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Thomas Nixon · (12-31-2016)

July 6, 2009
Washington, D.C.

Thomas Nixon sits in the driver’s seat of a 2001 Ford Mustang. “Hotel California” plays quietly in the small vehicle, as he rolls to a stop in across the street from a large townhouse. Although the home didn’t look particularly expensive, it had to be worth nearly a million dollars. Washington D.C. is not a cheap place to live.

Thomas Nixon turns the engine off, but he leaves the car on, keeping the music playing in the background. With his right hand, he adjusts the rear view mirror. Nixon stares himself in the eyes for a moment while taking deep breaths. After taking several deep breaths, he runs his hand through his sleeked back hair.

“We are all just prisoners here, of our own device”

The music cuts off, as Nixon turns the car off. He steps onto the sidewalk, and he begins to make his way towards the home.

Nixon is dressed in all black; a dark pair of jeans and a black, long-sleeved shirt. He glances at the window on the second floor. None of the lights are on in the home, but he knows that they will answer the door.

He rings the doorbell, as he touches his right hand to the pistol holstered at his side.

Initially, silence emanates from the building. Then, a light clicks on in the upstairs bedroom. Slowly, but surely, faint sounds can be heard from inside the building. Another few moments pass, then the door slowly creaks open.

A 93 year old white man stands in the doorway. He looks at Nixon, with a bit of shock in his face. He considers closing the door, but Nixon taps the butt of his holstered gun. The man glances at it, before he steps aside, allowing Nixon to enter the home.

Nixon walks into the room, seeing two couches and an arm chair surrounding a wooden coffee table. The room was well furnished; the furniture was relatively new and likely expensive. The man gestured for Nixon to take a seat on the couch, and the man sits directly across from him in the arm chair.

Before Nixon sits down, he pulls out the black handgun and places it on the coffee table in front of him.

“I appreciate that you’re making this easy for me.” Nixon said to his host.

“I don’t see the point in holding off the inevitable. I knew this day would come eventually. I wasn’t sure if it would be at your hands or natural causes, but the answer seems clear now.” The man said, leaning back in the arm chair.

“We haven’t had a chance like this before. I know everything about you, and you think you know everything about me, but this is the first time I’ve been able to look you in the eyes and talk to you. From here, this goes two ways. I know your wife is upstairs fast asleep. I’m either going to leave a mess here for her to find in the morning or you can go back to bed and die in her arms tonight. I assume that you would like the latter, but for that to happen, I want you to listen to me. That’s something you haven’t done in the last 93 years of your life.” Nixon explained with a hint of intensity in his voice. Otherwise, he remained calm.

The man nodded. “It’s a lost cause to try and make me regret my past. Feel free to try, but it hardly matters now.”

Anger stirred in the depths of Thomas Nixon. This is his chance to look into the eyes Robert McNamara and tell him his wrongdoing before he ends McNamara’s life. All of that, but it doesn’t seem like McNamara gives a rat’s ass. Nixon leans forward, and he stares into the old man’s eyes.

“Rob, you’ve put me through hell. Ever since you and your nasty allies took office with John F. Kennedy, you’ve given my people a hard time. I just want you to realize that you were wrong. Not only did you slaughter thousands of lizards, but you did so falsely. You thought that my people were some sort of informant for the Russians. You believed that we had a role in the Cuban Missile Crisis. As a result, Kennedy used his power to bring an unjust war against our people. Thousands of lizards died as a result, and normal people had no idea that these casualties even happened. Even worse, you killed one of my best friends. A mother figure to me growing up. You killed Hodiah just to push an agenda. And for these reasons, I’ve looked to end your life.

“It’s amazing that it took so long for this time to come, and it’s all because I made a mistake. I got emotional. When I was watching you and your family, I tried to attack you. I couldn’t stand seeing a man smile and laugh, when I’ve suffered so much because of your decisions. That put me on a watch list. I knew that I couldn’t get away with taking your life because my name would always be associated with you. Now, I still look like I did way back when. No official would believe that the man that attacked you on the ferry could possibly be me. It’s been decades! Now, nobody is watching me.

“The new administration has too much on their hands. Your death won’t be a priority to them. They only care about fixing the economy. So now I will get my revenge, although it is a little late.”

Nixon rises to his feet. Leaving the gun on the coffee table, he walks into the kitchen. He opens up a cupboard, finding a glass. He walks across the small space to the sink, and he fills the glass with water. He sets the glass on the granite countertop, and he reaches into his pocket to retrieve a tiny vial.

