Smoke in the Air

[Kyle]

1100 Hours / September 01, 2015

A Gentleman's Safari / Paradise, Mississippi.

There once was a man who dreamed of places bigger than Paradise, with creatures larger than the Whitetail Deer and occasional alligator to hunt; He dreamed of Africa. So he went there, a youth of nineteen, with the hopes of bagging some of the most impressive creatures imaginable. He was a Taxidermist in the small, Mississippian town, and he could only visualize the look on his customer's face when they walked into his shop, only to be greeted by a roaring lion or a rhino charging them. When they put his shop on the front page of the Paradise Daily (because what else would a podunk town like this write about), he would be standing there, cross-armed with the elephant head mounted above him casting a shadow across his impressive physique.

None of that would come to fruition, though, the Africa safari a waste of this man's time. Why, one might ask? Because of pesky "international laws" and such nonsense, endorsed and petitioned for by the WWFs and the PETS in the hopes to spare the lives of these majestic creatures or some nonsense. Giraffes? Protected. Lions? Protected. The little African kid that tried to pickpocket him on the first day? Protected. This man, this connoisseur of the finest hunting scenarios known to man, just couldn't find it in what many considered the finest hunting lands in all of the world. With resolve, he came back to Paradise, Mississippi to prove them wrong.

That was over four decades ago; Sir Westley Shelton, as he titled himself now, was not the same pimply-face youth who had left his town. No, he was the wealthiest man in the county, almost the entire state itself, all from his efforts in the animal and recreational hunting industry. For forty years Westley worked himself up the corporate ladder of the pig-farming business, until he found himself in charge of the distribution of the swine population on the entire eastern half of the country. In was in this business that he discovered the intelligence and utility of the pig, combining it with his other hobby, a union that yielded A Gentleman's Safari. Over 5000 acres that spanned three counties of Mississippi, where hundreds of wild hogs and pigs roamed, hunted for sport by The self-imposed Knight and his closest friends. It was a place without restrictions, without care, and most especially, without the interference of organizations of PETS. No, those Swine Lovers couldn't do anything to the man who had his hands in the pocket of every pig-farmer east of the Mississippi.

Oh, and he's a close friend of Patrick Ignatius Gardner, otherwise he wouldn't have gotten such a long introduction. Which was why the WCF star is going to visit him.

Patrick was in the front seat of a '69 (HA!) Ford Mustang Fastback, Royal Purple in color, with black leather interior with two six-sided die dangling on the mirror; each side depicted a different pork dish, with bacon and ribs the two visible images as Paddy drove through the heavily forested dirt road. Draped across the passenger seat beside him was Logan's Hot Dog Costume, still in the man's possession after the attack on him Sunday night. It was the reason Patrick was making his way out this way, into the deep pine jungle where tusked beasts roamed and the men of Paradise tracked them across the foothills in the chase of their lives. Patrick was on a different sort of hunt, with prey who stood on two legs, not four, but in the end, this was the place to go either way. So he went.

The road ahead forked off, with a directing traffic to the Loading Dock down the left fork, the place where new residents of Safari were dropped off and processed; the right led up to the manor above them, where Sir Westley sipped his sweet tea and admired the kingdom he had built around him. Patrick went left, knowing that he would find his friend, his secretary--as if a retired hunter actually needed one--having told him so. Patrick couldn't get much out of the secretary besides a new delivery coming in this particular morning. Patrick knew Westley would tell him all he needed to know; what else were friends for?

Patrick pulled the Mustang just short of a giant warehouse, with a half dozen loading docks where various trucks could back up to to release their loads into the various holding pens connected to them. One such truck was currently there with a sizable crew standing around them, Sir Westley amongst them, distinguishable in his safari gear contrasting against the grimy work clothes of his hired hands. Killing the engine, Patrick snatched up the costume beside him before climbing out the car and heading towards the commotion. As he drew closer, he noticed the truck shaking terribly, the creature inside terribly displeased to be trapped there. A large hog, indeed.

Sir Westley turned at the sound of gravel crunching behind, a smile creeping to his face at the sight of Patrick. He was a thin man, with short brown hair, flecks of gray here and there, tucked beneath a safari hat that Teddy Roosevelt would've shed a tear over; his mustache was thin, the ends curled up, only further emphasized when he smiled; a monocle covered his right eye, for what reason Patrick never really knew. He wore the knaki butt-on and shorts, with knee high socks and brown shoes that made the man look like he stepped right our of the 1980s. This man, just fresh from his sixtieth birthday, was anything but archaic. "I hope you don't think I'm going to wear something like that," he stated, gesturing to the Hot Dog costume in Patrick's hand.

