08-17-2013, 01:35 PM
White. Just a blank, white slate. That's all that can be seen, and it's a pretty fair representation of Tony Santos's life at this current time.
The camera rotates down at close to 180 degrees to see Tony, laying in his hotel bed in San Diego, California, staring at a white ceiling. Yup, just a white ceiling. Bruised and battered from head to toe following the beating that he took against Elisha on Warfare just a few days prior, Santos isn't feeling quite so invigorated this morning. His arms are taped up from wrist to bicep, his abdominal area is a sea of holes, engulfed by purple bruises and yellow puss, and his face stitched up and covered in bandages
He had a face that not even a mother could love... if he had a mother capable of loving him at all.
Tony just lays on his back, staring at the ceiling. Not a care in the world, and not having a reason or desire to move. He was just, idle, and he was okay with that. All of the travelling that he'd done over the past few months, all of the hard-fought matches (both inside and outside the ring), and all of the recent wrangling with management about how when he'd be receiving those frequently delinquent paychecks for a once thriving XWF show, well, they'd all managed to drain the life and energy out of Tony Santos.
He still wasn't over the laugher of a title reign that he had with the Xtreme Championship, a belt which he won from, and subsequently lost to, Stevie Tyler.
He was getting pretty fired up and disgruntled by management's decision to plop him solely in San Diego, in The War Room. Sure, the reason behind this was fair: Wallace Witasick was vanquished from the XWF, and out the door with him went his deep pockets. The money wasn't there, so this was a way to both remove excess travel expenses from the company's books, as well as create that "cult feel" that Paul Heyman seemed to have lost the ability to replicate.
But Tony hated it. He hated 70 degree weather and everything that came with it. Sunshine. Warmth. Happiness. Those motherfucking flip flops that drag against the concrete. He wanted to see the US. He wanted to be able to make his way to Boston. He wanted cold, the sweet, bitter cold. There's no better feeling than smoking a fresh Marlboro Black, then exhaling and seeing the smoke travel through the air in one steady stream.
But he wasn't in Boston. He wasn't enjoying a crisp day in October or an "it's so cold your hands look like they could burst at any moment" day in January. Nope, he was lying in a bed in San Diego, barely able to move, wondering whether this was the place for him.
*Knock knock knock*
His hotel door is thrusted backwards slightly at the impact of a closed fist hitting it. Tony, in too much pain to move, considers just ignoring the person behind the door...
*KNOCK... KNOCK... KNOCK*
But by the sound of it, this is someone who, while already becoming quite impatient after only a few seconds of acknowledgment of his knocking, is probably persistent enough that he won't be leaving until the door is answered. Thoughts bounce around in Tony's head...
Who the hell could that be?
Elisha? That lunatic might be coming over just to finish me off. Nah, couldn't be him. He's too busy gnawing on a body part or something.
Shannon? Did the kid tell her about my god damn "activities" while I've been on the road? That son of a bitch! I'll end him if Shannon's here to rip off a testicle...
Wait, wait, that guy in New York... the one who I knocked out in his little greaser bar a month or so ago... Did he remember it was me? Did he really report me? Shit, fuck, shit, shit. I can't go to jail, not now, not EVER. They don't serve beer in jail, do they? They do barter with cigarettes, so at least I'd be able to smoke... shit, I can't SMOKE the currency! Then I'd have no currency to buy MORE cigarettes, which, shit, even if I DID have the smokes to buy more smokes, I wouldn't be able to smoke THOSE smokes either. Damn it, jail sounds horrible.
But wait, what if it's...
*KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK... KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK... KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK*
No time to stall, this person was clearly not in the mood for waiting. Santos painfully but swiftly lifted himself from his bed. Every bone in his body hurt, and he let out a loud groan to make it known to the person attempting to knock down his door. Wiping from drool from the corner of his lip, Tony staggered toward the door, using whatever was near him as a crutch: a table, a dresser, hell, a barely stable ironing board was enough to keep him stable enough to not crumble to the ground and introduce him to a world of pain that he'd never considered possible.
Reaching the door, a man's heavy, nasally breathing can be heard from the other end.
Santos: Oh boy, we got a porker.
Tony peaks through the peephole and, yes, there was in fact a "porker" on the other side of that door. Standing at 6'4" and 315 pounds, this was a man who, based on his powerful knocks, could likely crush Santos on Tony's best day, let alone in his current condition. His bald head and black polo shirt give him the stereotypical look of your run-of-the-mill nightclub bouncer. As Tony turned the doorknob, he figured it was best to put on a good face and not anger the man in front of him.
Santos: What the fuck do you want, fatboy?
Or not.
Fatboy Porker: I have a letter for you. Was told it had to be hand-delivered to you. You Tony Santos?
Tony reaches for the letter.
Santos: Yup, that's me. Are you Peter Gilmour?
