Post by Eddie "Shiro" Felt on Apr 10, 2016 15:36:40 GMT -5
Black clouds rolled across the sky, blotting out the sun.
The Earth below found itself smothered by shadows; oblong, eldritch shapes in the sky. Writhing. Colliding with each other. The shadows danced on the dirt and swallowed civilization whole in their bloody maws. Darkness descended upon the light, snuffing it out without a shred of remorse.
The shadows gave birth to beasts and monsters, inhuman creations cloaked in ill-fitting people suits.
Eddie Felt stumbled out of a bar, running a trembling hand along his disheveled face before shoving both of his hands into his pocket. He smacked his tongue against the roof of his mouth a couple of times and swallowed a mouthful of spit to suppress the bile rising in the back of his throat. The sound of footsteps trailed behind him; slow, albeit purposeful.
He never gave much credence to the idea of the Man in Black. The government's greatest tool for dealing with truthers like himself. Not for any ethical reasons, he had no doubts that the government would do it, given the chance. His doubts were of the logistical nature; if the government was to invest in a secret group of spooks trained to track down and take care of those pesky conspiracy theorists, they'd certainly be trained well enough so that everyone and their mothers wasn't aware of their existence. They wouldn't be nearly as conspicuous as they'd have to be for the idea to be planted in so many heads.
Yet, despite his own misgivings toward the idea, the first thoughts that crossed his mind when he heard those footsteps were ones of fear. Fear that he was wrong. That the person behind him would definitively prove once and for all that the mythical Men in Black really were a thing with a single bullet to the back of his head. That he'd die face down on a sidewalk in Chicago, thousands of miles away from his family, his friends, anyone who cared about him in the slightest. That he'd "go missing". They'd know, but they wouldn't know. They'd hope he'd turn up eventually, but that would never happen. His body would be disposed of and the very same government that killed him would forget he ever existed. His legacy would be a set of confidential, blacked out documents locked in a filing cabinet in some classified military base.
He looked over his shoulder at his pursuer to find a thin man dressed in black. Shadows covered his face, but Eddie was certain he'd seen him before. The man slipped his hand into his jacket, and Eddie ran.
Though he struggled to maintain his balance, Eddie forced himself to keep moving at full speed down the sidewalk. His pursuer shouted something at him before taking off as well, chasing him through the concrete jungle of Chicago, Illinois.
His knees buckled with each step, before finally giving out as he attempted to round a corner. He dropped to the ground, skidding across the concrete.
Eddie stared up at the sky, eyes fixed on the sprawling morass of twisted clouds. The sound of footsteps drew closer, slowing from a sprint to a jog. He tried to push himself off the ground, to will himself forward, even if it was futile. He always dreamed he'd go out fighting. Yet, as the footsteps approached, his body didn't react. He couldn't get up. He couldn't crawl away. He couldn't do anything, but watch the sky, to concentrate on the black clouds in hopes of finding silver linings that simply weren't there.
The man in black towered over him, panting. Eddie tensed up, waiting for him to make his move.
The man sighed, and offered Eddie his hand.
"What the fuck did you do that for?"
Puzzled, Eddie forced himself to grab the man's hand, allowing the man to pull him back to his feet. He dusted himself off and shot a questioning glance at the man.
"You're Eddie Felt, right?"
Eddie swallowed hard and nodded.
"Yeah, that's what I thought. I got a friend who wants to see ya, come with me."
"You gotta be kidding me, right dude? That's your pitch?"
Eddie spat at the ground.
"Our mutual friend wants to meet face-to-face."
Eddie's eyes went wide. "You mean?"
The man nodded.
Y'know there comes a time in every man's life when they're faced with a choice: either put up, or shut up. When they gotta prove to everyone, themselves included, that they're really about every word they say. Explosion was that time for Ethan and I. Think about it; it was us up against #BeachKrew, the very same team we attacked the night of our debut. The most dominant stable in recent memory; possibly of all time. The very same stable we've been constantly accused of emulated, of aping, of ripping off like we're trying to latch onto them for even the slightest bit of relevance that we wouldn't have otherwise. See, Explosion was our chance to prove our doubters wrong. To live up to the hype we've been building for ourselves since before our debut.
