Post by The Ace on Mar 19, 2016 22:50:24 GMT
For most of you this match is simply about realising one far fetched dream to service another. You keep your eyes fixed on the prize and hope against hope that you'll somehow be able to last long enough in my ring to achieve your goals at the expense of mine.
In any other contest I would be among the first to champion such unbridled ambition from each of you, but this isn't a simple win-loss scenario, this isn't about having the skill to keep somebody's shoulders pinned to the mat for the three count or taking somebody to the very limits of their endurance physically. This isn't about forcing somebody to submit to your will, no the annual IWF Roulette match is about something a great deal simpler.
So simple in fact that all of you in this match have deluded yourselves into thinking you know exactly what winning this match would mean to each of you, and more than that you have allowed yourself to believe that I am driven by exactly the same myopic impetus that blinds each of you as you endeavour to enter this match.
You think it will be enough to secure the single greatest victory you will ever know in your career if you can hit the ring on fire, throwing haymakers, delivering dropkicks and maybe even a few clotheslines on your way to meet your destiny as a top contender for the most prestigious prize in this industry on the grandest stage of them all.
Even if we were to suppose for a moment that things were really that clear cut and that simple, ask yourself what exactly will you do even if all the chips fell in your favour at High Stakes? What happens if you do manage to somehow overcome even me, the last man standing in your way, and win this single battle?
Winning this game of chance to secure an even greater chance at the Imperial Championship is only half the battle, and more than that, it's half a battle in a war that you've all already lost.
You see it doesn't really matter if any of you have just enough luck on your side at High Stakes to knock me outside on my ass and secure yourself a shot at the richest prize in this business, because none of you have it in you to instigate the kind of change that misguided fools like Rob Diamond have convinced you that this company is in dire need of.
All of you have convinced yourselves of one of two things, either you will be the hero or you will put your faith in heroes like Rob Diamond and Warren Kane. You've convinced yourself that by winning this Roulette match yourself, or else ensuring that none of Roberto's men can win, you can "save" this company, or at least be a very small part of it's next revolution.
However the reality of the situation is that nothing you do will make a damn bit of difference to the bigger picture.
The Conway family stood around the large Sea Turtle feeding enclosure in the Shark Reef Aquarium at Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino in Las Vegas.
Jake is helping his youngest daughter lower food into the enclosure whilst Kathy and Solitaire watch in awe as an adult Sea turtle rises slowly and steadily to the surface to feed. They all smile as it takes the floating leaf that Domino has just released into the water before diving deeper below the surface.
"Wow!" whispered Domino.
"It's really quite something to see them up this close and personal, isn't it?" said Kathy.
"Okay, I admit it, that was pretty cool, Dad," grinned Solitaire.
"I told you it would be, didn't I?" smirked Jake, "Their longevity as a species has always fascinated me."
"I'll admit I know nothing about turtles unless you count the teenage mutant ninja kind," giggled Kathy.
"And you call me a comic book nerd," teased Jake.
"You are a nerd dear, not just of the comic book variety either," replied Kathy, "I, however, prefer the term 'pop culture geek'."
"Right, whatever...nerd..."
Kathy's immediate response to her husband's playful mocking is to stick her tongue out at him, which causes Domino to laugh, and that brings a smile to Jake's face.
It doesn't matter how many men you eliminate in this match, hell it doesn't even really matter if you defy all the odds and walk out of Night of the Immortals as Imperial Champion, having made good on all of your overstated promises because whilst even men like Roberto Verona may occasionally lose their grip on their titles, they never lose grasp of their ideals.
Each of you in this match may be lucky enough to throw one or two of your fellow men over the top rope and out of this match, but real men of power are never so easily usurped from their position and it's about time you realised that.
The single most frustrating thing about a man like Roberto Verona is that he knows that even without the Imperial Championship he will always be the most powerful man in this company and that kind of power is always the most influential and with great influence comes even greater friends and as long as he can continue to buy the loyalty of men, it won't matter who carries the most precious fourteen pounds of gold and leather of all.
In short, it won't matter if you are God or just cash in on one of his most divine miracles to walk out of the biggest show of the year with your head held high and all of your dreams crystallised, if Roberto Verona doesn't want you as the face of his company it won't be long before you aren't.
