The Amazing Griffin - Issue #1 - The Origin... Sorta
Mar 6, 2016 1:10:24 GMT -5
occulo, Tiffany White, and 2 more like this
Post by The Griffin #7/11 on Mar 6, 2016 1:10:24 GMT -5
The Amazing Griffin
Issue 1: The Origin… Sorta.
Six Months Ago…
5:00 AM – Somewhere Outside Los Angeles.
“You know, Los Angeles’s a really beautiful place when you get down to it. Many people paint it as the gritty, seedy underbelly of the states. And in some ways, it is. But really, in its pure essence, it’s impressive. It’s made to be the perfect city and in most ways it accomplishes this. It’s one of those few feats of mankind to create such a place. And now there are so many places like this – Montreal, Beijing, Tokyo, and there’s even more to mention. In ages past, we were lucky to have one Rome. One Alexandria. One London. Now we have so many to choose from. It should be paradise. It really should be.
It’s not.
We all know that. Big cities are a place where sins thrive. Adultery, petty theft, even pettier murder… it’s a cesspool. It’s a grimy, grimy cesspool. God himself has given us perfection and we’ve turned it into something twisted. It’s disgusting. It’s putrid. We should be ashamed and beg for forgiveness, as while our lord may be as patient as stone, he is not lenient. And while I pray that I shall be pardoned, I am not my Lord. I myself am running out patience!”
In a sudden jerky movement, his fist slammed onto the table with tremendous force, causing it to split apart with one blow, its shards shooting out across the room. Muffled screams and sobs reverberated off of the walls. Through his glasses, the taller man with a sloppily shaven head and an overgrown, scraggly beard turned to the woman struggling against her bonds in the middle of the room, shaking around in the chair to get free. The man’s face twisted into some struggling grimace. Without a word, the man grabbed an old chair from the corner and dragged it in front of the woman, taking a seat silently. He stared into her eyes for a few trying moments and then softly removes her gag. Obviously, she tried to scream the second the gag is off. As she tries to get someone’s, anyone’s help, he stared down at the floor, stone-faced. She didn’t know that no matter how much she screamed… no one would come. No one cared.
“Shhh, shhh. It’s all right. I’m calm now. I don’t often lose my temper, I assure you. But talks of… humanity make me passionate. See, I love humans, I really do. I love all of us so much it hurts. It hurts so much. Because they don’t deserve it. They really don’t, but I’ll be the first to say that there will be a few ones I miss. I really enjoyed that Taylor Swift’s music, you know? Specifically the one about her twentieth boyfriend, I found that one really inspiring.”
A few moments of silence, the young woman even stopped yelling for a little while.
“That was a joke.”
She just stared back in horror.
“I’ve never been very good at comedy, I’ll admit. But at the very least it’s polite to laugh at your host’s jokes. My wife taught me that. Did I tell you about my wife? I swear I did, I… oh no. Nope, that was the person before you. William was his name. Good fellow. Probably shouldn’t’ve cheated on his lovely girlfriend, but he was a good kid. He wasn’t like you, was he? No, you’re just a sweetheart. A lovely little lady in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
He rubbed his face, lacing his fingers into his beard, his lighter expression turning progressively dark.
“I really… really hate cheaters.”
His fist clenches down hard and suddenly the girl’s ankle bends the complete wrong way. A guttural shriek rings out as she glances at her foot hanging on by sinews.
“Oh! Oh I apologize!” He uses his hand to bring the foot back to the ankle and begins to reattach the skin very particularly while she sobs in pain.
The man grumbles to himself, “Twice I’ve been mad today. Twice. You may not believe me, but I’m not usually like this. Things have just been complicated for the last little while."
He places a hand upon her knee casually, stroking it with his thumb like she was someone familiar, “I… I am dying. Cancer. It’s been getting worse. But see, his voice… his voice has told me that this unholy sickness has been given unto me as a means to… to finish my plans.”
Rubbing his nose, he continues, “I have… plans. Plans for this city. Plans for myself. Plans for all of you. God wills me forth and I shall answer his call as his champion, his avenger, his angel of death. I will wipe out the disease that plagues this world. I shall begin anew as Noah once did.”
Taking too much effort and growing bored, he leaves her foot half-attached, and leans forward, close enough that with a flick of his tongue, he could taste the salt of her tears.
“I don’t expect you to understand. I, myself, had trouble accepting my new role at first. But God wills it and God’s will has no need to be understood, it must be done. Heed me, for I speak this very will as his holy Prophet.”
This so called Prophet stands up slowly and brushes her platinum blonde hair out of his face methodically, as if he has done this so many times before. And with that, a strained smile, looking unnatural upon his paling face. Then he rips off the necklace on her neck prompting a cry from her.
He leans down, kisses her forehead and kneels down to place his elbows upon each of her thighs, closing his eyes for a final prayer as she screams out for help for anybody.
“Through this holy anointing may the Lord in his love and mercy help you with the grace of the Holy Spirit.”
In a split second, her neck is snapped without him having touched her head. And a few plodding moments later, he makes the sign of the cross and stands up, using his apparent telekinesis to bring over a large wooden cross tilted against the wall.
Over the next few minutes, he uses slight gestures of the hand to nail her wrists and ankles to the cross, and floats her into a large cellar, where he shuts the door and locks it. One more sign of the cross later and he turns to the door to what appears to be a bathroom.
“Come now, boy. You are the next misguided soul I must send to her,” a leisurely drawl escapes his mouth as he makes his way over.