This was our moment, and we blew it.
Yeah, we blew it. I'm not too proud to admit it. Sure, we lost by countout, something that anyone with a functioning brain can recognize is not a decisive victory for #BeachKrew by any means but at the end of the day, The Pride (or the Pack whichever both are cool) walked out of Explosion with our heads down, trying to avoid the prying, disappointed eyes of any of the fans who were firmly on our side going into that match. No matter how it happened, the record books will show that we lost in our big Pay-Per-View debut. We lost our first match with #BeachKrew.
I remember heading into Explosion, I made a big deal about how out of all the stables in the WCF, it was The Pride that fired the first shot in the Stable Wars. It was us who made our presence known. Us who put the whole WCF on notice because we did what no one else would dare to do… yeah, you know all this. I said this all before.
And then we lost. We lost the first battle. But, fret not! See, we already have a chance to redeem ourselves against the very same combination of #BeachKrew members that we lost to. This is big. This is huge. See, I know it's easy for everyone to just write us off now that we went and lost to #BeachKrew. It's easy to buy into the #BK propaganda that we're nothing but wannabes. #FaceKrew. #ReachKrew. That we've never been anything but a gimmicky duo (nee trio) trying desperately to get famous by any means, even if it meant emulating the same group we've decided to arbitrarily villainize.
That's the easy narrative to accept.
But fuck that.
The Pride has never been about making taking it easy. Think about it, we stepped to #BeachKrew day one. Our first Pay-Per-View saw us facing off with #BeachKrew. And we're going to keep on fighting every single day. The #BeachKrew may have won the first battle, but the war isn't over. See, pessimists would call it quits right there. They'd lay down and die for #BK to feed their insatiable egos.
The Confederacy won both battles of Bull Run.
The Nazis took Belgium. They took France. They took the Netherlands.
You know what happened to them?
They lost the war.
Hey Andre. Hey Dustin. Didn't expect to be seeing us again so soon, huh? How does it feel, knowing that despite your claims of superiority, despite your repeated claims that Ethan and I aren't real competition for you, despite it all; you still couldn't get the job done? You still couldn't secure that decisive victory and had to go for the count-out win? Yeah sure, the record books will show that you guys won, but I know you don't feel like winners. How could you? You guys thrive on fulfilling your egos and just winning on a technicality doesn't do wonders for your starving egos. You want to gorge yourselves on the souls of fallen rookies, but you just couldn't.
But hey, I'm happy for you. I am. Again, you guys got the win.
Andre still couldn't secure a pinfall. He's still staring at miles of endless ocean. The water's up to his neck. He needs something to pull him out, because he's stuck. Sandwiched between all these fucking all-stars. All these champions. All these contenders. He's one barely noticeable blip on the WCF's radar despite being tied to the biggest stable in the federation. He's a weak voice screaming into the void, dying to be heard. Pleading to be remembered. Desperate to be validated. All he wants is the respect he feels he deserves, but he hasn't done anything to deserve respect.
Isn't that right, Andre? Isn't that what this is all about? You want that success; the taste of gold; the respect that comes with it. You feel like you're already a champion. The uncrowned king. But, every time he tries to prove to everyone, to himself, that he's everything he claims he is and then some; he alternates between crashing, burning, and being completely and utterly underwhelming. What's wrong, Andre, performance anxiety? Scared that your best isn't good enough because it hasn't been.
Keep on keeping on, Andre. Sooner or later, you'll do something to impress anyone. You'll secure a real victory and won't have to hold on, clinging desperately to those anecdotal, circumstantial success stories; you can flaunt your #BK beatdowns all you want, we both know that's not what you're really after. So tell me, Andre; when you get to your tag team title match, will you finally nut up and take charge, or will you hide behind Dustin to make the pin for you?
Hey, Dustin. Do you feel whole now that you're one half of the number one contenders to the tag titles? Is that the validation you've been looking for since you lost the TV title? I hope it is. See, I don't want to see either of you suffer, to languish, to flounder, desperately trying to prove to everyone around you that you're worth it.
Does it feel good?
See, Ethan and I are content to watch you guys fatten yourselves up on the hype you're stuffing your faces with. Because we're hungry.
Beavleave that.
