Post by mattknox on Jul 21, 2023 16:22:23 GMT
A deep breath caused his chest to rise, the unfamiliar weight of the hand upon it causing him temporary pause before the smell of flowers reached his nose. A smile cracked across his face as his eyes opened halfway, fingers already tracing a path through the shock of red hair splayed on the pillow next to his head. He leaned over, planting a gentle kiss upon her forehead before sliding out from under her arm and the blankets.
He stood as the lord made him for a moment beside the bed, taking a ginger step while trying to flex the feelings back into his hands. Before long, he stood in the shower beneath a stream of water hot enough to turn him a hue of red that matched the scalp of the form that joined him not long after he began to lather up.
Before long, the happy couple were walking down the stairs arm in arm. The squeal of children of varying ages, Hope’s voice trying to get them all to the table, Camryn’s happy squawks. It gave him pause halfway down the stairs. He couldn’t help the smile that plastered his face, the warmth coursing through the halls like a gentle fire on a frigid winter’s night.
If only he’d known how fortuitous that thought was going to be…
The memory of the morning that now felt like a memory from a life he never lived faded away to leave him where he’d been the whole time.
He stood staring at the blackened wreck of what had once been a happy home, then a tomb, and had finally slowly crawled itself back to being the former. Slow, measured steps through the wreckage brought him along a familiar path.
His feet stopped as his eyes came to rest upon the couch he’d been sitting in not long ago, explaining the intricacies of a 450 splash to his granddaughter who had far more interest in the kittens on the screen of her tablet. The warmth of the memory felt perverse now as he stared at the ahsen ruin left to pervert the sight of such a tender moment.
He tore his gaze away, heading for the den where Terrella had been. He forced his gaze to stay ahead and low as he willed himself past the scorched husk of what had once been AJ’s nursery, before she left. It had since become a playroom and overnight nursery for Camryn. Once, it had been Hope’s room.
And when he first came to know it, it was his own.
He sucked in a breath, trying to steady himself. The smoke choked him, but he wouldn’t give the world the satisfaction of hearing him do so. His form passed through a doorframe that should have led to the deep red walls, old cast iron light fixtures and a recliner that hadn’t moved since the moon landed beside an old record player.
The hearth behind the spot where the chair had been still stood proud, if scorched. He walked to it, brushing fingers over the warm ashen surface before letting out a humorless chuckle, turning to the pile of rubble behind him where Terrella had thrown the picture that had once been the centerpiece.
His biological father had been gone since before he had a grasp on the english language, but he’d had Hugh….Dad…since he was twelve. Inseparable for the rest of the old man’s time, he used to make fun of Matthew and the comments they’d get on resemblance.
“Oh, the boy? Ain’t mine..reckon it’s like a dog, innit? You spend enough time and it begins lookin’ loike its ownuh!” he could hear the thick cockney accent and the scratchy laugh that shouldn’t have boomed for how thin it was.
As he stared almost feebly at the pile of burnt debris, he couldn’t help but feel a pang in his chest. Stephen Terrella…Angel Blake. It had to be connected. God, why hadn’t he ended it when he could have? Cracked that blonde bitch’s head open and then break Terrella’s back. It was right there.
Why didn’t he plunge that lance into Angel’s heart at Wrestlestock?
If not him, why didn’t someone do something about this before it got this bad??
He knelt, seeing the dull silver of the frame and began to brush feebly at it as he felt his pocket vibrate again. He reached one hand into his pocket, producing a phone with the photo ofa gorgeous french red head staring at him. He ran his thumb over her face, before letting out a sigh and hitting the green ‘Answer’ button.
I shouldn’t have to be doing what I'm doing.
But here the fuck I am.
Cleaning up your goddamn mess, James.
Suppose we should start a few steps back, in the lead up to our one meeting where I did my best to protect your worthless ass from Wraith’s dollar store machinations. You, either in that promo or the one that followed, showed me the entire sum of your worth when you addressed him, James.
Calling out all the disparaging comments about Wraith’s effort to legacy ratio. Getting on your knees to worship at his altar of nepotism. It was fucking pathetic considering what you put yourself forward as, what you claim to be openly to the masses and to the boys in the back.
I’ve been meaning to ask…was it one of them that upped the Missus’ duff?