“Retribution is at ha-”
Opening the door, he hears it before he sees it, the top of a toilet swinging towards him, breaking in several pieces over his head. His body gives an involuntary tremble before he plops onto the ground. He hears a frenzy of muffled and scrambling footsteps and the slamming of a door.
The teenaged boy continues his frantic running all the way out the building and into the fields. He loses track of time as he makes strangled cries out for help, leaping over and through trees and rocks, pushing past shrubbery and trees that just didn’t care for his problems.
It was only when he crossed the street into Los Angeles did he finally look back, where he saw something that struck him as speechless and paralyzed him to the core. A burning cross plastered against the dawn’s purple sky sitting atop a building. And there, on this burning cross, flittered away a lock of platinum blonde hair.
The only movement he could muster was to step back slowly. All his ears could hear were the footsteps that rung out like church bells. Before his waist hit the railing and he fell back, he saw the holy figure step out from the burning cross, his eyes locked on him.
And then it was all black. But the darkness was not eternal. For it wasn’t shock that affected him so… it was blinding rage. A rage so powerful and overwhelming that nothing could stop it.
Not even death.
~X~
Three Months Later…
10:00 AM – Los Angeles, California
You know… they say that most great adventures start out very simply. And that’s true. This one did start off somewhat simply. It was just a boy and a dream to be someone more important than he was. Now it’s a heartfelt story and all that, but, it’s best left to another time.
Right now, I think we could all do with some good old fashioned violence to start things off strong.
Lunging forward, Gabriel swung his arms around the mugger’s head and pulled back on his neck. He felt the sudden gasp of surprise coughing out of the man’s mouth, but on instinct, he threw his shoulders around, breaking out of Gabriel’s grip with relative ease, as he wasn’t able to lock it in.
He spun around and, hesitating to bring his gun up after seeing the odd outfit his opponent was wearing, Gabriel takes the opportunity to throw his fist around, bringing it down on his temple, stumbling forward.
The blow didn’t have much force behind it because of the newfound vigilante’s shaky stance, so he gave him a receipt by thrusting his foot forward, knocking Gabriel down to his knees.
“Fucking…!” The burglar leveled his gun with his head and pulled the trigger without hesitation.
However, Gabriel turned his body down in an instant, the bullet whizzing over him without doing any serious damage, but the following kick to his stomach did hit its mark. Using the pain as a catapult of sorts, Gabriel smashed into the burglar’s hand, who was thinking he thought for sure that he had aimed his shot well, and followed through on his punch, extending his elbow out to down the opponent, but before he could fall, Gabriel gripped the mugger’s coat and thrashed him about, slamming him into the nearby dumpster.
Clumsily, Gabriel swings the side of his elbow up, uppercutting his jaw, his chin shooting up into the air and dropping almost immediately.
The criminal slumped down onto the slimy ground. Gabriel threw down a few blows, but realized that his graceless brawl and awkward uppercut had finished the job, incapacitating the culprit in question. He took the time to catch his breath and leaned on the dumpster over him, turning to find the older man a bit in shock.
“Are you all right?” the man asked, hesitant to reach out and help the man, wondering if he was some rival gang member or something who wanted his money more than the other guy did.
“I uh… hoofh… been better,” Gabriel groaned and stood up, rolling his shoulders.
“Are you going to mug me too?” came the next question.
“No. No, I, uh, I’m one of the good guys. I think. Name’s Griffin. Are you okay?”
“Fine. Guy didn’t touch me. Are you sure you’re okay? I can’t really tell with the, uh, is that a hockey mask? Wait no... Are you wearing a lucha mask?”
“Yeah.”
“I’m guessing you’re wearing hockey pads too?”
“No. No, those don’t fit under the tights.”
The older man’s first smile of the night cracked, “I don’t want to ask how you know that. Jesus, well, thanks for the save. Want a drink? A beer? I own a 7/11, you could come around.”
“I don’t drink but uh, do you have like coke or something?”
“Is Pepsi okay?”
The older man lent his shoulder to lean on and he took it, using his other arm to clutch his stomach from the previous blow, “Fine. It’s fine. I’ll just have a tea.”
The two of them stumble their way down the street to a little 7/11 on the corner of a city street. Cars raced past it and it looked mostly barren apart from the owner who would usually be situated behind the counter.
Gabriel winced as he looked around for a drink, “Why were you even outside in the first place? Aren’t you the only one here? Shouldn't you be manning the station?”
“Yeah, but the toilet’s shot and I had no other place to go, so I’d either go to the bathroom in the Subway a couple stores down or just piss in an alley,” The older man said offhandedly.
“Fair enough,” Gabriel opened up a can of iced tea and started to down it, but when he did, the owner stopped him.
“You have to pay for that, you know,” He told him.
“What?”
“Yeah, pay for it.”
Gabriel looked about the store, “But… I just saved your life!”
The older man pointed straight at him, “And then you proceeded to steal and drink a product in my store without paying for it. Pay up, ese!”
Gabriel groaned, “I can’t. Tights. I don’t have room for a wallet in tights.”
Rolling his eyes, the older man replied, “Fine, but you better come back tomorrow. If you don’t, I’ll tweet on social media about how some guy named Griffin tried to molest my daughter.”
His mouth opening a bit and his eyes widening, he replied, “Wh-What? Why-Agh, whatever. Fine. Fucking fine, I’ll come back tomorrow and pay you.”
“Good,” The older man finished.
Taking a moment to drink his tea, Gabriel eyed his nametag to see his name ‘Senna Assad’. He shrugged a little bit; the man didn’t look Arabic at all. He looked older, with a paler pigmentation than most people of his race. But, then again, Gabriel didn’t look all too Mexican either.