A smile crept onto Legion's face, despite his desire to come into this meeting with a cool focus. "I wouldn't want you to look silly, now would I?" his eyes looking Westley up and down, starting with the wingtips and ending with the monocled eye.

Westley threw his head back and laughed a hearty laugh, startling the workers around him, who didn't speak English. He holds his arms open, inviting a hug. "Well bring it in, my friend!" Legion didn't even have a chance to move before Sir Westley stepped forward, enveloping the big man in a bear hug with surprising strength, despite his size. Patrick awkwardly patted him on the back, hoping for the embrace to be over soon. And thankfully, it was. "Look at this beauty, Paddy," he said, turning back to the truck.

"A new arrival to the savanna?" Patrick asked, stepping up alongside his friend, who's lanky frame put him a few inches above the pig farmer. The truck shook on his frame as the massive hog slammed into the side.

"What does this look like, fucking Georgia?" Westley replied with a coy grin. "He's been a lab for most of his life, genetics testing and some other stuff off the books. Got a mean streak, those pasty scientists didn't want anything to do anything with him anymore. So I bought him off of the lab so I can run some experiments of my own."

"What sort of testing?"

"The kind that'll make for a good hunt. He's got strands in from some of the more vicious boars. Africa, South America. A real killer, this one." Sir Westley looked over at Patrick. "You know this fucker's got a beard. Some mishap with the DNA, they say, gave him some nice little facial hair."

"I'm sure he's handsome."

"Oh, a total stud. One of the workers tried to trim him in the lab, he gored him just for getting close. Man's got his pride to protect." Patrick didn't even bother to respond to that, allowing the silence to hang until Westley got the hint. Taking his eyes off of the pig, he looked hard at Patrick. "So why the visit, my friend? Did you finally accept my offer for a Safari Adventure?"

Patrick shakes his head, holding up the costume again. "I need one of your trackers, the best you got. Somebody thought it would be fun to attack me this past weekend and I want to know who."

"I see," Sir Westley replied, looking once more at the costume. "I think Scooby will do just the trick." And with that, the man lifted two fingers to his lips, releasing a shrill whistle into the air. From under the truck, a small pig bolts out, running up to the pair of men, dropping onto its haunches as soon as he arrived. "My best tracker I have. Can smell a trail a month old. Better nose than any dog you'll find working with the Paradise police."

Legion squatted down, looking the pig over. The thing that caught his eye was the Heart Tattoo with Scooby written across it. "A tattoo, Wes?"

Westley shrugged. "He wanted it; I couldn't convince him, otherwise."

Legion only shakes his head as he returns to his full height. "I guess he'll get the job done."

"Course he will. Like I said, finding the people won't don't want to be found is what he does best." A pause, as he looks at his friend, "What are you going to do when he does?"

In front of them, the truck was nearly knocked on its side as the boar slammed against the door. "What I had been born to do."

---

1900 Hours / September 1, 2015

The Shelton Abode / Paradise, Mississippi

The scene reopens to Sir Westley Shelton and Patrick Ignatius Gardner sitting on the front porch of the pillared, three-story Southern Plantation Home that held a scenic view over the Forested Safari beyond. The pair sat in expertly carved rocking chairs, with nary a creak as they swayed back and forth in their silence. They both were puffing away at tobacco pipes, the smoke of the snuff drifting above their head, hanging in the air. Patrick leaned back in his chair, taking the pipe away from his lips and blowing a smoke ring to the ceiling above their head, while Westley rocked in a nearly sleep-like state.

"A man comes into contact with countless things in his everyday happenings that are killing him. The people we meet, the things we eat, the very air we breathe both sustain us and abstain us from this existence that we call life. We subject ourselves to such tortures, such poison, in the hopes that, at least in the moment, they will please us, pleasure us in the way that mundane items cannot. Take this tobacco, for instance," Patrick waves the pipe in his hand for emphasis, "A Mediterranean blend from the Portuguese company Tabaquiera. I breathe it in, take into my very essence, for the brief enjoyment that it provides. A brief ecstasy that will eventually fade away like smoke in the air while I remain, a little less alive but able to stand to tackle another day."