The man just rolls his eyes at Tony and hands him the letter. Maybe this guy isn't prone to bouts of rage after all. Good for Tony, considering how incredibly antagonistic he managed to be in only two sentences and a total of 20 seconds of interaction.
Tony starts to close the door, only to have the man stop him with his abnormally large hand. Think of a block of concrete with fat wrinkles. Yeah, that's about what it looked and acted like.
Fatboy Porker: Almost forgot.
The man pulls another letter out of his back right pocket. The envelope encasing it bears the insignia of the hotel.
Fatboy Porker: Have a nice day.
Tony, not reacting to the man's pleasantries, slams the door. He tears open the first, blank envelope, which only bears the name "TONY SANTOS" on the front. Attempting to pull the letter out of the envelope, he notices a used piece of chewing gum stuck to the letter. He struggles to pull the letter out of the envelope because of this lovely side gift, and, after finally yanking the letter out of the envelope, he notices that he's also torn off the portion of the letter that was stuck to the chewing gum.
Santos: Classy.
The letter reads:
Due to your recent behavior in the Warfare locker room, as well as our inability (and unwillingness) to pay you, and also because you're terrible, please accept this letter on behalf of the entire Wednesday Night Warfare staff and roster to get the hell off of our show. You've been traded to Monday Night Madness PERMANENTLY. In return, we were able to get this nice piece of Big League Chew. We figured you'd like to taste the spoils of our dealings after, so we included our compensation for you with this letter. Enjoy!
Sincerely,
Dick Hunt
P.S. You're an asshat.
Tony, taken aback by the tone of the letter in his hands, just grunts, a look of disgust on his face.
Santos: Good! I hated them anyway! Now I get to hang with the likes of... Paul Heyman? Luca? Satellite? Damn it, this is NOT what I signed up for.
Tony tosses the letter on his bed, turning his attention to the hotel envelope in his hand. Tearing that envelope open, he yanks this much more professional-looking letter out and reads its contents.
Dear Mr. Santos,
We have been informed by your employer that you have been terminated. Since your room is being rented indefinitely by the staff of Wednesday Night Warfare, we have been ordered to have you removed from the premises immediately. Please gather your belongings and check out by 2pm PDT.
Thank you for staying at the Days Inn. We hope you'll come back soon!
Tony, stunned at this recent turn of events, looks around, eyes fluttering around the room, trying to understand this incredible turn of events. He opens his mouth, ready to articulately and emphatically express his current thoughts on the matter...
Santos: Shit!
The scene fades to black.
The camera rotates down at close to 180 degrees to see Tony, laying in his hotel bed in San Diego, California, staring at a white ceiling. Yup, just a white ceiling. Bruised and battered from head to toe following the beating that he took against Elisha on Warfare just a few days prior, Santos isn't feeling quite so invigorated this morning. His arms are taped up from wrist to bicep, his abdominal area is a sea of holes, engulfed by purple bruises and yellow puss, and his face stitched up and covered in bandages
He had a face that not even a mother could love... if he had a mother capable of loving him at all.
Tony just lays on his back, staring at the ceiling. Not a care in the world, and not having a reason or desire to move. He was just, idle, and he was okay with that. All of the travelling that he'd done over the past few months, all of the hard-fought matches (both inside and outside the ring), and all of the recent wrangling with management about how when he'd be receiving those frequently delinquent paychecks for a once thriving XWF show, well, they'd all managed to drain the life and energy out of Tony Santos.
He still wasn't over the laugher of a title reign that he had with the Xtreme Championship, a belt which he won from, and subsequently lost to, Stevie Tyler.
He was getting pretty fired up and disgruntled by management's decision to plop him solely in San Diego, in The War Room. Sure, the reason behind this was fair: Wallace Witasick was vanquished from the XWF, and out the door with him went his deep pockets. The money wasn't there, so this was a way to both remove excess travel expenses from the company's books, as well as create that "cult feel" that Paul Heyman seemed to have lost the ability to replicate.
But Tony hated it. He hated 70 degree weather and everything that came with it. Sunshine. Warmth. Happiness. Those motherfucking flip flops that drag against the concrete. He wanted to see the US. He wanted to be able to make his way to Boston. He wanted cold, the sweet, bitter cold. There's no better feeling than smoking a fresh Marlboro Black, then exhaling and seeing the smoke travel through the air in one steady stream.
But he wasn't in Boston. He wasn't enjoying a crisp day in October or an "it's so cold your hands look like they could burst at any moment" day in January. Nope, he was lying in a bed in San Diego, barely able to move, wondering whether this was the place for him.
*Knock knock knock*
His hotel door is thrusted backwards slightly at the impact of a closed fist hitting it. Tony, in too much pain to move, considers just ignoring the person behind the door...
