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SpineTwister · **01-10-2015, 07:34 PM**

SIMON LYSTER, “THE SPINE TWISTER,” back home in London, stands in a dimly lit room, reading over a compilation of various clippings and transcripts. Even in the low light, the name “C.C. HOLLYWOOD” can be seen underlined in red several times. The background sound is muted, but groans and sighs can be dimly heard in the peripheral shadows.

LYSTER turns to and addresses the camera.

“My apologies, Mr .HOLLYWOOD. I’ve been in the Far East dealing with a few trivial affairs – affairs, though, that might intersect with your own. But you’ve made some incisive comments that merit my attention and, when appropriate, rebuttal.

“I compiled these comments from several unrelated sources, so forgive any inaccuracies. The gist, however, seems to pertain to our upcoming battle royale and your… flattering?... description of me as a… how did you put it… ‘trophy kill.’

The camera pans in, tight close-up of LYSTER’s head.

“Thought I’d give you a good view of my head on the screen for your benefit. After all, if I’m to be your trophy kill, it’s only polite to let you change screen backgrounds… toggle color profiles. See how my complexion might match your paneling and drapes. There are protocols to these things.

“Since this is our first time conversing, I’ll begin by saying: I’m rather glad to be facing you, Mr. HOLLYWOOD.

“You're nothing like me, and don't presume to make the comparison. But I respect you.

“As I noted: Smarter than you look.

“Refreshingly free of the superstitious drivel that plagues this federation.” LYSTER snorts. “’Prophetic Belt of the Almighty Higher Power.' It's beyond absurd. I agree with you: I'd rather fight you one on one, man to man, without the extraneous window dressing. You deserve a more dignified end.

“An end nonetheless, but not over such a chavvy little trinket.”

LYSTER gestures upward. The camera pans to a flat-screen monitor displaying footage of C.C. HOLLYWOOD’s tag team victory at Monday Madness, then back down to LYSTER.

“I observed your out-of-the-gate win, and I take you seriously. Between you and me... let's just say I have my itinerary for this match, and you might be honored... and should be terrified... by your place on it.

“And yet... I’m in the business of identifying and capitalizing on weaknesses, so if you’ll forgive me: For all your jadedness in matters of faith, you still hold up one false idol: Pride.

“First off: Sorry to say, but the presence or absence of your pride is of no great consequence to me. I’m not here to break men’s pride. I’m here to break their backs. There are plenty of proud men in disability wards. They’re still cripples.

“That said, pride is the undertow of the waters in which I swim. Bondage, domination, submission, masochism, humiliations voluntary and involuntary: my stock in trade. So believe you me, I can play pride like a Stradivarius violin.

“What I’ve discovered: Everyone has pride until they...”

The camera pans back to reveal that LYSTER is standing in Room 101’s central dungeon, a combination of fetish sex parlor and torture chamber. Under UV lights, DOMINATRIXES abuse naked, groveling clients of all ages, genders, body types. Naked CUPBEARERS, eyes and ears surgically excised, limbs permanently broken, amputated, or both, stumble around the scene, in their remaining good limbs carrying goblets of semen, vomit, pus, piss, shit, menstrual blood and discharge, pouring them on the floor to be lapped up, eagerly or otherwise. Restraints, ropes, chains, manacles hold squirming lumps of meat. Orifices are stretched to capacity, ruptured, eviscerated, prolapsed. In a scene out of Dante’s Inferno, victims are restrained, harnessed, strapped into contraptions resembling medieval torture devices, undergoing agonizing mutilations. One victim’s eyeball has been pulled from its socket, dangling down the face on the optic nerve, letting him get an unobstructed view of his penectomy. The volume increases, allowing screams of pain, pleasure, or both combined to be heard.

“...don't.

“What else I’ve discovered: Pride is far, far from an unalloyed virtue.

“The prideful come to me. The elite of Europe beg me to break them. The brunt of these crippled things?” LYSTER waves a hand to encompass the dungeon space. “They sought me out of their own accord. They pleaded with me to throw off the encumbering weight of their pride and their spines, to take their place they craved, as slugs under my heel.”

Camera pans down to LYSTER’s HUMAN MAGGOTS: featureless, seemingly genderless, flopping things in full-body rubber suits, genitals and breasts amputated, encased in body braces, crippled, unable to rise, only to squirm across the floor. They writhe around LYSTER affectionately, raising their broken bodies off the ground like attention-seeking dogs.

“Every one of these things is where and what it is because of pride.

LYSTER points to a particular MAGGOT.

