Post by Kyle on Jan 13, 2017 8:24:45 GMT -5
He didn’t see him watching. He rarely did.
Sebastian Knight walked arm-in-arm with a young brunette, her curly hair falling out from beneath her lilac-dyed wool cap. She was laughing, her mirth escaping in a cloud in front of her face that left her cheeks flushed. She was, in lack of a better word, mesmerized by the man that walked beside her. The way he looked into his face, his eyes. The way she drew closer against him whenever the wind pushed through the crowd they walked among.
Poor girl.
It wasn’t that Sebastian didn’t put on the proper show for her. He grinned and laughed when it was expected of him. He held her close to him when they stopped at the crosswalk, waiting for it to turn. He even brushed aside hair that had been hanging across her face with a gentleness that was strange to see from a man like himself. All surface level, though. An act, a lure designed to bring girls just like herself through the threshold, let them in long enough to get what he wanted. Pleasure-seeking, Sebastian Knight was, seeking to fill the void present in his life. And he was good the way he made women look at him. Many men would envy him for this, but then some wouldn’t. There was more fun to be had with women than just sex, if one had the imagination. Sebastian had the capacity to make this same leap, if he only opened his eyes.
This particular man hoped to help him do just that one of these days.
Nathan von Liebert did not look away from the couple until they disappeared through the doors of his apartment complex. One of these days, when he was ready.
“Sebastian has certainly proven his worth in the short time that he had been there,” Atticus Sinclair said beside his leader. Despite the sub-freezing temperatures here in Manhattan, the priest wore only a black robe with his hands tucked away beneath his sleeves. His bald head was bare to the elements, but he didn’t seem to notice. “I’d say even better than you, Legion.”
Behind the two men, the bearded warrior grunted as he guarded over the two men. He wore a leather suit similar to that of NvL. He wore a duster instead of a trench coat to shield against the snow, but he too didn’t seem to notice. Arms crossed, he watched the shuffling crowd around them in silence. Not that the New Yorkers even feigned interest in the strange figures; it was easier to just duck the head away from the weather and the people around you.
“It may not be a bad idea to bring him in,” Atticus continued, watching another resident step through the doors to the complex. “Brief him on his role in all of this. Just think of the destruction he could wrought if he was but aware.”
Nathan closed his eyes and rolled his neck, thinking, plotting. “No,” he said, and it was so.
Atticus looked, for a moment, like he was going to argue his point before he finally relented. “As you say, sir.”
“Leave him, for now,” Nathan continued as he opened his eyes and looked at his bald companion. “He has his own war that’s he fighting, and that works in our favor. No need to divert his attention just yet, not when it serves our own purposes so nicely as is.”
The trio stand there in silence for a moment before Atticus nods again. He pulled one arm free of his sleeve to reveal a slip of paper. “And this?” Atticus asked, handing the document over to his leader. “Will you answer his call?”
Nathan took the sheet in his hand, his left hand, to look over the paper. Most of what was written could not be seen, save for a single word blazoned across the top left corner of the sheet. XIII.
Nathan grins. “They never learn, do they?” Nathan balls the paper up in his hand and tossed it over his shoulder into Legion’s awaiting hand. He was a monster, sure, but heaven forbid he litter. “Tell him I’ll be there. There’s someone in particular I’d like to meet, anyway.”
Nathan looks at Atticus.
“And call the doctor,” he continued, turning away to continue down the street. “Its time I finally followed through with that promise he made me.”
Atticus nods again as he and Legion fall into step behind their leader.
And Darkness.
The audio feeds follows
“The world loves to make their comparisons. It was too much to have seven billion men, women, and children who were wholly individual. No, nature wouldn’t allow it. The need, the desire, to be a part of something larger seized mankind and divisions were drawn. Class. Race. Religion. Belief. Forget unity. Forget commonality. Give us separation, power. And let us decide who rules who.
Would you believe me, Kevin Bishop, if I told you that we both reside in a world like that? Or has your place as head of one such group clouded your understanding to the point that you’re unwilling to open your eyes and accept the inequality you represent? The very name reeks of isolation, of a desire to alienate oneself from one’s place in society. The Brotherhood. Thing is, Kevin, is everyone can’t be that, a brother. That’s not a role fit for every single human being in the world. Nor does everyone have someone they can call that, a brother. I would know.
I killed mine.
Or, at least, I put him into a position in which he had no other place befit for him. After that, it was his own choice to become, or to exist no longer. I didn’t care; I had already moved on. I had already opened my eyes to the realities of the world, which bonds and boundaries were but lines to cross, connections to break. And I was compared, Kevin. I was not the only boy to snap and harm his closest relatives. I was not the only child who had ever heard voices in his head. A number, a statistic.