OOC: Apologies; procrastination and illness got the better of me these last two weeks.
The Earth below found itself smothered by shadows; oblong, eldritch shapes in the sky. Writhing. Colliding with each other. The shadows danced on the dirt and swallowed civilization whole in their bloody maws. Darkness descended upon the light, snuffing it out without a shred of remorse.
The shadows gave birth to beasts and monsters, inhuman creations cloaked in ill-fitting people suits.
Eddie Felt stumbled out of a bar, running a trembling hand along his disheveled face before shoving both of his hands into his pocket. He smacked his tongue against the roof of his mouth a couple of times and swallowed a mouthful of spit to suppress the bile rising in the back of his throat. The sound of footsteps trailed behind him; slow, albeit purposeful.
He never gave much credence to the idea of the Man in Black. The government's greatest tool for dealing with truthers like himself. Not for any ethical reasons, he had no doubts that the government would do it, given the chance. His doubts were of the logistical nature; if the government was to invest in a secret group of spooks trained to track down and take care of those pesky conspiracy theorists, they'd certainly be trained well enough so that everyone and their mothers wasn't aware of their existence. They wouldn't be nearly as conspicuous as they'd have to be for the idea to be planted in so many heads.
Yet, despite his own misgivings toward the idea, the first thoughts that crossed his mind when he heard those footsteps were ones of fear. Fear that he was wrong. That the person behind him would definitively prove once and for all that the mythical Men in Black really were a thing with a single bullet to the back of his head. That he'd die face down on a sidewalk in Chicago, thousands of miles away from his family, his friends, anyone who cared about him in the slightest. That he'd "go missing". They'd know, but they wouldn't know. They'd hope he'd turn up eventually, but that would never happen. His body would be disposed of and the very same government that killed him would forget he ever existed. His legacy would be a set of confidential, blacked out documents locked in a filing cabinet in some classified military base.
He looked over his shoulder at his pursuer to find a thin man dressed in black. Shadows covered his face, but Eddie was certain he'd seen him before. The man slipped his hand into his jacket, and Eddie ran.
Though he struggled to maintain his balance, Eddie forced himself to keep moving at full speed down the sidewalk. His pursuer shouted something at him before taking off as well, chasing him through the concrete jungle of Chicago, Illinois.
His knees buckled with each step, before finally giving out as he attempted to round a corner. He dropped to the ground, skidding across the concrete.
Eddie stared up at the sky, eyes fixed on the sprawling morass of twisted clouds. The sound of footsteps drew closer, slowing from a sprint to a jog. He tried to push himself off the ground, to will himself forward, even if it was futile. He always dreamed he'd go out fighting. Yet, as the footsteps approached, his body didn't react. He couldn't get up. He couldn't crawl away. He couldn't do anything, but watch the sky, to concentrate on the black clouds in hopes of finding silver linings that simply weren't there.
The man in black towered over him, panting. Eddie tensed up, waiting for him to make his move.
The man sighed, and offered Eddie his hand.
"What the fuck did you do that for?"
Puzzled, Eddie forced himself to grab the man's hand, allowing the man to pull him back to his feet. He dusted himself off and shot a questioning glance at the man.
"You're Eddie Felt, right?"
Eddie swallowed hard and nodded.
"Yeah, that's what I thought. I got a friend who wants to see ya, come with me."
"You gotta be kidding me, right dude? That's your pitch?"
Eddie spat at the ground.
"Our mutual friend wants to meet face-to-face."
Eddie's eyes went wide. "You mean?"
The man nodded.
-------
Y'know there comes a time in every man's life when they're faced with a choice: either put up, or shut up. When they gotta prove to everyone, themselves included, that they're really about every word they say. Explosion was that time for Ethan and I. Think about it; it was us up against #BeachKrew, the very same team we attacked the night of our debut. The most dominant stable in recent memory; possibly of all time. The very same stable we've been constantly accused of emulated, of aping, of ripping off like we're trying to latch onto them for even the slightest bit of relevance that we wouldn't have otherwise. See, Explosion was our chance to prove our doubters wrong. To live up to the hype we've been building for ourselves since before our debut.
This was our moment, and we blew it.