“Hey…” He wiped the counter a bit, “How’d you get into… whatever it is you do, exactly.”
“What?” No one had ever asked him the question, “Uh… I’ve always liked superheroes.”
…
“That’s it? That’s your only reason? What kind of autistic origin story is that?” Senna hissed.
“Dude, I just saved you. What the fuck’s up with the attitude?”
Senna waved him off, “Whatever. I assume there’s more to the story. I intend to hear-oh, dammit, not again.”
Gabriel was about to ask what he was swearing about, but Senna pointed him outside of the shop. Peering over across the street at a nearby martial arts dojo, the sounds of kids doing drills echoing from within its walls, a shady looking guy, probably a little older than Gabriel himself, walks up to a bike rack.
“What’s wrong, exactly?”
Senna sighed, “He comes ‘round every once in a while and steals a kid’s bike. Probably sells it for drug money.”
“That’s a bit presumptuous, isn’t it? Could be selling it to pay off student loans,” Gabriel responded while scoping out the target.
Senna smirked, “Kid. It’s LA. He’s not stealing bikes to pay through college.”
And at that moment, the guy somehow whipped a bike away from the rack and pulled it around, throwing away a wrapper onto the floor and racing off with it down the sidewalk!
“Litterbug and Bike Stealer. Litterbike Man,” Gabriel murmured.
Gabriel pressed up against the glass to see where he’s taking off, “I’m going after him!”
“What? Kid, he’s on a bike. You’re not catching up to him. You can lose a few small battles here and there, it’s fine,” Senna let him know.
Gabriel looked down to the floor for a moment, taking a deep breath. He bursts through the door of the 7/11 and sprints off down the street.
“I WILL WIN!” He roared as he increased his speed as much as he possibly could.
Senna wanted to yell after him, but couldn’t be bothered and walked inside to attend to his managerial duties.
Gabriel, in the meantime, could see the now distant figure of Litterbike Man gliding down the sidewalk with his bike. For a few moments, he felt like it might actually be a lost cause to chase after him, but after seeing that he was drifting slightly to the left, he knew he could do it!
Making a hard left turn, he scrambled into an alley, ran across a street, through another alleyway, and came out right onto a sidewalk, seeing that Litterbike Man was riding straight toward him a mere twenty-twenty five feet away.
“What in the fuck!?” The Litterbike fiend yelled out, drifting around.
“Gotcha!” Gabriel exclaimed and launched off his feet toward him, only for Litterbike Man to escape his grasp and take off to a nearby subway station, “You’re not getting away!”
The Litterbike Man attempted to clear the crowd in front of the stairwell down toward it but only a couple people moved out of the way, allowing for Gabriel to cut him off, which actually did clear the crowd entirely.
“Hah!”
He held out his hands to stop Litterbike and then gestured for him to come closer. The man looked at the man in green and purple tights in front of him and the crowd around him who were pulling out their phones, taking videos of this mysterious masked man and his assailant.
Gabriel didn’t allow for another option, “Hand. It. Over.”
"Look, I'm sorry, man! I'm just trying to pay off my student loans and shit, I don't want any trouble!" He squealed.
Heheh.
Told ya.
And, slowly but surely, the Litterbike Man handed him the small bike he stole from the kids’ karate school, to which Gabriel smiled under his mask. He stood up straight and gestured with his head for him to leave, giving him another chance, and he took off before anyone else could stop him.
“What… who are you!?” One of the crowd members questioned.
The crowd started to close in on him with questions and exclamations from all sides, but The Griffin just pushed through them and headed back the way he came, moving fast enough to deter anyone from following him. And no one did. Cause… who the fuck would, he’s just some douche in a mask.
But that douche, in some weird way, is a hero. I guess.
~X~
“Would you like to get some ice cream on the way home, little guy?” His Dad asked him.
The little blonde kid in a kimono put up both of his hands, “Yeah!”
Carter just finished up his karate class and was given his yellow belt! He was prouder of this accomplishment than anything else he had done in his life.
And, walking outside, he found his bike on the rack, safe and sound. However, the lock had been broken… weird.
~X~
“Hello everyone. It’s your boy Griff.
Now, normally I’d have to introduce myself to all of you when it comes to these kinds of things and I still will, but in this case, I don’t need to. You all already know who I am. I’m part of The Pride, which has been making waves around here. I’m fighting for the Internet title within my first week of being here, regardless of whether I win or not, I was the one who was picked to go against him. Other legends and main eventers put their cards in the hat to face ZMAC but I was chosen. And yeah, I’m flattered for that. Really am.
Joey Flash, the man himself, has endorsed us. Andre Holmes, one of the tag team champions, has endorsed us. All because Adam Cooper needed saving. By the way, Eddie’s got him pinned as an alien. Sure of it.
And then, as expected, we got booked on Slam for our debut match, the opener. Because, they and everyone else already knows that when we show up, we’ll hype the crowd up and steal the show.
So yeah, I recently found out that my boys Ethan, Eddie, and I were booked on a match. Then I looked at the card and…
And uh…
I said, “Who?”
I mean seriously, who are any of these guys? Warbird? Bad News Benson? Psycho Dragon? Aren’t we supposed to be the unknowns heading into this match?