Just look at the kinds of hurdles he has already put in place ahead of men like Rob Diamond and Warren Kane. If that's not enough, look at how easily he bought the loyalty of men like Cyrus Daniels and Alex Jones, the latter of whom was convinced not so long ago that Roberto was such a tyrant that he hastily convinced whoever he could to join his useless little rebellion of a cause.
How long did it last?
What good did it do?
What really changed?
Nothing.
In the end Roberto Verona still took matters into his own hands and decided that nobody but him deserved to be his premier company representative, so do you really think that any of you really stand a chance of truly prospering even if you do manage to delay my dream a little longer and realise your own by winning this match?
Do you really think winning the Roulette will prevent Roberto from stopping you from representing his company at the most fiscally important show of the year if he really wants to?
No.
So you may as well accept things as they are and as I have.
Roberto Verona will always be in charge, but he will never be the boss of me.
Because I am his best friend. I am his most loyal soldier. I am the living and breathing embodiment of his every ideal, and in so being I have not only earned the right to enter this match with the absolute best chance of victory, but I am also your last best hope for the future of this company.
Because I will never work for or against Verona. I will never antagonise him unnecessarily, instead I will always work with him.
Kathy and Jake stand in the middle of a sparsely populated glass tunnel, watching sharks swim overhead. Kathy keeps a close eye on Solitaire who is behind them, holding her baby sister's hand, firmly. Kathy smiles taking her elder daughter's initiative and reaching out for her husband's hand.
He squeezes back reassuringly and husband and wife smile at one another, before turning their attention back to the slowly circling sharks overhead.
"Kind of reminds you of work, doesn't it?" asked Jake.
"Yes," replied Kathy, nodding slowly, "As metaphors for our jobs go, I can't think of anything more apt."
"Oh good, it's not just me feeling a little lost at sea among the sharks at work then," said Jake.
"Nope, but at least I have a little more control over the type of sharks chasing me than you do," said Kathy, once again glancing back at her daughters.
"Yeah, it's been a while since I've had the kind of influence I used to have backstage."
"And whose fault is that?" asked Kathy, "You've left damn near everything about your wrestling career up to Roberto Verona. It's no wonder the boys in the back don't look at you as one of them any more. All anyone sees when they look at us Jake is corporate sell-outs."
"I don't care what they think of me, they're wrong about me, they always have been," stated Jake.
"They are, but that's not the point, darling. The point is you've been so selfless and loyal to him over the last three years that I think Roberto has taken advantage of that fact. He knows you're the one person under his employ that he can depend on to do anything he asks, and willingly."
"He doesn't control me if that's what you're insinuating," said Jake as they both start walking back over to their daughters.
"Doesn't he?" asked Kathy. "Loyalty and selflessness make you the best husband and father to our kids that I could ever ask for Jake. Those qualities even make you a damn good friend, Roberto knows that, but he also knows that they are also the same kinds of qualities that make you invaluable as exactly what he needs you to be. What he has always needed you to be."
"And what's that?"
"A soldier for his cause," stated Kathy, "A follower and not a leader."
Jake stood behind his eldest daughter, putting his hands on her shoulders as they watched the sharks pass them by. He took a deep breath as he digested his wife's words carefully.
It's a subtle distinction but a damned important one, and one I hope the rest of you will soon come to appreciate because ultimately it means that when I come running down that ramp and begin tossing each and every last one of you out on your piddly asses, I will not only be doing it for your own good but also for the good of this company.
If there's one thing I know Roberto respects even more than my loyalty, it's my commitment to earning my way through this company, and that's exactly why I need to win this Roulette match.
I will earn my way not only to the main event of Night of the Immortals but also my way to the Imperial Championship, and when the dust settles and the smoke clears on all of that, you all will finally be blessed with a real man as the Imperial Champion.
A man who Roberto Verona respects too much to even try intimidating.
A man who will make all of you earn each of your chances against me.
Just like I will in this match.
My road to the Imperial Championship will be your road to a fairer IWF for all.
Eliminate me from this match and you eliminate the best chance you'll ever have of eventually making it yourself in this company.
Keep me from my destiny and I will do nothing to stop him from continuing to devalue each of you as competitors.
So, ask yourself how long can any of you afford to keep me in this match? Are you prepared to be as selfless as I have been for the good of this company? Or are you willing to sacrifice the most ideal man in this match for your own selfish greed?