That’s rough, man…but it’s a risk. Not for them, though. You don’t exactly inspire fear or much of anything else in the hearts of your fellow competitors after all.
Anyway..I digress. Where was I? Right. Your image.
You carry yourself as this one eyed patron saint of wisdom in the biz. IWF’s resident old wise man.
‘There goes James Gilmore, he sure was something once.’
What it was, no one can really say. Sure you scaled the mountain twice, and didn’t do a thing. Sure you got a pinfall on Angel Blake but that’s fallen out of trend now that i’ve done it too, you see. It meant something for you though, meant something to you. Might still for all I know.
Do you want to know what it means to me, James?
It means that you failed. You were in the position that I’ve thrust myself into, and you fucking failed to live up to the expectations such a position brings.
….Suppose that calls back to your marriage too, eh?
In all seriousness though, James. If you had done your fucking job. If you had shown that you were half the brawler, half the tough guy, half the man you claim to be? Angel Blake would have been snuffed out as little more than a damn fine main event talent that had his moment but faded into obscurity.
But no…You failed. You failed, and his ascension went unopposed. You, too, fell in line afterwards. Bending the knee to the fucking twisted family dynasty that stalks children, burns homes, burns businesses, ruins lives and keeps all the glory circulating amongst themselves.
You kiss their feet, so they can let you call yourself a legend.
You let them make you lesser.
And you weren’t much to begin with, James.
Where you have failed, I will capitalize. Where you faltered, I will endure and see this through to the end. And when I bend the knee it will only be to lift the severed heads of the snakes and show those trying to make a name for themselves, to carve out a future in IWF that they may now do so because the dawn has come and the old monsters have all gone to rot.
You will rot with them, James. Because of your failure you will rot. Failure that took a home from my grandkids, that took a gym from the Keeton’s. Your failure has given a little girl, innocent of all of this, nightmares to add on to the countless other terrors of childhood. Because you are so small of a man, so unimpressive in your feeble fucking might.
Your weakness cost so many so much.
And now, It falls to me to make it right.
How do I make it right? How do I avenge my people, and punish the proud weakling all in one stroke?
Charity.
This open challenge you leapt upon, looking to prove something? Will be one of the last acts of charity to you and your legacy.
The final act will be your absolute destruction, by mine own hand.
You Fought.
You Failed.
And Now, I will put you to Rest.
I am Raze.
I am Ruin.
I am The Raven.
I am Invictus Totalus.
And the Bloody Assizes have convened to pass down your summary judgement, James Gilmore. In absence of any peers, you have been judged by your superiors as Guilty…and your sentence, to be handed out immediately?
Oblivion.
Years ago..
The hulking figure on the left opened the door for the smaller, daintier woman. She turned, gloved hand coming to caress his face and kiss the crown of his head. She bid him goodnight, telling Hugh to ‘show the boy around then’...
Here voice was distant..
In truth, he never had much time to get to know her voice…
“You can relax now, son..” the thick cockney voice rang clear as a bell through his mind, bringing the young boy’s gaze upward to meet the steel grey eyes staring down at him “You’re home now, Matty..the kinda home that stays..”
He leaned down, a crooked grin plastered on his features that took thirty years off his weathered face.
“And there ain’ta nun about the place, so your knuckles might just get their natural colour back eh?” another booming cackle and a hearty slap on his shoulder before the man continued on his path, the boy in tow in total silence. He hadn’t spoken for much of the process, or for much of his time in the orphanage. They’d tested him for whatever condition could get them a check, only for it to be determined that the muteness was a willful thing.
That only served to anger them more, but it was the only thing that kept him warm at night.
Well…until tonight.
“Listen, Matty…” the figure stopped before a door, setting the bags he’d been carrying down to turn and place his hands on the boy’s shoulders, gaze fixed on his own.
“I know it’s new, it’s scary…but I need you to know this, savvy lad?” he leaned down “This is home now…and can’t no one take that away from you…”
“and can’t no one take that away from you…”
“and can’t no one take that away from you…”
“and can’t no one take that away from you…”
The roar of the ocean sounding the call of his vengeance…
The crunching of Gravel serving to sound his coming…
His silence….
To indicate Their End.