A dream.
That’s why I’m here, Kevin; somebody had a dream that involved the two of us, standing across from one another in that ring. Two men who have inspired men to follow, to relinquish their absolute control over their own individuality for a place by their sides, gears in the proverbial machine that was their vision. You’re the face of today, Kevin. Newcomer of the year, leader of the stable that stands against corruption and arrogance. And me? Well, I’m just that notch in the door frame to mark the past.
Have you reached my height yet, Kevin?
Some would say you have, others would not. This match is an opportunity to leave speculation aside, answer the big question in the one place where it really mattered. And somebody in the back must be shaking with excitement in the back. NvL, stepping into the ring for the first time since Fifteen. Former World Champ with one more match in him against the Newcomer of the Year. Somebody think they’ve given Kevin Bishop the opportunity of a lifetime with this fight. A chance to take a step forward, further than his career had ever taken him to this point.
No one seems to think that this isn’t going to be as neat and pretty as originally thought.
I’m not coming back to roll over and lay down for you, Kevin. I’m not some name that has been groomed and cultivated for years for, what, to put new talent over? Do I look like fucking Gravedigger to you? No, no I’m not so fed-up with my reputation to piss it down the drain for a few final moments in my waning time as a respectable competitor. If that had been the case, I just would’ve said no, and left the common drab wondering what could’ve been. No, the fans will be getting the fight that they want so desperately, that I’ll guarantee.
But the comparison stops there, though. People see a match between two men who are of similar backgrounds, and they stop there. Its just a match, they say, just one high profile engagement of many on the night of XIII. What they fail to realize is that this is a conflict of far larger implications than is so apparent at face value. Believe me, I don’t give two shits about Kevin Bishop. I’ve come to stand against the idea, the concept that he represents. Brotherhood.
That’s what I’ve come for, what I break beneath my boot.
Because he is the man that supersedes all others. Forget the efforts of those beneath him. A man commits a terrorist act and he is treated as little more than a parasite, a disease that is separated from the body before it is allowed to spread. An anomaly, he’s declared, not an anatomical extension of the ideals he so represents. No, one man sets the tunes and then everyone dances along. Stop one from dancing, and another will simply pick up the beat. You have to silence the music first.
Only then will people stop and see just how silly they just looked.
That’s Kevin Bishop.”
An abrupt end to the audio and a fade out.
“. . . we’ve just received report that Wes Stevens, alleged bomber and estranged member of the controversial coalition known as The Brotherhood, has been relocated from his holding cell to an undisclosed location outside the city of Detroit. Kevin Bishop, self-proclaimed leader of this organization, could not as of yet be reached for comment on what many have declared as an act of domestic terrorism . . .”
The news report was background noise to the real work at hand. Nathan von Liebert barely looked up from the file in his hand, eyes scanning the contents with a voraciousness that he hadn’t felt in a while. So long he had been scheming, planning the next move in his war on existence. Everything was calculated to the point where deviations were rarely possible. But this, this was an exception, and a beautiful one at that. The people, they asked for this. Come, conquer, and then we’ll shake your hand afterwards and tell you ‘Good job.’ He could appreciate this, this breath of fresh air.
Karma Bishop.
A picture had been provided with the dossier, eight by eight. Nathan ran the fingers of his left hand across the glossy front, outlining the shape of the figure as he sat, transfixed in thought. Beautiful, really, the woman. She had that presence that belonged where the curious, the interested, could see her. The ring. The stage. The magazines. The hospital. The morgue. The Obituaries.
Oh, the chalk lines she would form.
Nathan grinned a feral grin; he did love to fantasize. And this woman, she would fulfill him, and the message he meant to see as well. He hadn’t felt the embrace of another like her since Miss Cicero who so brazenly plagued Legion last year. So long. Too long. But, alas, she did not fit into the confines of the plans he had. Unfortunate, really, but not unexpected.
But, oh, she was perfect.
“Atticus,” Nathan said aloud, never taking his eyes away from the picture. “Is Legion fit to attend me this Friday night?”
“Most certainly,” the smooth voice of Atticus Sinclair replied from across the room, unseen. “What is that you have in mind?”
“A message, of course,” Nathan said, setting the picture aside. “One that I think will be heard more clearly than anything I’ll say before then.”
A low chuckle can be heard. “I have no doubt, sir.”
Nathan sits back and opens his ears to the world around him; the news had moved on to the weather report. “Ready the plane, Atticus. I have one more place in mind before Minnesota.”