Look, I’ll be honest with all of you guys; I’m not the kind of guy who’s gonna stand up and throw every swear word and loose insult I can at my opponents. I mean, I could. I totally could. In fact, I’ll prove a point and do it. Seriously, don’t take this personally (or do lol) but, like, watch –
“PSYCHO DRAGON AND THE REST WANNA TALK SHIT?! OH YEAH!? WELL AT LEAST I DON’T SPEND MY TIME SUCKING DICKS IN THE BATHROOM AT OLIVE GARDEN. YOU DIRTY ROTTEN LOWDOWN SLIMY FILTHY DISGUSTING GLUTTONOUS HOGLIKE MOTHER FUCKING COCK SUCKING SON OF AN INCESTUOUS PEDOPHILE SHEMALE RAPIST PROSTITUTE. GET YOUR MOM’S DICK OUT OF YOUR MOUTH.
DO YOU KNOW WHAT I’M GONNA DO? I’M GONNA SHIT UP YOUR ASS.
STOP FOR A MOMENT AND REALLY GRASP THAT STATEMENT. I AM LITERALLY GOING TO SHIT UP YOUR ASS. I WILL TAKE MY PANTS OFF, RIP YOUR PANTS OFF, OUR SPHINCTERS WILL TOUCH AND I WILL SHIT. YOU WILL TRY TO COUNTERSHIT BUT MY SPHINCTER WILL OVERCOME, AND I WILL PUSH A LOG OF SHIT FROM MY ASS UP INTO YOUR BODY.
THIS IS WHAT SHALL OCCUR.
YOU KNOW WHAT ELSE?
I WILL PISS IN A POT. I WILL ADD CORNSTARCH TO THS PISS AND BOIL IT UNTIL IT GETS REALLY THICK.
LIKE SAUCE.
I WILL POUR THE THICKENED PISS INTO A PLASTIC CONTAINER AND PUT IT IN THE FRIDGE UNTIL IT HARDENS INTO FIRM JELLO. I WILL THEN CUT IT INTO RECTANGLES, BATTER IT IN A MIX OF MILK, FLOUR, AND EGGS, AND DEEP FRY IT AT 375 UNTIL GOLDEN BROWN, FLIPPING ONCE SINCE THEY FLOAT. AND I WILL SERVE ALL THREE OF YOU MY DEEP FRIED PISS.
THAT’S WHAT ALL OF YOU GET FOR BEING SUCH A BUNCH OF FAGGOTS.
BITCH.”
See, I’m not the kind of guy who’s gonna do that. That’d be really mean and stuff.
Mostly, I’m just gonna talk about you and why I think the Pride is gonna beat you. And, to be honest, the reason why I think the Pride’s going to win is because the three people we’re going up against are parodies of themselves.
All Psycho Dragon does is act intimidating by posting mysterious tweets about some dumb mysterious target. Why would we care? He hasn’t beaten anyone, who cares if he’s hunting people? Sure, he could be the Kraven of the WCF and run around killing dudes and people should be afraid of that. But, frankly, he’s not. He’s more like the not-as-cool Steve Irwin of the WCF.
~X~
“Oy, g’day mate, I’m Psycho Dragon and I see a Pride of fuccin’ lions over there… I’m gonna go touch them and see what happens!”
Three Hours Later…
“Hi, this is Fox News. This just in, Psycho Dragon ended up dying while filming an episode of ‘Pride Hunter’ after getting fucking murkt by all of the boys. More at 11. Back to some shit people actually care about.”
~X~
You know what I’m saying?
Honestly, if this is the best that Psycho Dragon has to offer, he should be sent home packing right after this match. That kind of stuff won’t cut it here and I’m not even trying to be mean here, you’re just not good enough to hang with the rest of us.
Now Bad News Benson! Here’s a guy who… who can’t really hang either.
Kind of irrelevant to be honest.
Like, I don’t have much to say about him.
He doesn’t seem to care so I don’t really care about him either. Meh.
I mean, I’ll admit it’s people like him that makes it difficult to do what I do. The apathetic ones. When you’re as apathetic as Bad News Benson, you never want to help anyone or contribute to society in any way. Who’s gonna remember Benson in four years? He’ll most likely end up as a WCF Network Trivia question at the end of the day.
~X~
“Who did the Pride murder in their debut match?”
“The correct answer is A. The Pride destroyed the career of Dag Riddik before their debut match even happened, not his alien-induced second personality named Adam!”
~X~
But yeah, pretty much all I have to say about him.
Oh, right, uh, Warbird. Warbird!
So Warbird is one of those guys a lot of us in the wrestling business has encountered before. A rebel without a cause who’s looking out for himself and only himself. But see, the difference about him is that he’s reckless! He doesn’t care about his own well being! He’ll go out and commit someDirty Deeds or uh… is wanted as Cactus Jack! Um… or… eh…
Hm. Yeah, I guess nothing really is unique about him. Huh.
But, I’ll be honest, out of all the guys who we’re facing this week, I’m mostly worried about him. I mean, look at him! He’s driven as hell! That’s the kind of quality a top star of a wrestling company needs. Someone who’ll throw all of his being into his work! He’ll show up early and leave late, he’ll-
…Wait, what’s that Ethan? He hasn’t been seen anywhere near the WCF premises since the match was announced?
…Oh.
…Well.
There goes his one defining trait.
This is actually kind of sad, really. I was hoping for something more during our debut match. Something to really, really get the crowd going! I really could use something like that now. A fight! A real fight!
But at the end of the day, I don’t care who you are. I don’t care what you’ve done. In the last several months I’ve had to stare down fear itself. I’ve had friends been hurt in front of me. I’ve had family members cry over my body. I’ve put my blood, sweat, and tears into this. I’ve been bullied, I’ve been hurt, I’ve been beaten down, and bloodied.
But if I’m still kicking… I can still win.
