Now-The Black Room

BONG!

The final peal of the clock sounded somewhere far in the distance, an appropriately eerie counterpoint to the crimson presence sitting in the crook of the lightning struck tree. Resting each arm on one of the tree's split flanks, The Red Death pushes himself to his feet. Corey takes a couple tentative steps backwards, and notices that the floor beneath him is now black as pitch, a disconcerting element that made him feel like he was free floating in the throes of this inky nothingness.

And here we are, Mr. Smith. Your final destination.

Corey tried to seem confident given the circumstances, but it didn’t quite bleed through the anxiety. What do you want?

What do I want, the figure gestured towards itself. What I….*cough* *cough*....excuse me…. Let’s try that again. What I want is….*COUGH, COUGH, COUGH!*....*sputter*

Corey canted his head in confusion. Ummm….

The Red Death held up a finger, as if to say, a “moment please” as its deep wracking coughs continued. Finally, once under control, the apparition spoke, Can I just drop the Darth Vader voice, christ it’s hell on the chords. The Red Death’s voice had altered to sound significantly more feminine. I mean, I think we can drop the shtick and mano y mano this bitch, eh? Reaching up, the creature removes it’s mask to reveal…



MADISON!

Yeah, it’s been me all along. She stops to consider the mask. This thing smelled like the interior of an unwashed asshole, who had this before me? She tosses it over her shoulder and starts to remove the crimson robes, revealing much more contemporary attire beneath. I’d tell you to turn around while I disrobe but then I remembered you ride the chocolate highway now. She kicks the robe off disdainfully. So how’s the XWF’s preeminent cuckboy doing?

Corey, barely containing his rage, stabs a finger in her direction. Get the fuck outta my head!

Oh! So you did figure out where we are. Well done Jessica Fletcher. And hey, while you’re solving mysteries, why not look into what makes your scrotum do that sound as it curls up inside you every time you see me.

No, no, nope! Corey waves his hands in the air dismissively. I’m done here. Fuck you. Fuck you to the furthest extent possible. Corey shuts his eyes.

What are you doing?

Willing myself out of this.

Madison starts in on a particularly caustic laugh. Oh ho hoooo, if only it were that easy. But you aren’t going anywhere until I show you what I want to show you. Which is the complete decimation of everything you know and love. A deconstruction of your life so complete, so absolute, that you will be rendered an inert pile of wiggling human flesh stuff that prays for a death that will never come until I decree that it is acceptable. Which I won’t. Open your eyes shithead.

Corey does so, only to find that they’re both back inside his home at the commune. He looks around, and quickly realizes that everyone and everything has been locked in time, immobile. What are you up to?

“What are you up to?” Madison mocks. Can you do something a little more hard hitting than the weak ass expository questions, please? My viewers demand a certain level of dialectic panache. And besides, you’re about to see what I’m up to riiiiiight NOW!

The environs come to life, albeit slowly, at maybe a quarter of the speed of reality. Corey watches, enthralled. He tries to reach out to touch the shoulder of a passing resident, but they don’t even seem to respond to his touch. Madison follows Corey, walking on the opposite side of the residents he’s inspecting. She looks towards the door expectantly, which opens, disclosing….

Corey’s eyes go wide. Oh God no….

The residents, slow moving as they are, don’t seem to catch on to the new arrivals, who seem to be moving in real time. The arrivals being Razors, Mercy, and Jace Mingla’s son Whisper, who is still clad in an eerie multi eyed body armor that makes him seem like some Lovecraftian abomination brought ashore and run through a military clearinghouse of heavy duty weaponry.

Razors sets an old school boombox down at the entrance and turns it on.



Mercy and Razors produce wicked looking blades as they seem to be eying the assembly with hunger. Whisper draws two handguns and turns off the safety on each.

No! Corey turns to his people, panic gripping him hard. RUN! Everyone RUN!

Madison cackles in the background as her trio of assassins gets to work.

Corey starts trying to jostle the people about him to life, but still no one responds to his touch or frantic presence. Meanwhile, Madison’s minions, untethered by the slowdown in time, fan out into the crowd, butchering as they go. Mercy shoves a blade through the throat of a teenage girl. Razors produces a blade from a sheath concealed under his sleeve and walks up on a middle aged male resident, jamming the blade savagely into his belly over and over. And Whisper starts popping off shots that land, unerringly, in multiple foreheads in quick succession.


NO! NO! NO! He turns to Madison, howling in a rage. WHAT ARE YOU TRYING TO PROVE?!!