Rising to his feet, Nathan steps away from the table he had been sitting at; the camera zooms in on the photo of Karma Bishop one last time before the scene fades.
“A figurehead.”
The Main Sanctuary of the Dark Brotherhood’s church in Portland, Oregon had been ransacked and vandalized. Pews had been overturned and their cushions cut open, their soft contents spilling out over the dust-covered carpets. Only half of a podium remained at the front, and the shattered remains of what had been a marble fountain.
Nathan von Liebert stood amongst it all, eyes looking upward on the back wall. Depicted was a mural of the God Oblivion, his visage shrouded in mask and shadow. He wore a robe similar to that of Atticus Sinclair, but more decorated, more ornate. It was an idealized representation, with the man ten feet tall and seated on a black throne. Little else of his figure could be made out, save for his right hand perched on the handle of the throne. It was blood red.
“In two-thousand twelve, a man was personified as a God right here in the World Championship Federation. Oblivion had been many things. A brute. A warrior. A monster. But we made him something more because we believed he was something more. That’s the mistake people make; they expect this glorious, heavenly divined sign for what we did, but it wasn’t necessary. All it took was the will to believe where others didn’t, and have the strength to back your beliefs when they were questioned.
And I had the strength, Kevin, to declare this man as God. I declared myself his Right Hand, as Pestilence embodied, and the Dark Saints proved themselves to be a viable threat to Pantheon, who were only just in their infancy. Did you know that, Kevin, that even before David Sanchez, there had been another plague here in the WCF. Another scourge on the sanctity that was Sunday Night Slam? I doubt it. You’re so stuck on the now that you fail to realize this opportunity you’ve been given would not have been possible without the efforts of men, greater men, who came before you.”
Nathan turns away from the mural, looking to his left at Atticus, Legion, and a half dozen nondescript men with shorned skulls.
“Tear it down. For good this time.”
Nathan steps further towards the center of the Sanctuary, leaving the mural behind him. Viewers get one final look at the fiery eyes staring out at them, and the red hand, before it disappears off-camera.
“That was the thing that was soon made apparent then, too. You see, Kevin, Oblivion may have been the self-proclaimed God, but the people knew who the real threat in the Dark Saints was. Obi would sputter and stomp his feet and shake the ring thinking it was mountains, but he was no real threat at the end of the day. Belief does a lot of things, but breaking the bond of physical mortality is not one of them. When push came to shove, Obi proved himself incapable of living up to the position we had carved out in the world for him. But me?
I relished in the opposition.
And I thrived in it, too. The Dark Saints folded, but Nathan von Liebert did not. I fought on and he fought harder to remind people just who I was, in case they forget during my hour of supposed servitude. Ask Frankie, Kevin, to see the scars on his wrist. Ask him about Johnny Nova. He doubted me, doubted what I could do.
Note the past tense, Kevin; that’s the key there.
And now, come Friday night, I’ve been given the opportunity to square my past up against the face of the future. Kevin Fucking Bishop. I think this is the part where I’m supposed to express my thankfulness at this opportunity to compete against you. Talk about the fight we’re going to have and how it means a lot to a veteran like myself.
How about no?”
Nathan runs his left hand across the wooden back of a pew still standing upright.
“Because that would require, Kevin, that I actually believe what I would say at this point. I’m many things, Bishop, but I am not much of a liar. Its hard,” Nathan waves his hand in front of his face. “To keep a straight face when I reflect on the massive joke that my opponents usually are. But trust me, Kevin, I’m trying to be serious with you, I really am.”
Nathan grins.
“But, can you really blame me?
Because when I look at you, Kevin, I see a man longing for recognition, for acceptance, even it means drawing on one’s accomplishments from beyond the realm in which you currently stand. Some people may have looked at you last week, with your World Title sitting in your lap, and been impressed. Had this been your first week here with the WCF, I may have been too; I’m not one to knock another person’s achievements they made before coming here. But to sit there, after you have stood in this company’s ring for months, and showed me a piece of metal you acquired somewhere else?
Its pitiful.
I’m supposed to validate you, is that it? Little old Kevin Bishop couldn’t cut it as anything more than the People’s Champion here in the WCF, so he started selling himself on the side, on the street corner of Chicago. He couldn’t make himself anything more than a middle of the pack name in this ring, so he went where the bigger names don’t reside for a stand to stand on top for once. Alex Richards? You’ll see how he compares against someone who calls this place home at XIII. Andre Holmes? He should’ve stayed there, where at least he was in a similar boat as yourself, Kevin. Celeste Mallory?
Fuck her.”