As he pours a clear solution into the glass, Robert McNamara stares at the gun on the coffee table. McNamara tunes out the sounds of Nixon walking into the kitchen and preparing the drink. He only comes back to his senses, when the glass is set down on the table in front of him.

“Take your time, just drink the whole thing.” Nixon requests.

“You just left the gun on the table.” McNamara said, completely bewildered. “What would you have done if I had picked it up and aimed it at you?”

Nixon laughed, picking up the gun and spinning it in his hand. “I didn’t think that scenario through. I’ve thought about this encounter a lot, and I knew that you wouldn’t pick the gun up. I knew that you wouldn’t use a gun on me.”

“Why wouldn’t I? You threatened my life. I have every reason to shoot you.” McNamara says with a hint of frustration in his voice.

“But you didn’t. The more I learned about you, the more you disgusted me. Not because you killed so many people I loved. Because you don’t feel bad about it. You weren’t the man pulling the trigger, or in Hodiah’s case, strangling her to death. You just made the orders. You didn’t see the pain you were causing. You don’t think that you did a damn thing wrong.”

Nixon’s laughter turned to anger, as he began to fixate on McNamara’s history.

“I actually have a theory that you haven’t directly killed a single person since your days in active duty, all the way back in World War 2. I could be wrong, but I think you’re completely desensitized when it comes to giving orders to kill. I didn’t think that you would have the balls to pick the gun up and take my life, and it looks like I was right.

You are just a coward, seeing as you can’t bring yourself to kill me. You let heinous actions take place because you’re a pathetic member of a disgusting group of men. I’m sickened by your administration’s treatment of the lizard people. You used them as a scapegoat. Truly, you just took innocent lives and forced thousands of more lizards into hiding. You, sir, do not deserve to keep living, when you’ve led to the death of so many good people.”

McNamara looked at Nixon, maintaining a mostly calm look. If anything, McNamara’s emotions would be described as accepting.

“If you’re done lecturing me, why don’t you leave me to die in peace?” McNamara reached for the glass. Nixon stared at the old man, and he watched him drink the poisonous concoction.

McNamara sets the empty glass on the table. Nixon carefully watches the man. They sit in silence for another minute, in Nixon’s mind, he wants to make sure the poison is appropriately digested. He rises to his feet, and he puts the gun into his holster. Once, he is sure that McNamara would not be able to escape the lethal poison, he turned his back to the old man and let himself out of the home.

Back in his car, Nixon punches the top of the steering wheel, violently swearing. With a tear in his eye, he drove off. Nixon’s stomach still is in a knot as a result of his intense anger. There was no catharsis in killing Robert McNamara.

* * *

It took me a long time to learn a valuable lesson. There isn’t any benefit from revenge or holding grudges. When you desperately want to take your anger out on something or someone, you are greeted with a horrible, hollow feeling when you finally take action.

It makes a lot of sense if you think about it rationally. When I poisoned Robert McNamara, I failed to reverse time and undo all of his atrocities. Thousands of people didn’t crawl up from their graves and return to their happy livelihoods. I didn’t come back to Philadelphia’s Masonic Temple and find Hodiah in her flesh. I just added another name to the Washington newspaper’s obituary section.

Revenge is an impulsive action. It’s the dumbest thing a man can do. Your body and mind lead you to believe that there is some satisfaction from losing your temper. That’s simply not how life works. Emotionally and logically, there isn’t anything fulfilling in revenge.

It’s important to separate that brute, raw emotion when conducting business. Once you let your rage take control of you, you’ve lost. The psychological battle is more important than the physical battle, especially when it comes to the wrestling ring.

In XWF, you need a plan and a strategy to win. Once your opponent gets under your skin, you lose focus of your game plan, and that’s the downfall of many athletes here.

I heard a compelling case from Brandon Moore. He said that he was going to take the match seriously, and he stayed out of trouble for once. He managed to avoid a bar room brawl, even though that’s the stuff that gets his adrenaline pumping.

With that being said, he wasn’t listening very closely. He made it clear that he’s taking the match seriously, but he called me a punk. He dismissed me, as if I’m some no name. He must have fast forwarded through a lot of my speech.

But if he wants to make the same error that my past opponents have, he has the constitutional right to it. He can underestimate me just like everyone else did. That overconfidence is going to be your down fall. Broken Hart told me he was plain better than me, but I came out on top. Gabe Reno dismissed me and my cause, but I’m the Television Champion.

Don’t let your pride shield you from the facts and don’t allow yourself to succumb to the urges that you find natural. Brandon, I want to tear the house down with you, but it only takes one mistake for me to turn you into a joke.

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