Post by Kyle on May 25, 2014 15:43:53 GMT -5
"Without finality, life would not be beautiful."
~George Hickenlooper
~George Hickenlooper
The man looks up at this point, his face coming into the light. His face was thinner than the WCF last remembered, and his brown eyes, once filled with hate, were now filled with pain. The man had moved closer to the camera, so his clothing was visible as well; military fatigues, desert camo to be exact. His hands, though, the one thing to verify him as the man the WCF universe thought him to be . . . well, his hands stayed in the shadows.
?: My name is Mark Dillinger, doc, and I need your help. The other doctors wouldn't help me when I asked, begged it of them. They told me nothing was wrong, but I say fuck them! I have voices in my head, constantly talking to me. A hundred, a thousand voices, some I recognize, and some I don't. Voices of the men and women who I have overcome, voices of those I never got the chance to defeat. Voices of my old friends, voices of my family. And above all, I hear a gnat buzzing in my ears, constantly reminding me how weak I am compared to him. I can't take it anymore, I just fucking take it anymore!
The man's voice breaks, unable to continue. He drops to his knees, his entire body in the light now. Tears are running down his cheeks, and his both arms rise to his face to cover them. The left hand wraps around the temple, the left eye covered by the palm, and the right . . . well the right covered nothing. There was no right hand, only a stump where the wrist was. The stump is held against his cheek, so the right eye is still looking at the camera, pleading.
Mark Dillinger: Dr. Remus, I need your help because I think I'm going crazy.
BOOM, static suddenly envelops the video feed, and the tron goes dark once more.
"This man . . . he is Mark Dillinger."
Dillinger lands onto the mat as Micayle mounts Caliban and begins wailing on him with stiff right hands. Cormack moves to help his own partner, kicking Remus upside the head. The Scientist rises to his feet, pushing Cormack roughly against the chest. Cormack pushes back, rougher. Remus smiles once and then shoves Cormack backwards straight into the waiting arms of Dillinger! Mark grins as the blood runs down his face and then tucks Cormack’s head under his arm in the reverse face-lock position.
Zach Davis: Dillinger has got Cormack in the position for the Straight Jacket Drop. Are we seeing Nathan von Liebert’s return?
"And he is dying, finality at its finest"
S-Pac push each other out of the way and Dillinger goes crashing into the announce table
STATIC
Mark starts beating himself over the head with his stump, confusion overshadowing his rage. The initial fire has dissipated, replaced with fear. Mark cowers away from the camera, fleeing into the shower area.
Mark Dillinger: What is happening to me?! Be quiet! He needs me!
STATIC
And with that, Dillinger is officially broken, his words replaced by sobs and groans
"It is a slow process, stretched out over weeks and weeks, failure after failure that tears away at the soul. But the chains . . . oh the chains are unraveling. I find myself slipping out for good."
The hipster dropped to the cold concrete beneath him, stunned from the surprise blow. The camera jerked as its handler straddled the man beneath him. Two arms appeared in the video feed, the left arm pressing against the neck while the right hammered down on the man's face once, twice, three times; viewers notice the lack of a right appendage on the right one. . . after the third blow, the man's eyes rolled up in the back of his head, a sign of unconsciousness.
"Last week was the beginning of the end for you, Mark Dillinger. You think Jeff Purse is tough?"
And stand he does. In fact, Nathan climbs the top rope while Rider is on the mat. Nathan looks over at Purse, who is on his knees outside the ring, before leaping off for a Frog Splash into a pin.
Zach Davis: Nathan lands the frog splash.
Shannan Lerch: And that is Purse's finisher, The Deflator. That isn't going to go well later.
ONE!
TWO!
THREE!
STATIC
Purse attempts to keep Nathan grounded on the mat, but the demon is having none of that. Nathan clocks the world champion in the head with an elbow, before lifting him up and over with a backdrop driver onto the steel chair!
Zach Davis: That could’ve broken Purse’s neck.
Shannan Lerch: Nathan sure hopes so.
