Flynn.

Sitting in his storage unit.

The center seat of a rectangular mahogany dinner table.

Staring off into the middle distance…

Absent…

His head at a tilt. As if the weight of his skull and its contents were overwhelming the muscles in his head.

A single spot light showers down a bright white onto the table.

His hair is a matted sweating mess….

His eyes barely open, squinting between slits of white and closed peach…

His clothes are torn, his smile that of delirium… His eyes lost and blissful…

A white napkin tucked into his broken torn collar like a gentleman.

However, the way he's sitting, instead of elegantly flowing down his chest, the napkin bunches up at the center.

The camera runs across the table.

Two beautiful red candles. Flame dancing.

Near his twitching, unfocused hands is a set tableware made of the finest silver, laying upon a velvet red tablecloth. A white cylinder with a sliver top sitting by his right hand.

Before him, an ivory white plate, red flooding into a circle on the table.

In the form of a steak, cooked rare, just barely pink in the middle.

Sizzling.

Aromas wafting from the center of the steak…

Visible, the smoke billowing off of the flawless sirloin.

The scent flows upwards.

Under Flynn's chin...

His nostrils flare.

His eyes blink...

As a reflex...

He licks his lips...

"Dinner time..."

Flynn's right hand stretches, his thumb popping in its socket, as it rotates in a circle. His fingers all hinge backwards, folding against themselves.

Then the whole hand balls up into a fist.

"I have to admit."

He sweeps the clump of hair back with his left hand.

Into a makeshift parting on the right side of his head.

"This whole 'being back' thing?"

"It's getting easier..."

The fist opens and grabs the knife...

While its partner grabs the fork.

"When I started this, I was lying face down. Basically brain-dead on the floor."

"Like everything else that goes in one of these storage units."

"Gathering dust. Degrading over time in value and use."

Flynn glides the fork along the surface of the steak, it's surface just giving in imperceivable millimeters, as the tines search for the most tender, succulent bite.

Flynn moans as his right shoulder circles and loosens.

"It's been so long since I've gotten to enjoy one of these... Feels like ages..."

His mouth can't produce saliva fast enough. That doesn't mean it isn't trying.

His fork circles one more pass.

Before stopping at a point just off center to the right.

Flynn's found it...

[orange]"Azrael Erebus..."

Suddenly, Flynn's left arm shoots up in the sky!

The fork spins in his hand...

And he jams it into the steak.

The utensil sticks straight up in the air as Flynn releases his utensil.

A beat.

"Excuse me. I think it'll need more garlic salt."

Flynn reaches for the white cylinder and begins gingerly shaking it over his meal, only the finest of particles touching the meat.

Flynn glances up at the camera as he does this.

"Having a tough week, old friend?"

"Sure seems like it."

Flynn waves his hand to his nostril to savor the mixture of sensations, closing his eye to focus his sense of smell.

And grumbles with the utmost satisfaction.

"Azrael."

His eyes open.

His hand grabs the fork...

And begins cutting into his meal.

Quickly, efficiently making squares...

"I understand why you're so off your game this week."

"Honestly, you're in a hole. You have the low ground, inferior firepower and inferior intelligence."

"And you're trying to fight through it. I respect that."

As Flynn's cutting continues, more clicks against the plate can be heard in between the separation of meat squares.

"But, let's realistically look at your situation. Your team is a fat idiot who's trying his best to beat me at my own game as 'Death, Destroyer of Worlds.'"

Flynn grins eyeing the camera.

"And failing miserably to the extent that you have to spend half of every promo explaining out via technicality and logic fallacy his stupid illogic about how he deserves the belt he didn't win."

"You're a smart spaceman, Azrael. What's to gain from hitching your boat to that sinking ocean liner?"

Flynn stops cutting. The meal is perfectly sliced and diced into bite-sized cubes.

"Especially with the weak ex-girlfriend-esque taunts you've decided to focus your efforts on this week."

Flynn looks from his plate, directly into the camera.

"Such classic hits as, 'Theo, don't let Flynn, break your heart like he broke mine! He says he loves you and that he'll always stick around but he doesn't mean it. He'll leave you too!'"

Flynn sits back in his chair as he shakes his head.

"Azrael, I feel bad. I genuinely mean it."

"I got you all excited about trash talk coming your way, over a year in a tournament for a belt that no longer exists."

"Didn't deliver. Beat you relatively easily. And you apparently still haven't forgiven me for it."

"For what it's worth, I'm sorry."

Flynn looks back down at his meal.