Legion takes another puff of the pipe, before blowing out another ring. He watches it disappear above his head before speaking again.

"Do you see the allusion to how my match will end up with you this Sunday, Jackson White. The Fenix, the bird who is dies and born again in thick haze of brief, flashy smog?"

Patrick upends the burning tobacco onto the porch under him, grinding it in with the bottom of his boot.

"There once was a boy--I'm sure you know the story, Jackson--who once fought alongside a Phoenix against a terrible monster, in hopes to save the life of a girl and to save his home. He had been alone, with the beast about to strike against him, when the Phoenix swept in, blinding the beast and dropping off the weapon the boy would need to defeat the monster. The Phoenix left, let the boy kill the beast and nearly die in the process, before coming back, patching wounds and carrying the bags for the other fighters. The mighty beast, that Phoenix was."

Westley opened his eyes, looking over at Patrick with a bemused look on his face. "Did you just reference Harry Potter?" A take on the pipe, "Didn't know you could read, Paddy."

"Where else can I look to find a Phoenix but a book, Westley?" Patrick asked as he tucked the pipe into the front pocket of his flannel shirt. "Because we all know they don't exist in real life, no matter how much my opponent this week tries to make us believe otherwise. They are, he is, pure and utter fiction."

Patrick lets that bold statement hang in the air as he leans forward, looking straight into the camera.

"But I must admit, Jackson, you've impressed me with your own reading ability as well; you and your daddy must have read this book together, the night light and hot chocolate and the whole shebang, before he proceeded to go and . . ." A cough from Patrick, "well, went bang."

Low blow of utter proportions from Patrick, who only holds his thumb and first two fingers to emphasize the gun reference, drawing a snort that released some pipe smoke from Westley's nostrils. A few fans, Jackson White fans most like, would compare Westley in that moment to be like a dragon; these fans lived in a fantasy world just like their favored competitor in the WCF.

"You're a faux rip-off of Fawkes, Jackson White, and even then you don't even do that right. Oh, your career has certainly looked like that of a Phoenix, but your approach to this business, you're view of your partners, your opponents . . . You cannot even pull off a fake caricature, one clearly defined in literature that I'm pretty sure was even translated into your own language. You've had everything at your disposal, Jackson, and all you've done is become someone to be disposed of. Like trash, you've been cast aside, waiting for some scavenger to rid this company of such garbage."

Legion smiles.

"And who is better at getting rid of trash than a pig himself?"

Oh what a feral grin Legion smiled.

"But don't let me get ahead of myself, Jackson, let's not skip ahead in the story; Harry didn't meet Fawkes for the first time in that dark chamber, and my first address of you will not be in that ring, where I pluck you to the very naked weakness that is at your core. No, I meet you first in the middle of your transformation, just like our friend, our fictional extension of the human existence, ran into you in the Headmaster's Office."

Westley nods, recognizing something from what Patrick was saying. "Yeah, Harry goes in and sees the Phoenix. And then the bird just explodes right in front of him." Patrick looks aside, surprised at his friend's outburst. Westley put the pipe back in his mouth, hands raised almost defensively, "I took the grandbaby to see it, that's all. I don't actually believe any of that kind of stuff."

"If you only looked at Jackson White's career, you'd might reconsider my friend. Because you look at Jackson and you see a man that was, for a time, hot. Teaming with Dune, winning big matches, challenging for titles in the first few months that he was in the company. The Phoenix did indeed soar high and proud, there is not doubt. But like his namesake, there came a time where he grew old, he grew stale. The gleaming feathers suddenly started molting and he suddenly wasn't flying much higher. Eventually, he found himself just sitting there, taking shot after shot from whoever came along. Angels of Death, Caliban, Omega and Purse . . . they all beat down on the Phoenix, rubbing in the dirt everything he thought he had accomplished until finally a man came along and changed all of that. A man came into the room, out of no where, and sparked the rebirth of the Phoenix."

A pause, the word hanging on the tip of Patrick's tongue.

"Logan."

Patrick nods.

"The Man that Decency Forgot himself came in and gave Jackson White a little poke in the butt to help him explode. They shared a connection and suddenly Jackson White was hot again. Reborn, he was ready to take the obstacles thrown against him; like Dumbledore, Logan wiped aside the ashes to reveal the new White. But to those of you won't don't remember this scene, I want to emphasize that out of those ashes did not rise the same Phoenix. He wasn't the full-grown Fawkes that blinded the Basilisk and carried our heroes out of that Chamber. No, Phoenix, our Jackson White, is still but a babe wallowing in is newfound birth. And as I'm sure all of you are well aware. . ."