Between them, Mercy grabs another young lady by the hair to prevent her slow moving escape, plunging her weapon deep into her chest and then sawing it up through her torso and out the base of her neck. The brutality of the act creates a geyser of blood that splashes into the air, with the liquid moving in slow motion as well. Madison advances on Corey, and at first she stands underneath the slow moving blood, glancing up at it before suddenly reaching up into it and dousing her hand with the crimson. She then reaches out and paints Corey’s face with the blood. Shocked, Corey shoves Madison away and brings his hands to his face.

What am I trying to prove? That that’s on you, asshole!

Corey lunges at Madison, but she side steps him, and Corey goes ass over tea kettle into a trio of bodies, still pumping blood freely onto the hardwood. When did she get so fast. He stands up, covered in their blood. His hands shake as he beholds them, smeared red with life preserving ichor. Corey closes his eyes and tries to repeat a mantra. It’s not real….it’s not real….it’s not real….

Madison Dyson steps over a body as the butchery continues in the background. Oh, you’re right. It’s not real. This time. This is just a sneak peak of what I am capable of…..

You’re DEAD! You're not capable of anything!

Clearly, she dramatically holds out her arms, you’re mistaken. Oh, but don’t look now, the calvary is here.

Madison points behind Corey, revealing Dolly circling around some fleeing residents with her pistol raised. You can see her shout “get down”, but she too is in slow motion and no sound emanates from her. She aims and fires at Whisper, forcing him behind a wall for cover, but as Dolly starts to advance a knife imbeds itself in her side, thrown by Razors. Dolly mutters something indiscernable and falters, looking at the wound in her side. Dauntless, she raises the gun at Razors and fires, just barely missing him. She’s taken down by a round to the side of the head courtesy of Whisper.

Jesus! Corey howls, turning away from the nightmare.

Now where IS that boy Christian that you love so much?

I swear to fucking God this will never come to pass, do you hear me Madison?! Your people want to continue this fight on your behalf? I’ll shred ‘em! They won’t make it past the front gates before their cooling corpses hit the pavement.

Madison covers a mock gasp with her hand. Ooooh, now there’s the fire!

Mercy drags Christian out from the hallway by his hair. His body is covered in deep ravine like defensive wounds. Corey, seeing this, shuts his mouth and quivers in rage. Mercy brings a huge knife to bear and starts hacking into Christian over and over and over, each blow landing with a thud deep in the viscera and bone and withdrawing a crescent of blood when she rears back for another slice.

Madison is behind him now, leaning over to breathe her final challenge into his ear. It’s not real this time. But next time? Oh God, I’m hot just thinking about it.

Christian’s eyes suddenly open. He should be well past dead. He screams Corey’s name and Corey…and Corey….

Wakey, Wakey

Corey awakes to find himself laid out on the couch. He goes to get up, but finds that his head is pounding. Eventually, the scene takes shape around him. Paramedics are checking on a number of the residents. Dolly looks to be talking to a police officer.

What…what? He stammers, holding his head and trying to understand.

Corey!

His mind instantly flashed back to the horrific sight of his lover being hacked to pieces, but Christian was alive and well but decidedly concerned. He takes a seat at Corey’s side, grabbing one of his hands in his. You’re up.

Corey blinked back against the dull throb in his head. Christian, what happened?

Somebody spiked the punch, Corey.

Corey smirks. What?

No, I’m serious. The deathly expression on Christian’s face confirmed it. The paramedics think it was some kind of hallucinagen, maybe peyote. They’re testing it now.

Wait…you're serious?! Corey shot up into a full and upright position. Holy fuck, the kids? Did the kids…?!

Christian pursed his lips together. They took a few of them to the hospital. They think they’re going to be okay.

Corey covered his face in his hands. Mother fucking hell….then, uncovering his face, WHO?!

We don’t know. That’s what the cops are working on right now. But Corey, there were so many people here in costume, we may never….

Mr. Smith. The authoritative quality in his voice identified him as a plain clothes detective. A familiar one too. Detective Bascombe.

Corey looked up at him. Yeah, I remember.

Do you need to get checked out by one of the medics?

No, not right now. Look, detective….

Corey I don’t think I need to tell you what a shit show this is.

I… he lowered his voice and his gaze. I know.

There are three children in the hospital after ingesting a probable narcotic in your home. Two more adults, and maybe some more on the way.

But it’s not his fault! Christian pleaded.