*KNOCK... KNOCK... KNOCK*
But by the sound of it, this is someone who, while already becoming quite impatient after only a few seconds of acknowledgment of his knocking, is probably persistent enough that he won't be leaving until the door is answered. Thoughts bounce around in Tony's head...
Who the hell could that be?
Elisha? That lunatic might be coming over just to finish me off. Nah, couldn't be him. He's too busy gnawing on a body part or something.
Shannon? Did the kid tell her about my god damn "activities" while I've been on the road? That son of a bitch! I'll end him if Shannon's here to rip off a testicle...
Wait, wait, that guy in New York... the one who I knocked out in his little greaser bar a month or so ago... Did he remember it was me? Did he really report me? Shit, fuck, shit, shit. I can't go to jail, not now, not EVER. They don't serve beer in jail, do they? They do barter with cigarettes, so at least I'd be able to smoke... shit, I can't SMOKE the currency! Then I'd have no currency to buy MORE cigarettes, which, shit, even if I DID have the smokes to buy more smokes, I wouldn't be able to smoke THOSE smokes either. Damn it, jail sounds horrible.
But wait, what if it's...
*KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK... KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK... KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK*
No time to stall, this person was clearly not in the mood for waiting. Santos painfully but swiftly lifted himself from his bed. Every bone in his body hurt, and he let out a loud groan to make it known to the person attempting to knock down his door. Wiping from drool from the corner of his lip, Tony staggered toward the door, using whatever was near him as a crutch: a table, a dresser, hell, a barely stable ironing board was enough to keep him stable enough to not crumble to the ground and introduce him to a world of pain that he'd never considered possible.
Reaching the door, a man's heavy, nasally breathing can be heard from the other end.
Santos: Oh boy, we got a porker.
Tony peaks through the peephole and, yes, there was in fact a "porker" on the other side of that door. Standing at 6'4" and 315 pounds, this was a man who, based on his powerful knocks, could likely crush Santos on Tony's best day, let alone in his current condition. His bald head and black polo shirt give him the stereotypical look of your run-of-the-mill nightclub bouncer. As Tony turned the doorknob, he figured it was best to put on a good face and not anger the man in front of him.
Santos: What the fuck do you want, fatboy?
Or not.
Fatboy Porker: I have a letter for you. Was told it had to be hand-delivered to you. You Tony Santos?
Tony reaches for the letter.
Santos: Yup, that's me. Are you Peter Gilmour?
The man just rolls his eyes at Tony and hands him the letter. Maybe this guy isn't prone to bouts of rage after all. Good for Tony, considering how incredibly antagonistic he managed to be in only two sentences and a total of 20 seconds of interaction.
Tony starts to close the door, only to have the man stop him with his abnormally large hand. Think of a block of concrete with fat wrinkles. Yeah, that's about what it looked and acted like.
Fatboy Porker: Almost forgot.
The man pulls another letter out of his back right pocket. The envelope encasing it bears the insignia of the hotel.
Fatboy Porker: Have a nice day.
Tony, not reacting to the man's pleasantries, slams the door. He tears open the first, blank envelope, which only bears the name "TONY SANTOS" on the front. Attempting to pull the letter out of the envelope, he notices a used piece of chewing gum stuck to the letter. He struggles to pull the letter out of the envelope because of this lovely side gift, and, after finally yanking the letter out of the envelope, he notices that he's also torn off the portion of the letter that was stuck to the chewing gum.
Santos: Classy.
The letter reads:
Due to your recent behavior in the Warfare locker room, as well as our inability (and unwillingness) to pay you, and also because you're terrible, please accept this letter on behalf of the entire Wednesday Night Warfare staff and roster to get the hell off of our show. You've been traded to Monday Night Madness PERMANENTLY. In return, we were able to get this nice piece of Big League Chew. We figured you'd like to taste the spoils of our dealings after, so we included our compensation for you with this letter. Enjoy!
Sincerely,
Dick Hunt
P.S. You're an asshat.
Tony, taken aback by the tone of the letter in his hands, just grunts, a look of disgust on his face.
Santos: Good! I hated them anyway! Now I get to hang with the likes of... Paul Heyman? Luca? Satellite? Damn it, this is NOT what I signed up for.
Tony tosses the letter on his bed, turning his attention to the hotel envelope in his hand. Tearing that envelope open, he yanks this much more professional-looking letter out and reads its contents.
Dear Mr. Santos,
We have been informed by your employer that you have been terminated. Since your room is being rented indefinitely by the staff of Wednesday Night Warfare, we have been ordered to have you removed from the premises immediately. Please gather your belongings and check out by 2pm PDT.
Thank you for staying at the Days Inn. We hope you'll come back soon!
Tony, stunned at this recent turn of events, looks around, eyes fluttering around the room, trying to understand this incredible turn of events. He opens his mouth, ready to articulately and emphatically express his current thoughts on the matter...
Santos: Shit!
The scene fades to black.