, Zoe. Not just failure because of me, but failure because you can’t succeed here. Quite simply, it’s because you’re not me.
See, I know your ego will make you try and make it all about you, just like O. has done so, and I know your ego will try and defy what I am saying. I know your ego will make you more dangerous than any other wrestler that enters the ring, proclaiming ‘destiny’ and ‘fate’ or whatever reason they have for being in the royale. But, even so, when it comes to me… let’s face it, you’re still haunted by that one night, aren’t you? The night that established me as the true ruler of Rise to Greatness and established my place haunting your mind every moment we reach this time of year.
Rise to Greatness X.
You, the greatest of all time, taken down by me. Denied the Rise to Greatness moment that you never had and haven’t had since. But that’s how it’s always been with us, hasn’t it, Zoe? I mean, you’ve been following my steps your entire career, haven’t you? I was the World tag-team champion, you followed me through that. I was the World Champion before you and because of me, you became world champion, and now? I ran through the entire royale from start to finish so you just have to, don’t you?
Don’t worry, Zoe, I’m not taking this personally where you are concerned. You’re merely a pawn in a more powerful person’s game. You’re just the key piece that’s being used to try and erase me from SCW history and keep me from my rightful place. Try and erase the entertainment because they can’t control it or me. You’re just the ‘nostalgic flavour of the year’ because anyone is better than Shilo Valiant, right?
But, like I said, the reason why this whole plan will fail is because you are you… and not me.
You do not possess the same passion and drive I do, Zoe. You don’t possess the anger, the frustration, and the bitterness of many years of watching your legacy get swept under the rug. You don’t possess the stamina to defy such odds because you’ve never had to.
Not once in your entire career have you had to overcome odds deemed ‘impossible’. You’ve always had someone there, holding your hand and saving your ass. Me? Besides the royale? Well, look at my face.
Make no mistake about it, Zoe, with your skills and your friends, your plan – and the plan of O. – you will get you far. Very well. You may very well be the iron woman of the royale, Zoe, but what will that mean in five years? In ten years? What will that mean when the RTG spotlight passes you by for a more deserving and entertaining person… because the only person that matters in this royale war, Zoe… is the winner!
And as soon as my music hits, as soon as I come down to the ring, all those dreams and plans of yours…gone. It will be the beginning of the end for you, Zoe. Because I will be the one person you can’t overcome. The one person you and your friends can’t figure out. Because, when push comes to shove, Zoe, just like under the spotlight of RTG X, I will overcome you.
And like I said, it’s not a personal thing for me where you are concerned, Zoe. It’s not. You’re just in the way of what I want – what’s owed to me. Because I’ve read the ‘script’ Mr, D. is trying to shove down people’s throats – lawyers aren’t exactly subtle, you know. I’ve seen spoilers of what he wants for RTG… and I don’t like it. I don’t like my place in his ‘plan’.
I’m not interested in season 9 of ‘Syren is the world champion’. That show’s been going downhill since 2016. I’d much rather see ‘Shilo Valiant regains his spot in the Rise to Greatness main event after eight long years’. I’d rather see ‘Shilo Valiant makes history as the first person to win the Taking Hold of the Flame battle royale twice!”. Doesn’t that sound like a much more entertaining comeback story to tell? And who knows better than me about entertaining comeback stories?
So, Zoe, I just wanted to give you a heads up about this. At Taking Hold of the Flame, I am going to burn your ‘plan’ and the boss’ ‘script’. Just gonna chuck it into a burning trash can. I’m going to assume the role of director and we are going to tell MY story… MY way.
And where you were destined to be the ‘leading lady’ in all of this, Zoe? You will be recast to a more suitable role. Not as the lead. Not as the winner. Not as the number-one contender… but quite simply…
You will be the woman… that makes me laugh…
The camera slowly fades on the grinning Shilo before fading entirely to black…
![[Image: v2jesterfour.png]](https://i.ibb.co/kh10ZRf/v2jesterfour.png)
The Man Who Laughs
SCW Supreme Champion
4x SCW Heavyweight Champion
3x SCW U.S Champion
2x SCW Tag Team Champion (w/ Masquerade)
1x SCW Adrenaline Champion
1x SCW Television Champion
1x Majestic Premier Champion
1x Extraordinary Champion
Achievements
Winner of the Elimination Chamber (2011)
Rise to Greatness Main-Event (2011/2012/2013)
God of Wrestling Tournament Winner (2012)
Undisputed Heavyweight Champion (SCW/Majestic) (2012)
Shocking Moment of the Year (2012, 2013)
Male Wrestler of the Year (2012)
Taking Hold of the Flame Winner (2013)
Match of the Year: RTG X (2013)
3x SCW U.S Champion
2x SCW Tag Team Champion (w/ Masquerade)
1x SCW Adrenaline Champion
1x SCW Television Champion
1x Majestic Premier Champion
1x Extraordinary Champion
Achievements
Winner of the Elimination Chamber (2011)
Rise to Greatness Main-Event (2011/2012/2013)
God of Wrestling Tournament Winner (2012)
Undisputed Heavyweight Champion (SCW/Majestic) (2012)
Shocking Moment of the Year (2012, 2013)
Male Wrestler of the Year (2012)
Taking Hold of the Flame Winner (2013)
Match of the Year: RTG X (2013)