So WCF, you just pull up behind me and take cover. I’m The Griffin and this is as far as evil will get.
You all don’t know what the fuck you’re messing with.
Excelsior, bitches.”
Issue 1: The Origin… Sorta.
Six Months Ago…
5:00 AM – Somewhere Outside Los Angeles.
“You know, Los Angeles’s a really beautiful place when you get down to it. Many people paint it as the gritty, seedy underbelly of the states. And in some ways, it is. But really, in its pure essence, it’s impressive. It’s made to be the perfect city and in most ways it accomplishes this. It’s one of those few feats of mankind to create such a place. And now there are so many places like this – Montreal, Beijing, Tokyo, and there’s even more to mention. In ages past, we were lucky to have one Rome. One Alexandria. One London. Now we have so many to choose from. It should be paradise. It really should be.
It’s not.
We all know that. Big cities are a place where sins thrive. Adultery, petty theft, even pettier murder… it’s a cesspool. It’s a grimy, grimy cesspool. God himself has given us perfection and we’ve turned it into something twisted. It’s disgusting. It’s putrid. We should be ashamed and beg for forgiveness, as while our lord may be as patient as stone, he is not lenient. And while I pray that I shall be pardoned, I am not my Lord. I myself am running out patience!”
In a sudden jerky movement, his fist slammed onto the table with tremendous force, causing it to split apart with one blow, its shards shooting out across the room. Muffled screams and sobs reverberated off of the walls. Through his glasses, the taller man with a sloppily shaven head and an overgrown, scraggly beard turned to the woman struggling against her bonds in the middle of the room, shaking around in the chair to get free. The man’s face twisted into some struggling grimace. Without a word, the man grabbed an old chair from the corner and dragged it in front of the woman, taking a seat silently. He stared into her eyes for a few trying moments and then softly removes her gag. Obviously, she tried to scream the second the gag is off. As she tries to get someone’s, anyone’s help, he stared down at the floor, stone-faced. She didn’t know that no matter how much she screamed… no one would come. No one cared.
“Shhh, shhh. It’s all right. I’m calm now. I don’t often lose my temper, I assure you. But talks of… humanity make me passionate. See, I love humans, I really do. I love all of us so much it hurts. It hurts so much. Because they don’t deserve it. They really don’t, but I’ll be the first to say that there will be a few ones I miss. I really enjoyed that Taylor Swift’s music, you know? Specifically the one about her twentieth boyfriend, I found that one really inspiring.”
A few moments of silence, the young woman even stopped yelling for a little while.
“That was a joke.”
She just stared back in horror.
“I’ve never been very good at comedy, I’ll admit. But at the very least it’s polite to laugh at your host’s jokes. My wife taught me that. Did I tell you about my wife? I swear I did, I… oh no. Nope, that was the person before you. William was his name. Good fellow. Probably shouldn’t’ve cheated on his lovely girlfriend, but he was a good kid. He wasn’t like you, was he? No, you’re just a sweetheart. A lovely little lady in the wrong place at the wrong time.”
He rubbed his face, lacing his fingers into his beard, his lighter expression turning progressively dark.
“I really… really hate cheaters.”
His fist clenches down hard and suddenly the girl’s ankle bends the complete wrong way. A guttural shriek rings out as she glances at her foot hanging on by sinews.
“Oh! Oh I apologize!” He uses his hand to bring the foot back to the ankle and begins to reattach the skin very particularly while she sobs in pain.
The man grumbles to himself, “Twice I’ve been mad today. Twice. You may not believe me, but I’m not usually like this. Things have just been complicated for the last little while."
He places a hand upon her knee casually, stroking it with his thumb like she was someone familiar, “I… I am dying. Cancer. It’s been getting worse. But see, his voice… his voice has told me that this unholy sickness has been given unto me as a means to… to finish my plans.”
Rubbing his nose, he continues, “I have… plans. Plans for this city. Plans for myself. Plans for all of you. God wills me forth and I shall answer his call as his champion, his avenger, his angel of death. I will wipe out the disease that plagues this world. I shall begin anew as Noah once did.”
Taking too much effort and growing bored, he leaves her foot half-attached, and leans forward, close enough that with a flick of his tongue, he could taste the salt of her tears.
“I don’t expect you to understand. I, myself, had trouble accepting my new role at first. But God wills it and God’s will has no need to be understood, it must be done. Heed me, for I speak this very will as his holy Prophet.”
This so called Prophet stands up slowly and brushes her platinum blonde hair out of his face methodically, as if he has done this so many times before. And with that, a strained smile, looking unnatural upon his paling face. Then he rips off the necklace on her neck prompting a cry from her.
He leans down, kisses her forehead and kneels down to place his elbows upon each of her thighs, closing his eyes for a final prayer as she screams out for help for anybody.
“Through this holy anointing may the Lord in his love and mercy help you with the grace of the Holy Spirit.”
In a split second, her neck is snapped without him having touched her head. And a few plodding moments later, he makes the sign of the cross and stands up, using his apparent telekinesis to bring over a large wooden cross tilted against the wall.
Over the next few minutes, he uses slight gestures of the hand to nail her wrists and ankles to the cross, and floats her into a large cellar, where he shuts the door and locks it. One more sign of the cross later and he turns to the door to what appears to be a bathroom.
“Come now, boy. You are the next misguided soul I must send to her,” a leisurely drawl escapes his mouth as he makes his way over.
“Retribution is at ha-”
Opening the door, he hears it before he sees it, the top of a toilet swinging towards him, breaking in several pieces over his head. His body gives an involuntary tremble before he plops onto the ground. He hears a frenzy of muffled and scrambling footsteps and the slamming of a door.