It's your choice, make it wisely.
Because you'll only be able to make it once.
In any other contest I would be among the first to champion such unbridled ambition from each of you, but this isn't a simple win-loss scenario, this isn't about having the skill to keep somebody's shoulders pinned to the mat for the three count or taking somebody to the very limits of their endurance physically. This isn't about forcing somebody to submit to your will, no the annual IWF Roulette match is about something a great deal simpler.
So simple in fact that all of you in this match have deluded yourselves into thinking you know exactly what winning this match would mean to each of you, and more than that you have allowed yourself to believe that I am driven by exactly the same myopic impetus that blinds each of you as you endeavour to enter this match.
You think it will be enough to secure the single greatest victory you will ever know in your career if you can hit the ring on fire, throwing haymakers, delivering dropkicks and maybe even a few clotheslines on your way to meet your destiny as a top contender for the most prestigious prize in this industry on the grandest stage of them all.
Even if we were to suppose for a moment that things were really that clear cut and that simple, ask yourself what exactly will you do even if all the chips fell in your favour at High Stakes? What happens if you do manage to somehow overcome even me, the last man standing in your way, and win this single battle?
Winning this game of chance to secure an even greater chance at the Imperial Championship is only half the battle, and more than that, it's half a battle in a war that you've all already lost.
You see it doesn't really matter if any of you have just enough luck on your side at High Stakes to knock me outside on my ass and secure yourself a shot at the richest prize in this business, because none of you have it in you to instigate the kind of change that misguided fools like Rob Diamond have convinced you that this company is in dire need of.
All of you have convinced yourselves of one of two things, either you will be the hero or you will put your faith in heroes like Rob Diamond and Warren Kane. You've convinced yourself that by winning this Roulette match yourself, or else ensuring that none of Roberto's men can win, you can "save" this company, or at least be a very small part of it's next revolution.
However the reality of the situation is that nothing you do will make a damn bit of difference to the bigger picture.
The Conway family stood around the large Sea Turtle feeding enclosure in the Shark Reef Aquarium at Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino in Las Vegas.
Jake is helping his youngest daughter lower food into the enclosure whilst Kathy and Solitaire watch in awe as an adult Sea turtle rises slowly and steadily to the surface to feed. They all smile as it takes the floating leaf that Domino has just released into the water before diving deeper below the surface.
"Wow!" whispered Domino.
"It's really quite something to see them up this close and personal, isn't it?" said Kathy.
"Okay, I admit it, that was pretty cool, Dad," grinned Solitaire.
"I told you it would be, didn't I?" smirked Jake, "Their longevity as a species has always fascinated me."
"I'll admit I know nothing about turtles unless you count the teenage mutant ninja kind," giggled Kathy.
"And you call me a comic book nerd," teased Jake.
"You are a nerd dear, not just of the comic book variety either," replied Kathy, "I, however, prefer the term 'pop culture geek'."
"Right, whatever...nerd..."
Kathy's immediate response to her husband's playful mocking is to stick her tongue out at him, which causes Domino to laugh, and that brings a smile to Jake's face.
It doesn't matter how many men you eliminate in this match, hell it doesn't even really matter if you defy all the odds and walk out of Night of the Immortals as Imperial Champion, having made good on all of your overstated promises because whilst even men like Roberto Verona may occasionally lose their grip on their titles, they never lose grasp of their ideals.
Each of you in this match may be lucky enough to throw one or two of your fellow men over the top rope and out of this match, but real men of power are never so easily usurped from their position and it's about time you realised that.
The single most frustrating thing about a man like Roberto Verona is that he knows that even without the Imperial Championship he will always be the most powerful man in this company and that kind of power is always the most influential and with great influence comes even greater friends and as long as he can continue to buy the loyalty of men, it won't matter who carries the most precious fourteen pounds of gold and leather of all.
In short, it won't matter if you are God or just cash in on one of his most divine miracles to walk out of the biggest show of the year with your head held high and all of your dreams crystallised, if Roberto Verona doesn't want you as the face of his company it won't be long before you aren't.
Just look at the kinds of hurdles he has already put in place ahead of men like Rob Diamond and Warren Kane. If that's not enough, look at how easily he bought the loyalty of men like Cyrus Daniels and Alex Jones, the latter of whom was convinced not so long ago that Roberto was such a tyrant that he hastily convinced whoever he could to join his useless little rebellion of a cause.
