I’m no expert, that’s for sure, at least not about things like that… but man, I have been around the block a time or two and seen things that make you believe it.
Things come around full circle a lot of the time, you know? Like an ourobouros, the snake that devours itself, or the way the phoenix rises from its own ashes every time it’s consumed by flame.
Not you, Ghost Tank, shut up.
The thing is though, I believe things come around again so that we have a chance to make it right. If we only ever got one shot at things… well, we’d never get the chance to be better, would we?
Doctor Louis D’Ville calls himself the king of the XWF. It’s a title he won in a tournament I didn’t take part in. It’s an empty crown.
Why? Because since Doc has been on top of the XWF, the entire thing has gone into the shitter. Look around. Look at the mass exodus of talent from these halls. My friend Gator’s gone, after what Doc did to him. The Three Kings? All retired or on hiatus. Eli James is gone. Even newer notable names like Austin Fernando or Justin Sane… the guys who were supposed to be the bright future of the XWF… gone.
Shit, even Maverick left. Let that sink in. MAVERICK has better things to do than spend his time in the XWF.
When you have a dictator sitting at the top and calling all the shots, you lose what makes you great.
Listen, I’m an American, and I’m a proud one. My father took a bullet in a Vietnamese jungle and he reminded me every day of his life that he was a tougher son of a bitch than I could ever hope to be. And you know what? He was right. I wouldn’t have wanted to fight him even on his deathbed. He knew about heart, about the fight, and about the desire for freedom and independence that pumps the blood through the heart of every American out there.
And you know what every American has in common, Doc?
We don’t much care for kings.
Like I said, man, history has a way of repeating itself. In 1776, we were born as a country when we told King George of England to fuck off. We invented freedom, man. We inspired nations across the world to overthrow kings and czars and emperors, just to be more like us.
When France lopped the head off of their king, they did it because they wanted to be more like the United States of America, they wanted to be GREAT. England did it. Russia did it. The list goes on and on.
Now here we are again… full circle… the denizens of the XWF writhing like dying bugs under the thumb of a despot. One who hides behind his Asylum and has them pick apart his would-be enemies until there’s nothing left but a few stray chunks of meat on weary bones.
Like he tried, and failed, to do to me.
All the king’s horses and all the king’s men… couldn’t do shit to stop the ascent of the megastar as he shoots across the sky, brighter than the sun and higher than the heavens. You got friends and enemies of mine alike in on it, dude, guys like Mastermind and Ghost Tank... You got teammates of mine, like Harrison and Frodo, along with the biggest hunk of useless hired muscle in the entire federation in Dim.
But guess who’s still here? And guess who’s still gonna be looking you right in that one good eye of yours come Saturday night, Doc?
Make no bones about it, Doc, I’m coming for the one prize you have that means anything. I’m not only going to throw that big gold belt over my shoulder and hold it over my head for myself, but also to symbolically carry the entire XWF on my back and bring it back to the heights it once enjoyed, before your medieval reign of impotence began. Before you sat your ass in the throne and took a shit all over the legacy that this company has always represented.
The best of the best.
The future.
We haven’t been able to claim that in months, Doc. Not since you showed up and set your sights on the top of the mountain.
Tomorrow night? We take it back.
Tomorrow night, we drag the XWF out of the shadows and back into the light, letting it breathe easy and free like it always has before.
Tomorrow night, we come out of the dark ages, lit up by a shooting star.
A megastar.
No more puppet masters, no more asylums… no more kings.
Funny… they say that heavy is the head that wears the crown. You must be feeling that weight about now, huh Doc? The crushing girth of all that hollow emptiness sitting atop that bald dome of yours. A symbol of an old world, one where you maybe had an ounce of relevance. One that’s dead.
All that’s in that crown now is nothing.
Oh, don’t worry, Doc, you can keep the crown. It means nothing anyway. You can run around calling yourself the king until your pacemaker fails and you end up face down in a puddle of Extra Strength Ensure… it won’t matter to me. The world will know who the best is, dude.
The world will have its champion, and it will have one it can respect and admire.
See man, for a long time your little mind games even worked on me. The way you get in there and make everyone feel inferior by capitalizing on one or two little mistakes they make. You’re good, Doc, don’t get me wrong, you’re definitely good. But you made your name squeaking by, not by being this unbeatable god that so many seem to see you as.
Yeah, you had me going. When I feel short to you in September, I bought into the hype. I figured, hell, he beat me, he MUST be the second coming… but when I re-watch that match now, dude, I just see a version of “Loverboy†Vinnie Lane that didn’t do enough to win, not a Doc D’Ville that couldn’t be beat.
When I watched your matches with TJ Wallace and Aerial Knight, or with Gator, or even with Mastermind… I saw you for what you are. A guy who backpedals when he’s outclassed and takes advantage of an overzealous opponent like Gator, or an alleged ‘champion’ who makes sure he only gets in the ring with opponents who have no business challenging him to begin with.
Once I opened my eyes, man, I realized your light wasn’t all that bright at all. And when I stared right into it, dude, and you saw me looking at you… you flinched first, didn’t you?
You, the champion, the unbeatable, the end boss, the big bad… you felt the need to insert yourself into my life with the Federweight Title. You felt the need to interject yourself by having your underlings abduct me and try to break my spirit the MOMENT I became your top contender. You felt the need to send out your hired thugs and try to wear me down leading up to this match. You felt the need to add weapons and a cage to the match to give you some sort of hope of using twisted steel to your advantage.
But Doc, dude, once again you forgot… you may be the king of the ring, but man, I’m king of the cage. I’ve done nothing but prove that over and over again since day one in the XWF, man.
You made a mistake.
Now you’re in a panic.
What are you going to do, Doc, when the cage is locked and you have no place left to run? No place left to hide? No one to cower behind? No mind games left to play? Because tomorrow night, dude? Tomorrow night it’s just you, me, and that Universal Championship that you’ve been dragging through the mud for way too long now.
There’s a tidal shift, Doc. A polar swap in the air. I know you sense the balance of power swaying as much as I do, dude. I know you can smell the ozone burning in the air. The hint of warmth on the night breeze. You’re stuck on the ground now like a dog howling at the moon, and I’m soaring overhead like a god damn eagle.
So what does the future hold for a shamed and discarded former champion? The wannabe who never really was? I bet we’ve seen the last of you, haven’t we? I bet after you’re deposed, the world is freed from this one of your many forms.
Someday, another dragon will rear its head, dude, and another white knight will come along and lay is asunder… it’s the way it’s always been.
It’s the cycle, come right back ‘round again.
History repeating itself over and over, the universe expanding and contracting like a god taking a deep breath.
And when all is said and done, dude, the universe always rights itself. The homeostasis of the great, big empty has a way of filtering out the bits of death and disease that get caught up in its karmic immune system.
Doc, tomorrow night you’re getting coughed out like the diseased phlegm that you are, and the prestige of the Universal Championship, and the XWF, will be brought back to the glory it knew before.
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