The teenaged boy continues his frantic running all the way out the building and into the fields. He loses track of time as he makes strangled cries out for help, leaping over and through trees and rocks, pushing past shrubbery and trees that just didn’t care for his problems.
It was only when he crossed the street into Los Angeles did he finally look back, where he saw something that struck him as speechless and paralyzed him to the core. A burning cross plastered against the dawn’s purple sky sitting atop a building. And there, on this burning cross, flittered away a lock of platinum blonde hair.
The only movement he could muster was to step back slowly. All his ears could hear were the footsteps that rung out like church bells. Before his waist hit the railing and he fell back, he saw the holy figure step out from the burning cross, his eyes locked on him.
And then it was all black. But the darkness was not eternal. For it wasn’t shock that affected him so… it was blinding rage. A rage so powerful and overwhelming that nothing could stop it.
Not even death.
~X~
Three Months Later…
10:00 AM – Los Angeles, California
You know… they say that most great adventures start out very simply. And that’s true. This one did start off somewhat simply. It was just a boy and a dream to be someone more important than he was. Now it’s a heartfelt story and all that, but, it’s best left to another time.
Right now, I think we could all do with some good old fashioned violence to start things off strong.
Lunging forward, Gabriel swung his arms around the mugger’s head and pulled back on his neck. He felt the sudden gasp of surprise coughing out of the man’s mouth, but on instinct, he threw his shoulders around, breaking out of Gabriel’s grip with relative ease, as he wasn’t able to lock it in.
He spun around and, hesitating to bring his gun up after seeing the odd outfit his opponent was wearing, Gabriel takes the opportunity to throw his fist around, bringing it down on his temple, stumbling forward.
The blow didn’t have much force behind it because of the newfound vigilante’s shaky stance, so he gave him a receipt by thrusting his foot forward, knocking Gabriel down to his knees.
“Fucking…!” The burglar leveled his gun with his head and pulled the trigger without hesitation.
However, Gabriel turned his body down in an instant, the bullet whizzing over him without doing any serious damage, but the following kick to his stomach did hit its mark. Using the pain as a catapult of sorts, Gabriel smashed into the burglar’s hand, who was thinking he thought for sure that he had aimed his shot well, and followed through on his punch, extending his elbow out to down the opponent, but before he could fall, Gabriel gripped the mugger’s coat and thrashed him about, slamming him into the nearby dumpster.
Clumsily, Gabriel swings the side of his elbow up, uppercutting his jaw, his chin shooting up into the air and dropping almost immediately.
The criminal slumped down onto the slimy ground. Gabriel threw down a few blows, but realized that his graceless brawl and awkward uppercut had finished the job, incapacitating the culprit in question. He took the time to catch his breath and leaned on the dumpster over him, turning to find the older man a bit in shock.
“Are you all right?” the man asked, hesitant to reach out and help the man, wondering if he was some rival gang member or something who wanted his money more than the other guy did.
“I uh… hoofh… been better,” Gabriel groaned and stood up, rolling his shoulders.
“Are you going to mug me too?” came the next question.
“No. No, I, uh, I’m one of the good guys. I think. Name’s Griffin. Are you okay?”
“Fine. Guy didn’t touch me. Are you sure you’re okay? I can’t really tell with the, uh, is that a hockey mask? Wait no... Are you wearing a lucha mask?”
“Yeah.”
“I’m guessing you’re wearing hockey pads too?”
“No. No, those don’t fit under the tights.”
The older man’s first smile of the night cracked, “I don’t want to ask how you know that. Jesus, well, thanks for the save. Want a drink? A beer? I own a 7/11, you could come around.”
“I don’t drink but uh, do you have like coke or something?”
“Is Pepsi okay?”
The older man lent his shoulder to lean on and he took it, using his other arm to clutch his stomach from the previous blow, “Fine. It’s fine. I’ll just have a tea.”
The two of them stumble their way down the street to a little 7/11 on the corner of a city street. Cars raced past it and it looked mostly barren apart from the owner who would usually be situated behind the counter.
Gabriel winced as he looked around for a drink, “Why were you even outside in the first place? Aren’t you the only one here? Shouldn't you be manning the station?”
“Yeah, but the toilet’s shot and I had no other place to go, so I’d either go to the bathroom in the Subway a couple stores down or just piss in an alley,” The older man said offhandedly.
“Fair enough,” Gabriel opened up a can of iced tea and started to down it, but when he did, the owner stopped him.
“You have to pay for that, you know,” He told him.
“What?”
“Yeah, pay for it.”
Gabriel looked about the store, “But… I just saved your life!”
The older man pointed straight at him, “And then you proceeded to steal and drink a product in my store without paying for it. Pay up, ese!”
Gabriel groaned, “I can’t. Tights. I don’t have room for a wallet in tights.”
Rolling his eyes, the older man replied, “Fine, but you better come back tomorrow. If you don’t, I’ll tweet on social media about how some guy named Griffin tried to molest my daughter.”
His mouth opening a bit and his eyes widening, he replied, “Wh-What? Why-Agh, whatever. Fine. Fucking fine, I’ll come back tomorrow and pay you.”
“Good,” The older man finished.
Taking a moment to drink his tea, Gabriel eyed his nametag to see his name ‘Senna Assad’. He shrugged a little bit; the man didn’t look Arabic at all. He looked older, with a paler pigmentation than most people of his race. But, then again, Gabriel didn’t look all too Mexican either.
“Hey…” He wiped the counter a bit, “How’d you get into… whatever it is you do, exactly.”