Legion holds a fist up, wrapping his other hand around it. Then he applies pressure, cracking all of the knuckles in front of him for auditory accompaniment to his words.

"I have a habit of snapping the necks of babes."

Patrick leans back in the chair, nodding his head as if agreeing with something said off-screen.

"Not that my track record in the company thus far can honestly speak much. I'm well aware that my debut ended with a tie to a man who, to say the least, is not well respected in this company. I was given a chance to right that embarrassing mar on my record, to beat this man one on one at Revenge. Alas, my opponent didn't even bother to come to the arena, leading to a count-out victory and an extra layer to what has become a rather unimpressive tenure here in the WCF. So, to say that I'm dominating or unrelenting in the ring is not possible because up until this point, I haven't had the chance to really prove my worth. But I ask this, Jackson: why are you here? Why is the man who teamed with Dune, who has competed for titles, who is a man who will never die and will never be fully conquered by a finite existence, why is he fighting against a pig farmer who is way over his head right now?"

Legion smiles.

"Because Jackson White isn't as fucking good as he thinks he is."

Patrick shrugs as he rocks in the chair.

"Why waste words on so easy of an explanation? Oh, I could go on how about how Dune carried the matches that White found himself involved in. But Jackson White wouldn't listen. I could go into extreme detail about how the weeks following that was the real Jackson White, the one who couldn't win a match, with bad partners or otherwise. But Jackson White wouldn't listen. I could tell him that this week won't be any better, that I'm not just some pig farmer, not some one and done competitor. But Jackson White wouldn't fucking listen, so why waste my words on him?"

Patrick points to the camera.

"So I'm speaking to the WCF Universe now, because I know you're listening. I know you're hoping to see me slip up, to fall short, so that your Phoenix can begin to soar again. With all the allusions to literature, you can only assume that my match with Jackson White is the proverbial chamber showdown, where The Phoenix swoops in and saves the day. The thing is, White stopped reading before this point, else he'd realize just how sorely out of his element he truly was. The Phoenix, you see was a companion animal, one who fought alongside others, not on his own. Fawkes fought with another against the terrible monster; he did not fight it alone.

And that is where you fail at being who you think you are, Jackson. You go on and on about your partners, for good or for worse. From Dune to the Ultimate Destroyer, you've teamed with the best and the worst this company has to offer. And at the end of the day, they're the deciding factor in your success or failure. Oh, you won't admit it when you win; Dune and I, We won our tag matches, but in the same breath, The Ultimate Destroyer lost, not I. You've tried so hard to deviate from the way the story was written, trying to be bigger than you were. Jackson, you've tried so fucking hard to be someone you're not that by the time you actually find yourself against the Basilisk, there will be no one there to back you up; Dune is not going to save you, White, from the mess you've brought upon yourself. He's already gone ahead and Defeated the Dark Lord Beckman, while you're still wallowing around in the ashes of your past accomplishments. No, you'll be utterly and terribly alone when you face the snake in your life.

And you'll be alone this week, too, when you face me.

Because I, Jackson, am not your Basilisk; that is a role for another who deems his time as something he can waste on the likes of a child like you. No, I am but a simple pig farmer, rooted in reality and bred to resist the temptations and fantasies of the world. You scoff at the idea that someone like me can actually make a difference in this company, but at least I represent something beyond an imaginative realm that people go to when they aren't cut out for real life. The Greeks tell stories of boars being hunted down by the likes of Hercules and Atalanta because it was acceptable for a pig to be a mighty beast. But a Phoenix? Apollo stopped and listened to your song once."

Legion leans forward, looking deep into the camera.

"And this Sunday, I'm going to have you crying out a song of agony as the fans watch as I finally, finally get my hands on the competition the WCF has to offer. No more battle royals, no more count-outs. Just Patrick Ignatius Gardner and Jackson White who's greatest accomplishment, like Fawkes, will be crying into my arm just before I plant you onto the mat. This isn't a fairy tale, White, and I'm not your everyday fucking pig farmer. I'll see you soon."

The scene looked as if it was ready to fade out, until Westley speaks up.

"Where did you say this tobacco was from again?"

"Portugal, my friend."

"Its terrible."

"What from that country isn't?"

And with, the scene indeed fades out.