Nathan shakes his head, running his hand through his unkempt, black hair.
“I’ll give you this, Kevin: you know how to make a man say things he didn’t want to. No one cares to hear me talk about competitors from another company who can’t make it here, in the WCF. But here I stand, addressing this very subject. Sure, it shows that I’ve been paying attention to my opponent, that I’m aware of his comings and goings. Its even kind, really, to address it in the first place.
No one would bother to pay attention otherwise.
But like I said before, I have come to XIII to address an issue far larger than the insignificant successes of a cult leader living in Farmville, USA.”
NvL grins a feral grin.
“Burns, doesn’t it, to have your entire vision, all of your ideals, summed up with such a word. Forget hope, here’s a label with some awful connotations. Oh, I know its awful to hear, to know that such assumptions have been made and are continued to be made every single day. Sure, I saw your heartfelt monologue on how The Brotherhood is more complex and more meaningful in today’s society than the label ‘cult’ allows for. Believe me, I was moved. Moved, even, to tune into Slam this past week to watch you successfully defend your brothers and your identity against the might of #BeachKrew.
Nope.
No, I watched what appears to be a continued trend of The Brotherhood uniting against the opposition, up until said opposition, you know, opposes. What a mighty leader you are, Kevin, to so graciously take the fall for your brother, FPV. Messianic even. Seriously, talk to him about those scars of his.
He’ll tell you that being crucified isn’t all that’s it made out to be.”
NvL chuckles.
“There’s are few things I dislike more than a leader incapable of being stronger than the men he leads. Despise it. Because it is my belief that men were created to be individuals in this world, untethered by the constraints of kinship or social norms. We’re just all too different. But man proved themselves early in human history incapable of accepting this simple truth and have bound themselves to belief systems unfit for our expected existence. Leaders arose, and groups were formed. I, in a rare exception of absolute necessity, have served in groups of my own, and formed one of my own. Not because it was what I wanted, but what was expected until what was wrong can be righted.
And in my time, I have served under men and women who were not fit to maintain this illusion of necessary rule. Oblivion in the Dark Saints. Sarah Twilight and Eric Price in Bravado. I am not proud to admit that there have been times when my judgment has been clouded by the ways of the world. But I promise you this: I step into XIII with the utmost clarity as to who I am, and who you are, Kevin Bishop. And believe me, truly believe me, when I say this.
Kevin Bishop can fuck off.
I don’t care about him at all.
It’s the platform on which he stands upon that I’m after, the concept of righteous and deserving rule over a people meant to live by their own devices, or die in the process. You prolong the existence, Kevin, of men and women undeserving of it. And that I will can not allow. So I will use this opportunity that I have been afforded to send a message, while I have the chance, before I step back into the shadows. I will step into that ring and usurp the rule you have over your place in this company. I doubt The Brotherhood will fold after XIII.
Cockroaches die hard.
But I will leave the man on the top questioning his place before its all said and done. His place in this company, as the People’s Champion, and as a man himself. And I’ll do it without a second thought, not because I think myself any better than the next man, but because its simply the way of the world. I am but a tool in which will is inflicted.”
A final pause as Nathan looks deep into the camera.
“I revived the Dark Saints in twenty-fifteen just to show Oblivion, and the world, that I could do it without him being involved. People didn’t even give it a second thought at the time. They didn’t think about it because to them it wasn’t much of a shock. NvL, one-upping a God? What else was new?
Ponder that, then, Kevin Bishop, before you step into the ring with me at XIII. Ponder your mortality and how I wield it so easily in my hand. Ponder your position before you watch it crumble away. I’ll see you soon.”
Darkness
“This may sting a bit,” a familiar voice said.
Agony. Sweet, sweet agony. Pain shot through his body, sinking into every crevice. He was fire and lightning and the heavens and creation all in one. He stared into the abyss, and the abyss stared back. Did he blink? Or was that life itself, folding before his stare?
Nothing.
Nathan exhaled and laid his head back against the metal table he laid on. His body was nude from the waist up, revealing a patchwork of white scars across his torso and arms. Sweat covered his body, running off the sides onto the platform. “Is it done?” NvL asked, breathing heavily.
“Try it out for yourself,” Doctor Remus Micayle replied, looking at Nathan from his seat at the head of the table. “Just flex it.”
Nathan held his hand up. His right hand. It was obvious it was some sort of metal material, flexible and firm. It didn’t just sit on the stump; it had been fused with it. He felt its differentness, but at the same time, it felt apart of him. A pulse ever looming in the back of his head.
He willed it.
The hand curled into a fist.
Nathan grinned, despite himself. He was whole once more.