How long did it last?
What good did it do?
What really changed?
Nothing.
In the end Roberto Verona still took matters into his own hands and decided that nobody but him deserved to be his premier company representative, so do you really think that any of you really stand a chance of truly prospering even if you do manage to delay my dream a little longer and realise your own by winning this match?
Do you really think winning the Roulette will prevent Roberto from stopping you from representing his company at the most fiscally important show of the year if he really wants to?
No.
So you may as well accept things as they are and as I have.
Roberto Verona will always be in charge, but he will never be the boss of me.
Because I am his best friend. I am his most loyal soldier. I am the living and breathing embodiment of his every ideal, and in so being I have not only earned the right to enter this match with the absolute best chance of victory, but I am also your last best hope for the future of this company.
Because I will never work for or against Verona. I will never antagonise him unnecessarily, instead I will always work with him.
Kathy and Jake stand in the middle of a sparsely populated glass tunnel, watching sharks swim overhead. Kathy keeps a close eye on Solitaire who is behind them, holding her baby sister's hand, firmly. Kathy smiles taking her elder daughter's initiative and reaching out for her husband's hand.
He squeezes back reassuringly and husband and wife smile at one another, before turning their attention back to the slowly circling sharks overhead.
"Kind of reminds you of work, doesn't it?" asked Jake.
"Yes," replied Kathy, nodding slowly, "As metaphors for our jobs go, I can't think of anything more apt."
"Oh good, it's not just me feeling a little lost at sea among the sharks at work then," said Jake.
"Nope, but at least I have a little more control over the type of sharks chasing me than you do," said Kathy, once again glancing back at her daughters.
"Yeah, it's been a while since I've had the kind of influence I used to have backstage."
"And whose fault is that?" asked Kathy, "You've left damn near everything about your wrestling career up to Roberto Verona. It's no wonder the boys in the back don't look at you as one of them any more. All anyone sees when they look at us Jake is corporate sell-outs."
"I don't care what they think of me, they're wrong about me, they always have been," stated Jake.
"They are, but that's not the point, darling. The point is you've been so selfless and loyal to him over the last three years that I think Roberto has taken advantage of that fact. He knows you're the one person under his employ that he can depend on to do anything he asks, and willingly."
"He doesn't control me if that's what you're insinuating," said Jake as they both start walking back over to their daughters.
"Doesn't he?" asked Kathy. "Loyalty and selflessness make you the best husband and father to our kids that I could ever ask for Jake. Those qualities even make you a damn good friend, Roberto knows that, but he also knows that they are also the same kinds of qualities that make you invaluable as exactly what he needs you to be. What he has always needed you to be."
"And what's that?"
"A soldier for his cause," stated Kathy, "A follower and not a leader."
Jake stood behind his eldest daughter, putting his hands on her shoulders as they watched the sharks pass them by. He took a deep breath as he digested his wife's words carefully.
It's a subtle distinction but a damned important one, and one I hope the rest of you will soon come to appreciate because ultimately it means that when I come running down that ramp and begin tossing each and every last one of you out on your piddly asses, I will not only be doing it for your own good but also for the good of this company.
If there's one thing I know Roberto respects even more than my loyalty, it's my commitment to earning my way through this company, and that's exactly why I need to win this Roulette match.
I will earn my way not only to the main event of Night of the Immortals but also my way to the Imperial Championship, and when the dust settles and the smoke clears on all of that, you all will finally be blessed with a real man as the Imperial Champion.
A man who Roberto Verona respects too much to even try intimidating.
A man who will make all of you earn each of your chances against me.
Just like I will in this match.
My road to the Imperial Championship will be your road to a fairer IWF for all.
Eliminate me from this match and you eliminate the best chance you'll ever have of eventually making it yourself in this company.
Keep me from my destiny and I will do nothing to stop him from continuing to devalue each of you as competitors.
So, ask yourself how long can any of you afford to keep me in this match? Are you prepared to be as selfless as I have been for the good of this company? Or are you willing to sacrifice the most ideal man in this match for your own selfish greed?
It's your choice, make it wisely.
Because you'll only be able to make it once.
Well howdy there pardner.