"I'm sorry that you're not worth the time nor the effort of physically dissecting. Not even this week. You've managed to surround yourself with two inflatable clown punching bags that always bounce back up to take another punch to the eye and always keep a smile on their face."

"As if punching them means they're winning."

Flynn taps his nose.

"That whole 'the fact you're proving me wrong proves I'm right' thing really Elijah insists on coating his insipid vomit with really ties the whole 'smiling punching bag' metaphor together nicely, I think. Wouldn't you agree?"

Flynn sneaks a glance at the camera and grins before looking back down at his meal, snatching his knife with his right hand.

"Meanwhile, you're, to continue the punching bag metaphor, like a tarp filled to the brim with oatmeal and milk."

Flynn tests his hand on his chin a moment as he taps a temple with his left hand...

"Sure, you can also attack it. And it also can't really defend itself. So it meets the minimum requirements of a punching bag. But who in their right mind would assault one when other options are available?

"I hate to break it to you, Azrael. But that's the big reason I can never seem to trash talk against you."

"You're just not worth the effort."

Flynn shrugs as he scratches his face, itching his beard, before dropping his right back to the table.

"You're like a cockroach with a broken antenna or a one-winged moth who keeps trying to fly and then falling back to the ground, repeating this process endlessly in an even more tragic Sisyphus-like situation."

"Like, why strain myself on you? You're just a minor nuisance that something else will probably take care of. A spider or an errant air conditioner."

Flynn touches his fork.

"Circle of life, strong devour the weak, etcetera."

Flynn then pauses...

...

"I'll tell you what though."

Flynn re-grips his fork and rotates it, eyeing the gleam below the tines.

"If you give me something to care about?"

"Like, a genuine thought out of your skull that causes me to have a reaction to it?"

Flynn plunges his fork into a square and lifts it to his cheek.

"I'll give you something back."

"You can do it. I believe in you, spaceman."

Flynn genuinely smiles.

Then, his face turns to the meat dangling on the fork in front of him.

And his face contorts to that of disgust.

"Which is more than I can say for dear Elijah."

Flynn sighs as he pops the first bite into his mouth.

"Let's start on the positives, my dear boy."

"There are few so it seems best to just get them out of the way."

He chews, savoring the sensations across his tongue...

"First, you took my advice! Hooray! Good boy, Elijah!"

Flynn claps slowly, the fork and knife in his hand preventing his hands from meeting.

Making the applause virtually silent except for the clinking of silver against silver.

"I told you you were hindering your team by stream of consciousness spewing whatever came into your fat skull and that you needed to cut back or you were going to effectively slice your trio's heels before they could even start running."

"And you took a whole day off after I dropped that little piece of advice! Hooray! Gold star for my student Elijah."

Flynn catches another cube on his fork and then slides it into his mouth, a trail of red forming at the corner of his mouth.

"However, if I may offer another little direction for you."

"It's not a good idea to, after clearly being shaken by how outclassed you are in this little one-on-one situation that we find ourselves in."

"To pretend like I didn't touch a nerve."

"To insinuate that what I'm saying isn't getting to you."

"When anyone with eyes can see I'm so deep in your fucking head, your eyes are popping out of your oversized Neanderthal skull."

Flynn swallows and smiles, a blood red stain across his left incisor.

"Probably the reason you're verbally shambling about, trying to beat every stick you have together, hoping one of the sounds you make comes off as gunfire."

"You're basically blind at this point considering how much headspace of yours I'm taking up residence in."

Flynn clicks his tongue to the roof of his mouth, closing his eyes, relishing the remnants of that last morsel.

"Now."

Flynn's eyes open.

"We move onto the 'Needs Improvement' area of your points."

Flynn quickly pops a piece down his throat and swallows it whole.

“So.

You’re telling me.

That the obese southern preacher talking about the end of the world, how we’re all going to Hell and the children’s song ‘He’s got the Whole World in His Hands.'

Is calling me unoriginal.”

"...How deliciously... Revoltingly ironic.."

Beat.

“Of course, I’m referring to the fact that Evangelical rants about Hell are as old as nursery rhymes at this point.”

Flynn winks.

“Sorry, I have a facial tic."

Flynn pops the fork down on one.

Two cubes.

And brings the fork to his eager lips. He chews as he shakes his head.

"Oh Eli.

Elijah.

Elias.

Elohim.

Everett.

Jeff.

‘Rock ‘n Roll’ Dean Patterson."

Flynn swallows as he sneers into the camera.

"I don’t give a fuck what you prefer being called.

Or what people have called you in the past.

If the long name trick is something you've experienced before, let me break it down on a psychological level.