May God save them all.
Fin
Sebastian Knight walked arm-in-arm with a young brunette, her curly hair falling out from beneath her lilac-dyed wool cap. She was laughing, her mirth escaping in a cloud in front of her face that left her cheeks flushed. She was, in lack of a better word, mesmerized by the man that walked beside her. The way he looked into his face, his eyes. The way she drew closer against him whenever the wind pushed through the crowd they walked among.
Poor girl.
It wasn’t that Sebastian didn’t put on the proper show for her. He grinned and laughed when it was expected of him. He held her close to him when they stopped at the crosswalk, waiting for it to turn. He even brushed aside hair that had been hanging across her face with a gentleness that was strange to see from a man like himself. All surface level, though. An act, a lure designed to bring girls just like herself through the threshold, let them in long enough to get what he wanted. Pleasure-seeking, Sebastian Knight was, seeking to fill the void present in his life. And he was good the way he made women look at him. Many men would envy him for this, but then some wouldn’t. There was more fun to be had with women than just sex, if one had the imagination. Sebastian had the capacity to make this same leap, if he only opened his eyes.
This particular man hoped to help him do just that one of these days.
Nathan von Liebert did not look away from the couple until they disappeared through the doors of his apartment complex. One of these days, when he was ready.
“Sebastian has certainly proven his worth in the short time that he had been there,” Atticus Sinclair said beside his leader. Despite the sub-freezing temperatures here in Manhattan, the priest wore only a black robe with his hands tucked away beneath his sleeves. His bald head was bare to the elements, but he didn’t seem to notice. “I’d say even better than you, Legion.”
Behind the two men, the bearded warrior grunted as he guarded over the two men. He wore a leather suit similar to that of NvL. He wore a duster instead of a trench coat to shield against the snow, but he too didn’t seem to notice. Arms crossed, he watched the shuffling crowd around them in silence. Not that the New Yorkers even feigned interest in the strange figures; it was easier to just duck the head away from the weather and the people around you.
“It may not be a bad idea to bring him in,” Atticus continued, watching another resident step through the doors to the complex. “Brief him on his role in all of this. Just think of the destruction he could wrought if he was but aware.”
Nathan closed his eyes and rolled his neck, thinking, plotting. “No,” he said, and it was so.
Atticus looked, for a moment, like he was going to argue his point before he finally relented. “As you say, sir.”
“Leave him, for now,” Nathan continued as he opened his eyes and looked at his bald companion. “He has his own war that’s he fighting, and that works in our favor. No need to divert his attention just yet, not when it serves our own purposes so nicely as is.”
The trio stand there in silence for a moment before Atticus nods again. He pulled one arm free of his sleeve to reveal a slip of paper. “And this?” Atticus asked, handing the document over to his leader. “Will you answer his call?”
Nathan took the sheet in his hand, his left hand, to look over the paper. Most of what was written could not be seen, save for a single word blazoned across the top left corner of the sheet. XIII.
Nathan grins. “They never learn, do they?” Nathan balls the paper up in his hand and tossed it over his shoulder into Legion’s awaiting hand. He was a monster, sure, but heaven forbid he litter. “Tell him I’ll be there. There’s someone in particular I’d like to meet, anyway.”
Nathan looks at Atticus.
“And call the doctor,” he continued, turning away to continue down the street. “Its time I finally followed through with that promise he made me.”
Atticus nods again as he and Legion fall into step behind their leader.
And Darkness.
*****
The audio feeds follows
“The world loves to make their comparisons. It was too much to have seven billion men, women, and children who were wholly individual. No, nature wouldn’t allow it. The need, the desire, to be a part of something larger seized mankind and divisions were drawn. Class. Race. Religion. Belief. Forget unity. Forget commonality. Give us separation, power. And let us decide who rules who.
Would you believe me, Kevin Bishop, if I told you that we both reside in a world like that? Or has your place as head of one such group clouded your understanding to the point that you’re unwilling to open your eyes and accept the inequality you represent? The very name reeks of isolation, of a desire to alienate oneself from one’s place in society. The Brotherhood. Thing is, Kevin, is everyone can’t be that, a brother. That’s not a role fit for every single human being in the world. Nor does everyone have someone they can call that, a brother. I would know.
I killed mine.
Or, at least, I put him into a position in which he had no other place befit for him. After that, it was his own choice to become, or to exist no longer. I didn’t care; I had already moved on. I had already opened my eyes to the realities of the world, which bonds and boundaries were but lines to cross, connections to break. And I was compared, Kevin. I was not the only boy to snap and harm his closest relatives. I was not the only child who had ever heard voices in his head. A number, a statistic.