Yeah, we blew it. I'm not too proud to admit it. Sure, we lost by countout, something that anyone with a functioning brain can recognize is not a decisive victory for #BeachKrew by any means but at the end of the day, The Pride (or the Pack whichever both are cool) walked out of Explosion with our heads down, trying to avoid the prying, disappointed eyes of any of the fans who were firmly on our side going into that match. No matter how it happened, the record books will show that we lost in our big Pay-Per-View debut. We lost our first match with #BeachKrew.
I remember heading into Explosion, I made a big deal about how out of all the stables in the WCF, it was The Pride that fired the first shot in the Stable Wars. It was us who made our presence known. Us who put the whole WCF on notice because we did what no one else would dare to do… yeah, you know all this. I said this all before.
And then we lost. We lost the first battle. But, fret not! See, we already have a chance to redeem ourselves against the very same combination of #BeachKrew members that we lost to. This is big. This is huge. See, I know it's easy for everyone to just write us off now that we went and lost to #BeachKrew. It's easy to buy into the #BK propaganda that we're nothing but wannabes. #FaceKrew. #ReachKrew. That we've never been anything but a gimmicky duo (nee trio) trying desperately to get famous by any means, even if it meant emulating the same group we've decided to arbitrarily villainize.
That's the easy narrative to accept.
But fuck that.
The Pride has never been about making taking it easy. Think about it, we stepped to #BeachKrew day one. Our first Pay-Per-View saw us facing off with #BeachKrew. And we're going to keep on fighting every single day. The #BeachKrew may have won the first battle, but the war isn't over. See, pessimists would call it quits right there. They'd lay down and die for #BK to feed their insatiable egos.
The Confederacy won both battles of Bull Run.
The Nazis took Belgium. They took France. They took the Netherlands.
You know what happened to them?
They lost the war.
Hey Andre. Hey Dustin. Didn't expect to be seeing us again so soon, huh? How does it feel, knowing that despite your claims of superiority, despite your repeated claims that Ethan and I aren't real competition for you, despite it all; you still couldn't get the job done? You still couldn't secure that decisive victory and had to go for the count-out win? Yeah sure, the record books will show that you guys won, but I know you don't feel like winners. How could you? You guys thrive on fulfilling your egos and just winning on a technicality doesn't do wonders for your starving egos. You want to gorge yourselves on the souls of fallen rookies, but you just couldn't.
But hey, I'm happy for you. I am. Again, you guys got the win.
Andre still couldn't secure a pinfall. He's still staring at miles of endless ocean. The water's up to his neck. He needs something to pull him out, because he's stuck. Sandwiched between all these fucking all-stars. All these champions. All these contenders. He's one barely noticeable blip on the WCF's radar despite being tied to the biggest stable in the federation. He's a weak voice screaming into the void, dying to be heard. Pleading to be remembered. Desperate to be validated. All he wants is the respect he feels he deserves, but he hasn't done anything to deserve respect.
Isn't that right, Andre? Isn't that what this is all about? You want that success; the taste of gold; the respect that comes with it. You feel like you're already a champion. The uncrowned king. But, every time he tries to prove to everyone, to himself, that he's everything he claims he is and then some; he alternates between crashing, burning, and being completely and utterly underwhelming. What's wrong, Andre, performance anxiety? Scared that your best isn't good enough because it hasn't been.
Keep on keeping on, Andre. Sooner or later, you'll do something to impress anyone. You'll secure a real victory and won't have to hold on, clinging desperately to those anecdotal, circumstantial success stories; you can flaunt your #BK beatdowns all you want, we both know that's not what you're really after. So tell me, Andre; when you get to your tag team title match, will you finally nut up and take charge, or will you hide behind Dustin to make the pin for you?
Hey, Dustin. Do you feel whole now that you're one half of the number one contenders to the tag titles? Is that the validation you've been looking for since you lost the TV title? I hope it is. See, I don't want to see either of you suffer, to languish, to flounder, desperately trying to prove to everyone around you that you're worth it.
Does it feel good?
See, Ethan and I are content to watch you guys fatten yourselves up on the hype you're stuffing your faces with. Because we're hungry.
Beavleave that.
OOC: Apologies; procrastination and illness got the better of me these last two weeks.
