Inevitable

[Roberto Verona]

{ Our scene opens in an ornate suite, high atop a luxurious hotel deep in the heart of Chicago, the home to IWF’s biggest show of the year, Night of the Immortals. A fire crackles at the rear of the room, in front of which is a large leather sofa upon which Hannah Reed sits, her body sprawled across its length. A few feet away Roberto Verona stands behind a well-stocked bar, carefully pouring a bottle of expensive wine into two glasses. Suddenly, the door opens and Gibford Famularo enters the room, prompting Roberto to put down the bottle and walk over to him. Verona extends a hand, but Gib awkwardly decline to accept it, instead walking into the room as Verona calls after him. }

Roberto Verona: Gib… how did it go?

{ Gib shakes his head. }

Gib Famularo: I hate to break it to you, but it aint’ good news.

{ Hannah turns her head to look at Roberto. }

Hannah Reed: What is he talking about?

{ Verona closes the door behind Gib, turning to look back at Hannah. }

Roberto Verona: You may as well tell her.

{ Gib scratches his head, looking down at the floor in an attempt to avoid eye contact. }

Gib Famularo: Well… we tried to set-up a trap.

Hannah Reed: A trap? For who?

Roberto Verona: For Jess.

Gib Famularo: At the Night of the Immortals house show.

{ Hannah suddenly pulls herself upright, staring at the pair of them. }

Gib Famularo: I did everything you asked, Verona. I booked her, in the main event no less, I got everybody to advertise it, pushed it on social media… everything. Yet, when her music hit, nothing. We tried… more than once, told people we were having technical difficulties, played for time…

{ Gib shakes his head again. }

Gib Famularo: She didn’t show. Luckily a few of the girls were on hand to cover, they tossed on a few bits of gear and pretended it was all a ruse but… everybody backstage knew others. Nobody has been able to contact her. I’d have asked Eternity to help but it wouldn’t surprise me if she had her locked in a cellar somewhere…

{ Verona closes his, reflecting for a moment as Gib stands nervously between him and Hannah, his eyes darting back between the pair. Sensing his nerves, Hannah tilts her head to one side, releasing Gib from his obligation as he nods appreciatively before making haste for the nearest exit. Verona stands still for what seems like minutes before bowing his head and making his way over to Hannah. }

Roberto Verona: God damn it.

Hannah Reed: Did you honestly think that would work?

{ Roberto sighs dejectedly.}

Roberto Verona: I assumed her professional pride may have overruled her emotional pain. Perhaps it was naïve of me, but she never missed a match before. Not once. Whether it was the main event of a pay-per-view or the opener of a house show in some two bit town in the middle of nowhere, she always showed up. Even when she wasn’t fit enough to justifiably do so.

Hannah Reed: She isn’t going to just come out of hiding because put her name up in lights, Roberto.

Roberto Verona: It was worth a shot.

{ Hannah sighs. }

Hannah Reed: It’ll have done more harm than good. Now people will be angry at her for failing to show up, because of us she has unwittingly disappointed all of the people who believed in her, more to the point now you have just hung her out to dry. You’re not going to find her by playing the same games you do with everybody else, she isn’t like everybody else.

{ Hannah rests a hand on Verona as he sits down beside her. }

Hannah Reed: You said it yourself, we’re going to have to play her game.

Roberto Verona: I’d hoped that perhaps something far simpler would have sufficed. Wishful thinking clearly.

Hannah Reed: So did I. When you first suggested it I thought it was insane, but you were right. Jess isn’t operating in the same reality we are, she’s living inside a world where she dictates the terms, not us. When I got over the shock I went through some of her things and reminisced. When we were kids, we used to play, like anybody else… but the game never stopped when the rest of us grew tired, or we had to go inside. Whatever world we created, Jess would keep living it, until she was ready to come out. If you tried to force her to leave it, she’d just retreat even further inside.

Roberto Verona: That’s all well and good but we’re neither of us are exactly well versed in video game culture.

Hannah Reed: Funnily enough, I did some research.

{ Verona cocks an eyebrow. }

Roberto Verona: You… of all people, played a video game?

{ Hannah shakes her head. }

Hannah Reed: Don’t be ridiculous. I bought some books and did real research. We wouldn’t get anywhere sat in front of a monitor pretending to be somebody else.

{ Verona laughs, despite his demeanour fighting against it. Smiling he turns to look at Hannah. }

Roberto Verona: This just might work. So. Where do we start?

{ Hannah leans over to a nearby table, dragging a large hardback book across the glass before getting a firm grip and lifting it up. She slips through a few pages before finally finding her mark, planting a finger on the page as she taps at the item at her fingertip. }

Hannah Reed: Somewhere called White Orchard.

The moment is finally here.

The culmination of two acts of betrayal, the path of a tyrant and a legacy which truly befits the stage upon which this final act will play out.

A lot of people have shared their opinions of what you have both done to me in the build up to this weekend. Many have called you karma, a well justified force of penance sent to deliver me for my grotesque sins. Some have even deigned to call your traitors, men who have betrayed my confidence to stab me in the back, bleeding in the gutter.

I have a far simpler answer.

You’re an inevitability.

Anybody who assumes that this wasn’t on the cards since day one has committed the fatal sin of woefully underestimating the pair of you, something that I would never do. There wasn’t a chance in hell that Mike Laszlo or Jake “The Ace” Conway were ever going to fail to capitalises on the opportunity to exploit their positions by my side to manoeuvre themselves into contention for the prize they risked so much to protect and keep around my waist. You'd be resisting the habits of a life time if you did so.

I would be a fool to think otherwise.