A dream.
That’s why I’m here, Kevin; somebody had a dream that involved the two of us, standing across from one another in that ring. Two men who have inspired men to follow, to relinquish their absolute control over their own individuality for a place by their sides, gears in the proverbial machine that was their vision. You’re the face of today, Kevin. Newcomer of the year, leader of the stable that stands against corruption and arrogance. And me? Well, I’m just that notch in the door frame to mark the past.
Have you reached my height yet, Kevin?
Some would say you have, others would not. This match is an opportunity to leave speculation aside, answer the big question in the one place where it really mattered. And somebody in the back must be shaking with excitement in the back. NvL, stepping into the ring for the first time since Fifteen. Former World Champ with one more match in him against the Newcomer of the Year. Somebody think they’ve given Kevin Bishop the opportunity of a lifetime with this fight. A chance to take a step forward, further than his career had ever taken him to this point.
No one seems to think that this isn’t going to be as neat and pretty as originally thought.
I’m not coming back to roll over and lay down for you, Kevin. I’m not some name that has been groomed and cultivated for years for, what, to put new talent over? Do I look like fucking Gravedigger to you? No, no I’m not so fed-up with my reputation to piss it down the drain for a few final moments in my waning time as a respectable competitor. If that had been the case, I just would’ve said no, and left the common drab wondering what could’ve been. No, the fans will be getting the fight that they want so desperately, that I’ll guarantee.
But the comparison stops there, though. People see a match between two men who are of similar backgrounds, and they stop there. Its just a match, they say, just one high profile engagement of many on the night of XIII. What they fail to realize is that this is a conflict of far larger implications than is so apparent at face value. Believe me, I don’t give two shits about Kevin Bishop. I’ve come to stand against the idea, the concept that he represents. Brotherhood.
That’s what I’ve come for, what I break beneath my boot.
Because he is the man that supersedes all others. Forget the efforts of those beneath him. A man commits a terrorist act and he is treated as little more than a parasite, a disease that is separated from the body before it is allowed to spread. An anomaly, he’s declared, not an anatomical extension of the ideals he so represents. No, one man sets the tunes and then everyone dances along. Stop one from dancing, and another will simply pick up the beat. You have to silence the music first.
Only then will people stop and see just how silly they just looked.
That’s Kevin Bishop.”
An abrupt end to the audio and a fade out.
*****
“. . . we’ve just received report that Wes Stevens, alleged bomber and estranged member of the controversial coalition known as The Brotherhood, has been relocated from his holding cell to an undisclosed location outside the city of Detroit. Kevin Bishop, self-proclaimed leader of this organization, could not as of yet be reached for comment on what many have declared as an act of domestic terrorism . . .”
The news report was background noise to the real work at hand. Nathan von Liebert barely looked up from the file in his hand, eyes scanning the contents with a voraciousness that he hadn’t felt in a while. So long he had been scheming, planning the next move in his war on existence. Everything was calculated to the point where deviations were rarely possible. But this, this was an exception, and a beautiful one at that. The people, they asked for this. Come, conquer, and then we’ll shake your hand afterwards and tell you ‘Good job.’ He could appreciate this, this breath of fresh air.
Karma Bishop.
A picture had been provided with the dossier, eight by eight. Nathan ran the fingers of his left hand across the glossy front, outlining the shape of the figure as he sat, transfixed in thought. Beautiful, really, the woman. She had that presence that belonged where the curious, the interested, could see her. The ring. The stage. The magazines. The hospital. The morgue. The Obituaries.
Oh, the chalk lines she would form.
Nathan grinned a feral grin; he did love to fantasize. And this woman, she would fulfill him, and the message he meant to see as well. He hadn’t felt the embrace of another like her since Miss Cicero who so brazenly plagued Legion last year. So long. Too long. But, alas, she did not fit into the confines of the plans he had. Unfortunate, really, but not unexpected.
But, oh, she was perfect.
“Atticus,” Nathan said aloud, never taking his eyes away from the picture. “Is Legion fit to attend me this Friday night?”
“Most certainly,” the smooth voice of Atticus Sinclair replied from across the room, unseen. “What is that you have in mind?”
“A message, of course,” Nathan said, setting the picture aside. “One that I think will be heard more clearly than anything I’ll say before then.”
A low chuckle can be heard. “I have no doubt, sir.”
Nathan sits back and opens his ears to the world around him; the news had moved on to the weather report. “Ready the plane, Atticus. I have one more place in mind before Minnesota.”