“What?” No one had ever asked him the question, “Uh… I’ve always liked superheroes.”
…
“That’s it? That’s your only reason? What kind of autistic origin story is that?” Senna hissed.
“Dude, I just saved you. What the fuck’s up with the attitude?”
Senna waved him off, “Whatever. I assume there’s more to the story. I intend to hear-oh, dammit, not again.”
Gabriel was about to ask what he was swearing about, but Senna pointed him outside of the shop. Peering over across the street at a nearby martial arts dojo, the sounds of kids doing drills echoing from within its walls, a shady looking guy, probably a little older than Gabriel himself, walks up to a bike rack.
“What’s wrong, exactly?”
Senna sighed, “He comes ‘round every once in a while and steals a kid’s bike. Probably sells it for drug money.”
“That’s a bit presumptuous, isn’t it? Could be selling it to pay off student loans,” Gabriel responded while scoping out the target.
Senna smirked, “Kid. It’s LA. He’s not stealing bikes to pay through college.”
And at that moment, the guy somehow whipped a bike away from the rack and pulled it around, throwing away a wrapper onto the floor and racing off with it down the sidewalk!
“Litterbug and Bike Stealer. Litterbike Man,” Gabriel murmured.
Gabriel pressed up against the glass to see where he’s taking off, “I’m going after him!”
“What? Kid, he’s on a bike. You’re not catching up to him. You can lose a few small battles here and there, it’s fine,” Senna let him know.
Gabriel looked down to the floor for a moment, taking a deep breath. He bursts through the door of the 7/11 and sprints off down the street.
“I WILL WIN!” He roared as he increased his speed as much as he possibly could.
Senna wanted to yell after him, but couldn’t be bothered and walked inside to attend to his managerial duties.
Gabriel, in the meantime, could see the now distant figure of Litterbike Man gliding down the sidewalk with his bike. For a few moments, he felt like it might actually be a lost cause to chase after him, but after seeing that he was drifting slightly to the left, he knew he could do it!
Making a hard left turn, he scrambled into an alley, ran across a street, through another alleyway, and came out right onto a sidewalk, seeing that Litterbike Man was riding straight toward him a mere twenty-twenty five feet away.
“What in the fuck!?” The Litterbike fiend yelled out, drifting around.
“Gotcha!” Gabriel exclaimed and launched off his feet toward him, only for Litterbike Man to escape his grasp and take off to a nearby subway station, “You’re not getting away!”
The Litterbike Man attempted to clear the crowd in front of the stairwell down toward it but only a couple people moved out of the way, allowing for Gabriel to cut him off, which actually did clear the crowd entirely.
“Hah!”
He held out his hands to stop Litterbike and then gestured for him to come closer. The man looked at the man in green and purple tights in front of him and the crowd around him who were pulling out their phones, taking videos of this mysterious masked man and his assailant.
Gabriel didn’t allow for another option, “Hand. It. Over.”
"Look, I'm sorry, man! I'm just trying to pay off my student loans and shit, I don't want any trouble!" He squealed.
Heheh.
Told ya.
And, slowly but surely, the Litterbike Man handed him the small bike he stole from the kids’ karate school, to which Gabriel smiled under his mask. He stood up straight and gestured with his head for him to leave, giving him another chance, and he took off before anyone else could stop him.
“What… who are you!?” One of the crowd members questioned.
The crowd started to close in on him with questions and exclamations from all sides, but The Griffin just pushed through them and headed back the way he came, moving fast enough to deter anyone from following him. And no one did. Cause… who the fuck would, he’s just some douche in a mask.
But that douche, in some weird way, is a hero. I guess.
~X~
“Would you like to get some ice cream on the way home, little guy?” His Dad asked him.
The little blonde kid in a kimono put up both of his hands, “Yeah!”
Carter just finished up his karate class and was given his yellow belt! He was prouder of this accomplishment than anything else he had done in his life.
And, walking outside, he found his bike on the rack, safe and sound. However, the lock had been broken… weird.
~X~
“Hello everyone. It’s your boy Griff.
Now, normally I’d have to introduce myself to all of you when it comes to these kinds of things and I still will, but in this case, I don’t need to. You all already know who I am. I’m part of The Pride, which has been making waves around here. I’m fighting for the Internet title within my first week of being here, regardless of whether I win or not, I was the one who was picked to go against him. Other legends and main eventers put their cards in the hat to face ZMAC but I was chosen. And yeah, I’m flattered for that. Really am.
Joey Flash, the man himself, has endorsed us. Andre Holmes, one of the tag team champions, has endorsed us. All because Adam Cooper needed saving. By the way, Eddie’s got him pinned as an alien. Sure of it.
And then, as expected, we got booked on Slam for our debut match, the opener. Because, they and everyone else already knows that when we show up, we’ll hype the crowd up and steal the show.
So yeah, I recently found out that my boys Ethan, Eddie, and I were booked on a match. Then I looked at the card and…
And uh…
I said, “Who?”
I mean seriously, who are any of these guys? Warbird? Bad News Benson? Psycho Dragon? Aren’t we supposed to be the unknowns heading into this match?
Look, I’ll be honest with all of you guys; I’m not the kind of guy who’s gonna stand up and throw every swear word and loose insult I can at my opponents. I mean, I could. I totally could. In fact, I’ll prove a point and do it. Seriously, don’t take this personally (or do lol) but, like, watch –
“PSYCHO DRAGON AND THE REST WANNA TALK SHIT?! OH YEAH!? WELL AT LEAST I DON’T SPEND MY TIME SUCKING DICKS IN THE BATHROOM AT OLIVE GARDEN. YOU DIRTY ROTTEN LOWDOWN SLIMY FILTHY DISGUSTING GLUTTONOUS HOGLIKE MOTHER FUCKING COCK SUCKING SON OF AN INCESTUOUS PEDOPHILE SHEMALE RAPIST PROSTITUTE. GET YOUR MOM’S DICK OUT OF YOUR MOUTH.