“That one? Minister of Parliament, House of Lords. He got entangled in the American military-industrial complex, and he sent some fine British meat to die in a sandy shithole. Someone more pragmatic would have shrugged it off as… well, natural selection. But he was proud, and the widows and orphans wailed. He was broken long before he came to me.

LYSTER points again.

“Her? Ran a credit-derivatives portfolio for a Swiss-based consortium. Lost it all. Anyone with a grain of sense knows the global economy is a casino. Not your money, they knew the risks, shrug your shoulders, move on. Oh, but she had her pride. Had to be the smartest in the room. Like all the rest: Snap. Pop. Broken. And now she licks the secretions off my floor.

And again.

“Him? Bishop in the Anglican Church… you can guess where this is going. He was proud, you see, and couldn't reconcile his dual nature -- Jekyll at the pulpit, Hyde at the youth retreat. He doesn't have to bear his burden anymore. I ended his pain.”

LYSTER shrugs.

“All this has left me less than convinced of pride’s utility in advancing one’s position in the world. So I cast it out of my brainspace and fill the vacuum with more useful governing principles.

“As I told a previous opponent, the four tenets of my credo are: strength, flesh, leverage, and pain. All of which, to a greater or lesser degree, can be quantified.

“So let's talk numbers.

“For our match, here are the numbers with which you should be most concerned: 67 and 33.

“Conveniently, they add to 100. About a two-third/one-third split. Roughly mirroring your odds of each outcome, I think.

“67: The number of judo throws in the Kodokan method, in which, as mentioned, I have a black belt. I'm retraining in them, modifying their arcs and parabolas to facilitate over-the-top-rope ejections instead of mat takedowns. As I've noted before, I outweigh you by 30 kil-- 65 pounds....

“Sorry -- I've gotten used to converting from the metric system for the benefit of the peanut gallery. I suspect I don't need to condescend to you in that manner. Nonetheless, the point being: You'll go where I want you to go.

“You draw one of the 67, you get lucky. But, as you said, luck is for losers. So you lose. Down to the concrete and, for the time being, nothing broken but your vaunted pride.

“It's the 33 that should concern you. If you've been stalking me as some kind of trophy kill as you claim, then you might hazard a guess as to that number's significance. Bingo: the number of vertebrae in your spinal column.”

Camera pans to a flat-screen monitor. A CGI scan of a human spinal column appears, a red arrow pointing to a particular spot on the lower portion of the structure.

“Like I said: I respect you. So, should your number come up, here's the killshot: L-4. Fourth lumbar vertebra.” The CGI scans in for a close-up view of the vertebra and its surrounding cartilaginous disks.

Back to LYSTER.

“Body vise portion of the Paralyzer, at your weight of 90 kilos, let’s see… 14% body fat…

“…you should lay off the Waffle House, by the way…

“…hooks in at Achilles tendons, arc the hips... let's say 81-degree counterclockwise rotation. One smooth, sharp twist, and then...

“Pop goes your career.

“Nothing unnatural about this selection, Mr. HOLLYWOOD. Classic Darwinism. Selection of an eminently natural variety, another Serengeti drama. Like all the rest that have been played out over the past billion years.

“The interesting thing about targeting L-4, though, is that it will leave you a paraplegic, not a quadriplegic. Your wrestling dream over before it begins, of course, and you confined to a wheelchair, but with the use of your hands.

“You're a smart man, Mr. HOLLYWOOD. No point in having it all go to waste. My GIMPS are... what they are, and they do an indifferent job of cataloguing and cross-referencing the data I use to formulate strategies. Making the intuitive connections between disparate facts that lead to the dossiers and clips I need. You can have abject slaves or you can have self-starters, but rarely both. Good help, hard to find, you know the drill.

“Therefore, once you heal, I’ve resolved to offer you a position as my chief archivist. Competitive compensation and… fringe benefits like you wouldn’t believe. London's disability-friendly and pleasant in the fall.

“Think of it as an opportunity. For an opportunist.”

The SUBMISSIVES enter the frame: one sliding in to LYSTER's right, one to LYSTER's left, the third crawling into the frame from below to wrap herself around LYSTER's legs. They are, to be fair, smoking hot if you're into the tatted/pierced/suicide-girl look, and they're nearly naked except for latex straps and their medical support braces.

The effect is blunted by the fact that all wear full latex masks airbrushed with the facial features of C.C. HOLLYWOOD.

SUBMISSIVE #1: “One of us.”
SUBMISSIVE #2: “One of us.”
SUBMISSIVE #3: “One of us.”
SUBMISSIVES [all]: “One of us.”

LYSTER casts a disdainful eye around the scenes in the torture chamber.

“But… yes… broken…”

SUBMISSIVES [all]: "...like all the rest."

[fade to black]

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