Rising to his feet, Nathan steps away from the table he had been sitting at; the camera zooms in on the photo of Karma Bishop one last time before the scene fades.
*****
“A figurehead.”
The Main Sanctuary of the Dark Brotherhood’s church in Portland, Oregon had been ransacked and vandalized. Pews had been overturned and their cushions cut open, their soft contents spilling out over the dust-covered carpets. Only half of a podium remained at the front, and the shattered remains of what had been a marble fountain.
Nathan von Liebert stood amongst it all, eyes looking upward on the back wall. Depicted was a mural of the God Oblivion, his visage shrouded in mask and shadow. He wore a robe similar to that of Atticus Sinclair, but more decorated, more ornate. It was an idealized representation, with the man ten feet tall and seated on a black throne. Little else of his figure could be made out, save for his right hand perched on the handle of the throne. It was blood red.
“In two-thousand twelve, a man was personified as a God right here in the World Championship Federation. Oblivion had been many things. A brute. A warrior. A monster. But we made him something more because we believed he was something more. That’s the mistake people make; they expect this glorious, heavenly divined sign for what we did, but it wasn’t necessary. All it took was the will to believe where others didn’t, and have the strength to back your beliefs when they were questioned.
And I had the strength, Kevin, to declare this man as God. I declared myself his Right Hand, as Pestilence embodied, and the Dark Saints proved themselves to be a viable threat to Pantheon, who were only just in their infancy. Did you know that, Kevin, that even before David Sanchez, there had been another plague here in the WCF. Another scourge on the sanctity that was Sunday Night Slam? I doubt it. You’re so stuck on the now that you fail to realize this opportunity you’ve been given would not have been possible without the efforts of men, greater men, who came before you.”
Nathan turns away from the mural, looking to his left at Atticus, Legion, and a half dozen nondescript men with shorned skulls.
“Tear it down. For good this time.”
Nathan steps further towards the center of the Sanctuary, leaving the mural behind him. Viewers get one final look at the fiery eyes staring out at them, and the red hand, before it disappears off-camera.
“That was the thing that was soon made apparent then, too. You see, Kevin, Oblivion may have been the self-proclaimed God, but the people knew who the real threat in the Dark Saints was. Obi would sputter and stomp his feet and shake the ring thinking it was mountains, but he was no real threat at the end of the day. Belief does a lot of things, but breaking the bond of physical mortality is not one of them. When push came to shove, Obi proved himself incapable of living up to the position we had carved out in the world for him. But me?
I relished in the opposition.
And I thrived in it, too. The Dark Saints folded, but Nathan von Liebert did not. I fought on and he fought harder to remind people just who I was, in case they forget during my hour of supposed servitude. Ask Frankie, Kevin, to see the scars on his wrist. Ask him about Johnny Nova. He doubted me, doubted what I could do.
Note the past tense, Kevin; that’s the key there.
And now, come Friday night, I’ve been given the opportunity to square my past up against the face of the future. Kevin Fucking Bishop. I think this is the part where I’m supposed to express my thankfulness at this opportunity to compete against you. Talk about the fight we’re going to have and how it means a lot to a veteran like myself.
How about no?”
Nathan runs his left hand across the wooden back of a pew still standing upright.
“Because that would require, Kevin, that I actually believe what I would say at this point. I’m many things, Bishop, but I am not much of a liar. Its hard,” Nathan waves his hand in front of his face. “To keep a straight face when I reflect on the massive joke that my opponents usually are. But trust me, Kevin, I’m trying to be serious with you, I really am.”
Nathan grins.
“But, can you really blame me?
Because when I look at you, Kevin, I see a man longing for recognition, for acceptance, even it means drawing on one’s accomplishments from beyond the realm in which you currently stand. Some people may have looked at you last week, with your World Title sitting in your lap, and been impressed. Had this been your first week here with the WCF, I may have been too; I’m not one to knock another person’s achievements they made before coming here. But to sit there, after you have stood in this company’s ring for months, and showed me a piece of metal you acquired somewhere else?
Its pitiful.
I’m supposed to validate you, is that it? Little old Kevin Bishop couldn’t cut it as anything more than the People’s Champion here in the WCF, so he started selling himself on the side, on the street corner of Chicago. He couldn’t make himself anything more than a middle of the pack name in this ring, so he went where the bigger names don’t reside for a stand to stand on top for once. Alex Richards? You’ll see how he compares against someone who calls this place home at XIII. Andre Holmes? He should’ve stayed there, where at least he was in a similar boat as yourself, Kevin. Celeste Mallory?
Fuck her.”
Nathan shakes his head, running his hand through his unkempt, black hair.