DO YOU KNOW WHAT I’M GONNA DO? I’M GONNA SHIT UP YOUR ASS.
STOP FOR A MOMENT AND REALLY GRASP THAT STATEMENT. I AM LITERALLY GOING TO SHIT UP YOUR ASS. I WILL TAKE MY PANTS OFF, RIP YOUR PANTS OFF, OUR SPHINCTERS WILL TOUCH AND I WILL SHIT. YOU WILL TRY TO COUNTERSHIT BUT MY SPHINCTER WILL OVERCOME, AND I WILL PUSH A LOG OF SHIT FROM MY ASS UP INTO YOUR BODY.
THIS IS WHAT SHALL OCCUR.
YOU KNOW WHAT ELSE?
I WILL PISS IN A POT. I WILL ADD CORNSTARCH TO THS PISS AND BOIL IT UNTIL IT GETS REALLY THICK.
LIKE SAUCE.
I WILL POUR THE THICKENED PISS INTO A PLASTIC CONTAINER AND PUT IT IN THE FRIDGE UNTIL IT HARDENS INTO FIRM JELLO. I WILL THEN CUT IT INTO RECTANGLES, BATTER IT IN A MIX OF MILK, FLOUR, AND EGGS, AND DEEP FRY IT AT 375 UNTIL GOLDEN BROWN, FLIPPING ONCE SINCE THEY FLOAT. AND I WILL SERVE ALL THREE OF YOU MY DEEP FRIED PISS.
THAT’S WHAT ALL OF YOU GET FOR BEING SUCH A BUNCH OF FAGGOTS.
BITCH.”
See, I’m not the kind of guy who’s gonna do that. That’d be really mean and stuff.
Mostly, I’m just gonna talk about you and why I think the Pride is gonna beat you. And, to be honest, the reason why I think the Pride’s going to win is because the three people we’re going up against are parodies of themselves.
All Psycho Dragon does is act intimidating by posting mysterious tweets about some dumb mysterious target. Why would we care? He hasn’t beaten anyone, who cares if he’s hunting people? Sure, he could be the Kraven of the WCF and run around killing dudes and people should be afraid of that. But, frankly, he’s not. He’s more like the not-as-cool Steve Irwin of the WCF.
~X~
“Oy, g’day mate, I’m Psycho Dragon and I see a Pride of fuccin’ lions over there… I’m gonna go touch them and see what happens!”
Three Hours Later…
“Hi, this is Fox News. This just in, Psycho Dragon ended up dying while filming an episode of ‘Pride Hunter’ after getting fucking murkt by all of the boys. More at 11. Back to some shit people actually care about.”
~X~
You know what I’m saying?
Honestly, if this is the best that Psycho Dragon has to offer, he should be sent home packing right after this match. That kind of stuff won’t cut it here and I’m not even trying to be mean here, you’re just not good enough to hang with the rest of us.
Now Bad News Benson! Here’s a guy who… who can’t really hang either.
Kind of irrelevant to be honest.
Like, I don’t have much to say about him.
He doesn’t seem to care so I don’t really care about him either. Meh.
I mean, I’ll admit it’s people like him that makes it difficult to do what I do. The apathetic ones. When you’re as apathetic as Bad News Benson, you never want to help anyone or contribute to society in any way. Who’s gonna remember Benson in four years? He’ll most likely end up as a WCF Network Trivia question at the end of the day.
~X~
“Who did the Pride murder in their debut match?”
A. Bad News Benson.
B. Adam Cooper.
C. All of the Above.
“The correct answer is A. The Pride destroyed the career of Dag Riddik before their debut match even happened, not his alien-induced second personality named Adam!”
~X~
But yeah, pretty much all I have to say about him.
Oh, right, uh, Warbird. Warbird!
So Warbird is one of those guys a lot of us in the wrestling business has encountered before. A rebel without a cause who’s looking out for himself and only himself. But see, the difference about him is that he’s reckless! He doesn’t care about his own well being! He’ll go out and commit some
Hm. Yeah, I guess nothing really is unique about him. Huh.
But, I’ll be honest, out of all the guys who we’re facing this week, I’m mostly worried about him. I mean, look at him! He’s driven as hell! That’s the kind of quality a top star of a wrestling company needs. Someone who’ll throw all of his being into his work! He’ll show up early and leave late, he’ll-
…Wait, what’s that Ethan? He hasn’t been seen anywhere near the WCF premises since the match was announced?
…Oh.
…Well.
There goes his one defining trait.
This is actually kind of sad, really. I was hoping for something more during our debut match. Something to really, really get the crowd going! I really could use something like that now. A fight! A real fight!
But at the end of the day, I don’t care who you are. I don’t care what you’ve done. In the last several months I’ve had to stare down fear itself. I’ve had friends been hurt in front of me. I’ve had family members cry over my body. I’ve put my blood, sweat, and tears into this. I’ve been bullied, I’ve been hurt, I’ve been beaten down, and bloodied.
But if I’m still kicking… I can still win.
So WCF, you just pull up behind me and take cover. I’m The Griffin and this is as far as evil will get.
You all don’t know what the fuck you’re messing with.
Excelsior, bitches.”