The point of calling someone by the long version of their name is to chastise them. To make it clear that they've done something wrong."

Flynn rolls his eyes as he leans, his fork flying with his hand as he gestures, trying desperately to convey something he believes is impossibly simple.

"I'm berating you, like a teacher who's student showed up with an undone homework assignment and a forged parent's apology letter for not having done the homework."

He sighs, leaning back in his chair, rubbing his left eye.

"You disgust me. Your fear, as you insist that I'm afraid. You deceive and double talk as you insist that I am deceitful and unforward.

And when I point out the corner you back into...

Or, more accurately, as I warn you of the cliff you edge near...

Of the fall to come...

You just cover your ears.

And keep backing away..."

Flynn shakes his head, losing his appetite as he pops another cube into his mouth.

"I don't care what you've done.

What others have said about you in the past.

I don't even care who you are.

Your name is meaningless to me.

All of your names are meaningless to me."

Flynn slowly rises out of his chair.

"Not all of you as in the three person team I’m taking on this Wednesday night for those stolen belts around your waist.

I mean all of you.

Your kind."

Flynn jabs his finger toward the camera, spitting rage.

"All the pretenders.

All the false prophets who call me a false prophet.

All the spooky story tellers who start off their dissent with an ‘OOOOH SPOOKY!’ soaking in sarcasm.

All the soothsayers, the magicians, the preachers.

All those who claimed they'd change Mark Flynn.

That I was the disease.

And they were the cure."

Flynn lies back down in his chair. Retaking the fork. Not breaking the pace of his speech.

"And like any miracle elixir salesman, some people line up around the block to get what you people sell every time.

But the doctor doesn't change his wares, the genuine article doesn't fear the changing times."

Flynn leans in over his meal.

"Because when the chips are down.

When the magician is asked to prove the trick is real?

When the preacher is asked to call on his God?

Your elixir?

Your truth?

Lime juice and sugar pills."

He's down to three cubes.

The fork clatters against the plate.

Now, two.

"And do you want to know the difference, Elijah?

Between you and I?"

Flynn closes his eyes, then cocks his neck until a quiet crack is heard.

He opens them again.

"...

Content.

You seem happy to leave the result of your speech to the listener's imagination.

Implying implied implications, so deeply tissue, not a concrete layer for you to even stand on.

You harp on damnation and suffering... Kool-Aid and The Lord...

But I haven't seen you talk about any of those things. All you've talked about is how other people talk about you talking about Jesus."

Flynn pops the second to la-...

No, it stays on his fork. Flynn sets it down.

"You call Theo a liar.

You tell Theo he is going where liars go.

You don't say where that is, you ask him if he knows where that is.

You don't tell him when he'll get there, what will happen when he gets there.

Or who will be waiting for him."

Flynn wipes his brow with the napkin in his collar.

Picks up the fork.

And eats the second to last piece.

"I, on the other hand.

When I ascend my pulpit.

And begin my personalized sermon.

I tend to draw a lot of converts.

I tell people where they're going.

What darkness in their hearts made them end up there.

And how I will end their suffering.

And for you, Eli?

I'll provide the same service."

Flynn leans back and closes his eyes, his hands come to rest on his knees.

"...

You're going where liars go in my version to the truth.

You're going to the middle of a wrestling ring.

You're going to go there on Wednesday.

I'll be the one meeting you there.

And when we meet.

On Wednesday.

In the middle of a wrestling ring.

..."

Flynn smiles.

"I'm going to trap your head between the mat and my knee.

And I'm going to pull your right arm in the opposite direction.

Tearing the god damned muscle off your shoulder, wrenching the arm back and forth against the walls of the joint.

Until the whole god-damned socket tears.

And the only way you can for sure tell you still have an arm.

Is the unending agony erupting through your entire right half of your body."

Flynn grabs the fork. Jams it hard into the last morsel on the plate.

And presses it into his lips. Leaving a trace of sauce and garlic on his mouth.

Slowly opening, as it slides into his mouth.

"...

I came back to the XWF to deliver a message.

Unlike yours, it's a message of purpose and substance.

And, one last tip: The only way to make sure the world sees your message.

Is to erase the board so yours is the only one around.

..."

Flynn finishes the steak, the last piece sliding down his throat.

"I'm not trying to scare you, Elijah.

Oh no."

Flynn licks his lips, clearing his face.

"I'm trying to warn you..."

Flynn takes the cloth napkin out of his collar.

Dabs at his cheeks and lips.

And tucks the rag into his pocket.

"Just like I told you I'd hoped it would be, Elijah..."

"Delicious..."