“I’ll give you this, Kevin: you know how to make a man say things he didn’t want to. No one cares to hear me talk about competitors from another company who can’t make it here, in the WCF. But here I stand, addressing this very subject. Sure, it shows that I’ve been paying attention to my opponent, that I’m aware of his comings and goings. Its even kind, really, to address it in the first place.
No one would bother to pay attention otherwise.
But like I said before, I have come to XIII to address an issue far larger than the insignificant successes of a cult leader living in Farmville, USA.”
NvL grins a feral grin.
“Burns, doesn’t it, to have your entire vision, all of your ideals, summed up with such a word. Forget hope, here’s a label with some awful connotations. Oh, I know its awful to hear, to know that such assumptions have been made and are continued to be made every single day. Sure, I saw your heartfelt monologue on how The Brotherhood is more complex and more meaningful in today’s society than the label ‘cult’ allows for. Believe me, I was moved. Moved, even, to tune into Slam this past week to watch you successfully defend your brothers and your identity against the might of #BeachKrew.
Nope.
No, I watched what appears to be a continued trend of The Brotherhood uniting against the opposition, up until said opposition, you know, opposes. What a mighty leader you are, Kevin, to so graciously take the fall for your brother, FPV. Messianic even. Seriously, talk to him about those scars of his.
He’ll tell you that being crucified isn’t all that’s it made out to be.”
NvL chuckles.
“There’s are few things I dislike more than a leader incapable of being stronger than the men he leads. Despise it. Because it is my belief that men were created to be individuals in this world, untethered by the constraints of kinship or social norms. We’re just all too different. But man proved themselves early in human history incapable of accepting this simple truth and have bound themselves to belief systems unfit for our expected existence. Leaders arose, and groups were formed. I, in a rare exception of absolute necessity, have served in groups of my own, and formed one of my own. Not because it was what I wanted, but what was expected until what was wrong can be righted.
And in my time, I have served under men and women who were not fit to maintain this illusion of necessary rule. Oblivion in the Dark Saints. Sarah Twilight and Eric Price in Bravado. I am not proud to admit that there have been times when my judgment has been clouded by the ways of the world. But I promise you this: I step into XIII with the utmost clarity as to who I am, and who you are, Kevin Bishop. And believe me, truly believe me, when I say this.
Kevin Bishop can fuck off.
I don’t care about him at all.
It’s the platform on which he stands upon that I’m after, the concept of righteous and deserving rule over a people meant to live by their own devices, or die in the process. You prolong the existence, Kevin, of men and women undeserving of it. And that I will can not allow. So I will use this opportunity that I have been afforded to send a message, while I have the chance, before I step back into the shadows. I will step into that ring and usurp the rule you have over your place in this company. I doubt The Brotherhood will fold after XIII.
Cockroaches die hard.
But I will leave the man on the top questioning his place before its all said and done. His place in this company, as the People’s Champion, and as a man himself. And I’ll do it without a second thought, not because I think myself any better than the next man, but because its simply the way of the world. I am but a tool in which will is inflicted.”
A final pause as Nathan looks deep into the camera.
“I revived the Dark Saints in twenty-fifteen just to show Oblivion, and the world, that I could do it without him being involved. People didn’t even give it a second thought at the time. They didn’t think about it because to them it wasn’t much of a shock. NvL, one-upping a God? What else was new?
Ponder that, then, Kevin Bishop, before you step into the ring with me at XIII. Ponder your mortality and how I wield it so easily in my hand. Ponder your position before you watch it crumble away. I’ll see you soon.”
Darkness
*****
“This may sting a bit,” a familiar voice said.
Agony. Sweet, sweet agony. Pain shot through his body, sinking into every crevice. He was fire and lightning and the heavens and creation all in one. He stared into the abyss, and the abyss stared back. Did he blink? Or was that life itself, folding before his stare?
Nothing.
Nathan exhaled and laid his head back against the metal table he laid on. His body was nude from the waist up, revealing a patchwork of white scars across his torso and arms. Sweat covered his body, running off the sides onto the platform. “Is it done?” NvL asked, breathing heavily.
“Try it out for yourself,” Doctor Remus Micayle replied, looking at Nathan from his seat at the head of the table. “Just flex it.”
Nathan held his hand up. His right hand. It was obvious it was some sort of metal material, flexible and firm. It didn’t just sit on the stump; it had been fused with it. He felt its differentness, but at the same time, it felt apart of him. A pulse ever looming in the back of his head.
He willed it.
The hand curled into a fist.
Nathan grinned, despite himself. He was whole once more.
May God save them all.
Fin