The reality is I was pertinently aware that sooner or later the pawns I built around me to protect my interests would ultimately seek to utilise their positions against me. Humanity is simple and wrestlers even more so, there was never any way that I could avoid conflict with men ambitious enough to align their interest with mine in an environment where I proactively cultivated the ideology of survival of the fittest.

Sooner or later you were going to attempt to strike me down to further your own ambitions. Especially with something as potent as a contract in your possession or the love of your life whispering sweet encouragements in your ear.

You'd both have been fools to ignore that sort of motivation.

Quite honestly, if you hadn’t used every means at your disposable to place yourselves in advantageous positions then any respect that I had for either of you would have ceased to exist. It would have been nothing more than a glaring pox on my judgement if I surrounded myself with men who utterly lack application or ambition to succeed. You’re both a product of the crop I have sowed and Night of the Immortals is merely that stage upon which it’s produce will be reaped. You are the chaotic fruit of my labours.

I created you.

And this weekend I will accept responsibility for my actions and destroy you both.

Because much like the pair of you, I understand that business is business. Many will expect me to unleash a verbal barrage designed to tear you both down but fortunately I possess more maturity than the petulant children who occupy this roster. When you walked down that ramp at High Stakes, Jake, you understood that by accomplishing the goals you set out to achieve you gain the opportunity to correct your failures at Metamorphosis. When you triumphed a year ago at Night of the Immortals, Mike, you understood that the contract you held in your possession allowed you to dictate the terms most favourable to yourself.

Both of you exploited the opportunities provided to you to position yourselves in the main event of the biggest show of the year and both of you have taken every opportunity to soften me up in the process.

And what a fine job you did. For the first time in months the pair of you accomplished more than everybody else managed in six and left me lying in a pool of my own blood.

Twice no less.

To stand here indignantly condemning you for simply doing the exact same thing I would have done in your position is an exercise in extreme futility. If anything I am here to congratulate you for embracing everything I have actively promoted since November and for providing me with a challenge worthy of both the stage we will occupy and the champion I have ultimately become.

I am here to say thank you.

Yes, you heard me correctly.

Thank you, Mike Laszlo. Thank you, Jake Conway.

Thank you for exemplifying the qualities which I have demanded my employees to exhibit, the pure, raw, determination to be the masters of your own fate, to dictate your own terms. Thank you for finally proving that just being two of the most talented wrestlers in the world isn’t enough to coast by on, you have to make the most of every single opportunity and to take what you want instead of feeling you’re simply entitled to it. Thank you for finally providing me a challenge worthy of my ability and befitting the legacy which I have strove to build.

With your blood, and mine.

I am under no illusions, both of you are perfectly capable of pushing me to my limits, of beating me at my own games and doing everything it takes to be the Imperial champion. You’ve done it once before Mike, vanquishing a God in the process. And you, Jake? You stood tall over twenty nine other men and exorcised the demons which would have once consumed you. Each of you, in any other circumstance, would be every bit the champion this company deserves.

A champion worthy of the name.

However, despite all of this, despite all of the admiration I have for you both, despite the fact that I respect your motivations, I have absolutely no intention of walking down that ramp a champion and walking back up it a failure. Coming from anybody else, that would simply be an obvious statement of intent that any competitor would make before the biggest match of their lives, a confident mask donned to deflect any whispers of self-doubt.

Yet I’m not just anybody.

I am the single most successful Imperial champion in company history. I am the man who has proven himself to be every inch the champion he claims time and time again. I am the man who doesn’t just tell people what I am going to do, I strap up my boots, walk into the most hostile of environments and by any means necessary I accomplish everything I promised I would.

I do not peddle myths, I profess inevitabilities.

Hurdle after hurdle, I have preserved and triumphed regardless of the odds stacked against me. I have lied, I have cheated and I have stolen victory from the very jaws of defeat. I have beaten people on technicalities, I have gone toe to toe with my best friend and I have succeeded where other men would have finally paid their dues for the evils they have committed.

Where weaker men have crumbled to the whims of fate, I have endured.

This weekend I am not just going to beat Jake Conway, I’m not just going to beat Mike Laszlo, I am going to make history and confirm myself as not just an icon, not just the figurehead of an entire era, but the defining face of an entire industry. Jake Conway, Mike Laszlo, Rob Diamond, Alex Jones, Steve Awesome, Warren Kane, Adam Knite, Angel Blake, Spike Kane… they may be some of the finest professional wrestlers to have ever graced the ring but ultimately, that is all they were.

Athletes, participants, competitors.

Yet I…

I am professional wrestling.

This isn’t the deluded ramblings of an egotistical lunatic desperately trying to self-aggrandise to distract from the very realistic potential of defeat, clutching desperately to my final moments in the spotlight. No… this is conviction of a man who has consistently defied the odds, who has consistently followed through with each and every one of my proclamations and who has never, ever, allowed himself to accept mediocrity.

The conviction of a champion.

Nay, the conviction of the champion.

That is why on a night where everybody expects my luck to finally run out, where everybody is prepared to celebrate the culmination of my tyranny and where everybody is waiting for my past to finally catch up with me, I am going to prove them all wrong and triumph once more. I am going to march down to that ring, put my championship on the line and ultimately, when all the dust has settled, raise it back aloft once more in victory.

With the bodies of my would be usurpers beneath my boot.

When you were all children, you were brainwashed into placing your faith in fairytales, clinging to the sweet comfort of the idea that sooner or later the bad guys get what is coming to them. That eventually those who commit great evil are the recipients of their comeuppance. That nightmares may always have a beginning and a middle, but they also ultimately have an end. Yet reality is so much harsher, so much crueller…

This isn’t the end of Roberto Verona.

It is only the beginning.

Whether you like it, or not.