Nathan knows that might mean certain doom and fights out of it. He grabs the ropes and uses them to pull himself up. Purse runs at him but Nathan hits him with a Lariat, taking the Hardcore Champ down. Nathan lifts Purse up but Purse reverses with a Jawbreaker. He runs towards the turnbuckle, jumps up...
Erin Robbins: Anndd Jeff Purse is Taking off the Training Wheels!
Which Nathan sidesteps, and as the groggy and disoriented Jeff turns...
Erin Robbins: STRAIGHTJACKET DROP! THERE IT IS!
Nathan quickly pins his old rival Jeff Purse.
One.
Two.
Three.
"Heh, you wouldn't know tough if it was inside your head . . . but you will soon enough."
And complete darkness.
"Man has no sense of boundaries, never have."
Light appears as a single speck in the center of the darkness and expands outward. Focus follows and viewers find themselves looking at a single, wooden chair in the center of a shadowy expanse. A figure is seated there, hunched over with what appears to be a stick of chalk in his left hand. His only hand, viewers immediately notice.
"Man, oh imperialistic, all-powerful man, spits on the concept of borders and territories. He is forever going to defy claims by others; tell him not to cross this line, and do you know what he's going to do first?"
The figure falls out of the chair, landing on the rough concrete with his knees. He leans forward, almost to the point that his forehead touches the bare stone, and draws a line across with the chalk. And then, sluggishly, he crosses this line; imagine Gollum from Lord of the Rings to truly imagine how this figure carried him across the newly drawn boundary.
"And more often than not, the response is that of a child. A little stomping of the feet, crossing of the arms, and a new line drawn further back. And thus the cycle continues."
And on the screen, the cycle indeed continues. The figure would draw a line with the yellow chalk and then immediately step across it; above the light continues to follow the figure, but his face is still covered in shadows. As he continues to move forward, though, new details emerge; now, viewers see red converse shoes, a tattered wife-beater, and holey jeans. But no face, at least not on the screen; every single viewer saw a face within the back crevices of his mind. And then, suddenly, the figure stops short of something. He reaches his hands out into the darkness, groping for the invisible barrier.
"Eventually, though, man smartens up and builds a line far harder to cross. A wall, or, in my case, a cage."
The light finally catches up to the figure and viewers find see the cage preventing escape of the figure. Bars of steel, like one would see in the prison.
"I was no different; I was a man trying to maintain the territories he had garnered in his life. Though, unlike my brethren, the invader had already infiltrated my boundaries. He was within, the motherfucking monster was here, so I had to build the cage. I trapped the monster, locked him away, and kept the key close to heart. Every once in a while, the cage would fail and the monster would free himself. He'd wreck havoc, both within my boundaries and those of others; for the creature he was, he possessed the same fault as man; he lusted after the materials of others, coveted them to the point that he took them. Eventually, always, I would prevail again and force the monster back into his cage.
It was the success that would lead to my downfall."
The figure looked left, looked right, moved towards the latter. His hand touched each bar until, finally, he came upon an empty space. An open door to be exact, the escape from the cage.
"The monster had gone quiet for a long while and for a brief moment, I thought I had conquered him. I thought he had grown tired of his repeated failures and finally gave up. I thought he'd finally leave me in peace after our twenty-odd years together. So I grew lax, grew complacent. And then, when I was at my lowest, at my weakest, at War, he pounced. And then, for the first time since I was six years old, I found myself to be the prisoner again, not the turnkey."
The figure sticks his right arm into the empty expanse, his stump reaching for the darkness. The door swings shut suddenly, cutting him off, though; his arm catches in the door with a loud, painful thud.
"Gone goes the Right Hand, and all that it stood for."
The figures his arm free of the door, allowing it to completely shut. And then, for the first time, he turns to face the camera. For the first time in months, viewers see Nathan von Liebert. The eyes give it away, or at least the fire behind them.