Let’s not pretend this is the first time I’ve been here. Bascombe’s expression was stony. How Corey wished that were untrue, but with a fatality on the commune no more than a few months ago, he was completely in the right. We had to make a report with Child Protective Services.

Those kid’s parents could not have possibly known what would happen.

The report is against you.

The damning statement was like a knife plunging deep into his chest. Corey’s hands fumbled in his lap, and he leaned forward a bit as though the oxygen in his body was escaping him, causing him to deflate. Oh….

Christian stood up. You can’t do this!

I have to. What else would you have me do? This place is becoming a hub of trouble. The neighbors have certainly started to take notice, not to mention the whole department.

I’ll figure out a way to make this right! Corey recovered, speaking resolutely.

The detective sighed. Look, I don’t think you’re a bad kid. But this is starting to be….well, a little too much. I hope whatever you intend is well within the parameters of the law however. We’ll be checking in regularly. Good evening, Mr. Smith.

Corey watched the detective go, and Christian sat back down on his haunches and grabbed Corey’s hand again. Baby, I’m so sorry.

I’m going to make it right. I’m going to make it right.

Now

And I’m still working on making it right. Halloween may be done and over, but the Holiday this year left me with one hell of a trick. Lotta candy left over too. Not too many kiddos came. A pause. I guess I can’t blame them.

But this isn’t about my troubles, Elijah. I mean, you sort of ARE a trouble. But on my shit list lately you definitely rank more towards the bottom than anything else. For a goon who was root toot tootin’ about how bad he was going to beat my ass, there hasn’t been a whole lot of follow up, has there?

Yeah, yeah, I’m not one of those guys who makes the association that talk equals toughness. But as new as you are, and being given an opportunity like this so early in your tenure, you’d think this would be the perfect time to start staking out your brand. A brand that, so far, seems more like a dime store Thoreau than anything remotely resembling a credible threat to my championship. What concept are you going to wax on about next? Dignity? Integrity? Resilience? I’m thinking you have little more than a passing acquaintance with those topics.

But while we’re getting literary here, I’m reminded of one of my favorite quotes from my favorite poet Walt Whitman.

“These are the days that must happen to you.”

It’s a laden statement, for sure. But my read on it? That nobody goes through life without a bit of the “hello darkness, my old friend. “ Some people have more than others. I’ve had an usually high amount of that darkness. But over these years of loss and suffering; all these years of gathering…ghosts....I like to think I’ve built up a well spring of resilience. Just when I think I can’t take anymore I endure.

And those bad days? They have to happen. They need to happen. They’re formative. I know you don’t know this Elijah, but I was once given the opportunity to forget my bad days. I almost leapt at the chance. But in the end, I chose to hold them even more tightly than the good. Because that fire is what burned away so much of the weakness that characterized my early life.

And I know you’ll probably like to think you’re one of those bad days for me. But you won’t be. Compared to some of the shit I’ve already waded through, you’re a paltry road bump on my evolutionary highway. You showed in your first promo that you were ignorant of who I was and what I was about. You thought you could break me, humble me. But what you fail to realize is that I’ve already been broken. Multiple times. And then put together. Multiple times. And each time those cracks and fissures hardnened into tougher stuff.

In other words, I now thank God for those days that had to happen. And..heh….yeah, those days are still coming. And I’m going to do what I always do. Respond. Adapt. Change. And grow stronger.

What YOU need to do is ask yourself if you can be worse than one of those bad days? Because that’s what it’s gonna take to strip this championship from my grasp. When all else fails and my world is spinning out of control, the XWF (for better or for worse), is often a bedrock for me. THIS title, is a bedrock for me. A constant. And thus far I have seen nothing to suggest that you have the gumption to add to my list of all time worse days and take this from me.

But I’ll be there as I always am tomorrow night. Ready, willing and able to see if I should let it ride on that assumption or not. But me? I think my moneys safe. And by money, I mean king size candy bars in lieu of cash. God help me…there’s just so, SO many….

Just after the party….

Away from all the chaos and calamity, Corey Smith steals away to his room and takes out his cell phone. With a tremulous grip, though whether it was from fear or the after effects of the drugs still swimming about in his system, he punched in a number he was loathe to call.

Shockingly, Theo Pryce picked up after a couple rings.

Yeah, Theo. It’s uh, it’s Corey. I have a favor to ask. Do you still have any contacts at Decima Security? A pause follows. Yeah, I think I’m going to need some help….