"Long before I was faced the consequences of crossing boundaries, you warned me of it all with your own choices, Jeff Purse. For years I have watched you, the rival of all rivals, the man I both despise and respect. Before Steve Orbit, before the Kid Phantasm, before anyone. . . there you were, testing the crocodile filled waters with your toe, hoping the water was the right temperature, completely oblivious to the predators stalking you just feet away. You're a former World Champion, former War survivor, perpetual winner and love of the people; who am I to lecture you on mistakes? Who are you to be questioned in the first place? I mean, it isn't like you've never sided with the wrong people, never gone into situations way over your head, never done a fucking thing wrong."
These words are dripping with poisonous sarcasm, venom long overdue in their delivery from the lips of this man.
"No man would dare question you, Purse, for fear of the wrath you'd bring down upon them. No man, many of whom have not and will not achieve the same successes that you've achieved in your time with this company. Your face is etched in the archways of Pantheon, a name that will be forever hallowed in the annuls of history. Man will fear you, curse you, love and hate you; but they won't question you.
But I am no man."
NvL holds up the stump, waving it in front of the camera. Blood runs down the arm, dripping onto the concrete below, drawn from the steel of the door.
"I am a eunuch, Jeff, devoid of the parts that made me the man that I was. Thus, I find myself unhindered by the aura, the power, that is Jeff Purse. Always have been, always will be. Because you see, I knew Jeff Purse before he was Jeff Purse. I knew him as the man who loved feeling the vibrations of a motorcycle between his legs and canvas on his back. I knew him as the man who could barely catch a break, before he ever became the man who never broke. I was your oil to your water before you ever became holy in this company, Jeff Purse, and that is the key to my victory.
Because, Jeff, your own key has never changed, either."
NvL backs up, pressing himself against the door of the cage.
"For me, it was always failure. With each loss, the cage would weaken within myself. The monster would wait it they were at its weakest before throwing himself against it. When I was strong, when I was successful, I could best him. When I was weak, defeated, he won. We all have our little quirks like that, Jeff, we mortal, imperfect men. Do you wish to know yours, Jeff Purse?
Its death, Purse, finality."
Nathan pushes back and the cage door opens, allowing him to step into the darkness.
"Jeff, I've only admired one thing about your character since I first faced off against you, nearly three years ago: I admired your heart. Defeat never fazed you, Purse, only made you stronger. If someone beat you, your heart told you to get back up and win the next time. If you were broken, your heart would tell body to get itself together. You may be the man, but your heart was that of the gods, strong enough to defeat me several times in our long, storied history.
Only death can stop you, Jeff Purse.
And who knows death better than me?"
A second, brighter light is ahead, calling NvL forth. A table is illuminated from above by an unseen light source, but viewers didn't care for that; they focused only on the red hand suspended in a gel-like liquid.
"Jeff, I'm not going to literally kill you; I'm past the point in my life where I made such idle threats. I am going to stop your heart, though, because if I take that out, I take you out. If I knock you down, you're only going to get back up. If I break your hands, you're just going to kick me. If I break your legs, you're just going to crawl at me. Oh, to the WCF Universe, my description of your heart almost warrants your death; I mean, how else can I defeat you?
How else have I've beaten you in the past?
It just happens. It will happen."
Nathan taps the container in which is severed hand is stored, watching the camera as he speaks.
"Jeff Purse, when you accepted my challenges weeks ago, you crossed a boundary into a realm you've never been prepared for. Many times you have crossed, but failed. Many times you have toed the water, only to find out that the temperature will never be right for you. And yet you're always surprised with that pesky crocodile pops out and drops you on your fucking head."
Suddenly, the glass shatters in the container and the hand flies at the camera, hitting it broadside and knocking it onto the ground. Where it lays, the camera picks up on two red converse moving close. They pause, and then suddenly, the camera is angled upward to focus on Nathan von Liebert's cold, dark eyes.
"Prepare yourself once again, Jeff Purse, to look up at me. And pray, pray that it won't be the last time. Pray, because only one thing awaits you if this is the last time you see my face.
Finality.
Fucking Finality."
And then, the scene fades out.
www.wcfwrestling.com/mark.dillinger/blog/post=7
I don't even know who I am anymore.
Mark Dillinger signing off.
