Post by Markw on Jul 26, 2013 10:26:12 GMT -5
WFWF Battleground – One Step Forward...
I always do it, I always find a way to screw things up.
For as long as I can remember, whenever I've come close to getting what I want, I've blown it. Heck even if I get everything I want, I find a way to f*** it all up.
It's certainly starting to feel like a recurring theme. You can look at my first National Championship reign, which lasted all of a week before I was defeated by the man I won the belt from in the first place. Or my second, that concluded with an embarrassing loss to a guy who is nothing short of a joke.
It's not just in the ring, in every aspect of my life, I've shot myself in the foot whenever I've come close to success. Every time I've been on the verge of happiness. Every relationship has been ripped apart because I f***ed up. Every friendship ruined because I was so afraid of saying the wrong thing, that I said nothing at all. I blew my relationship with Jessica, destroyed my friendship with Jake and watched as my family self destructed without doing anything about it.
You know maybe I'm too weak. Maybe I don't say what needs to be said because I'm too soft. Maybe I fail to do what needs to be done because I show people too much respect. Whatever it is, it just keeps on happening.
What makes it so much worse, is that because of that history of abject failure... I'm afraid to take one step forward, because I know that I'm going follow it up with two steps back.
And when I finally do take that step forward, when I take that leap of faith... I know there's something right around the corner to knock me down again.
Honestly, I'm not sure I can keep getting back up.
---
Last Week
I'm not really sure why I cared.
I mean this was basically a stranger who I was meeting simply because they happened to be wearing an interesting t-shirt at an independent wrestling show I'd attended a couple of weeks ago. It's not like it should be the most important day of my life. But now I've built a simple invitation to a WFWF show as being one of the most important interactions I'll ever have, in my mind it has become a make or break moment. I've turned it in to a final chance at salvation, a final opportunity to sort my life out.
Trace Demon had thrown a spanner into the works, by booking me in this six man tag team match when I'd expected the night off. But I wasn't going to let him f*** things up for me, I wasn't going to let this ridiculous power struggle get in the way of my life. My path to redemption was not going to be blocked by him.
Bishop pulls up at the Cowell Stadium, greeted by an army of drunken, rowdy, WFWF fans. Attempts to navigate the crowd seemed relatively futile as a small group of guerrilla WFWF fans ambushed the member of Trace Demon's Battleground team, which is exactly what they seemed to be doing to anyone they'd ever seen on television who walked by.
Before he could even get out of his car a group of them had surrounded his vehicle and were waving all manner of ridiculous memorabilia in Bishop's face whilst waving pens in his general direction. Apparently these sad acts expected a guy who in just a couple of hours would be involved in one of the biggest matches in Revolution history to waste his valuable preparation time signing plastic figurines of Xavier Pierce and mugs with Trace Demon's face all over them.
Unfortunately signing these objects seemed to be the only option for any wrestler wanting to enter the Cowell Stadium, so Bishop obliged signing objects as he moved along the queue and tried his best to offer a half-hearted smile to any of the small children he passed on his way.
Eventually Bishop got to the entrance of the arena having wasted a good twenty minutes signing autographs.
---
Mak Cross is pathetic.
There I said it. I said what everyone already knows, but doesn't want to say.
We all know that Mak Cross is a coward, we all know that he's in the process of throwing away a promising career because he hasn't got the balls to take advantage of the chance he's been given.
Once again he had a chance to prove that he's one of the best wrestlers in the world and once again he threw in the towel before a punch was thrown. It sickens me to see a guy with that much talent, with so much potential, throw it all away. It sickens me to see a guy who has on countless occasions been given incredible opportunities, spit in the face of the people who have given him that shot. But he's not just spitting in the face of people who got him there, he's spitting in the face of the people that would be getting those chances if he wasn't there, he's spitting in my face.
Hopefully someone has finally gotten the message, hopefully Mak Cross has finally been figured out. Hopefully it has become to Xavier Pierce and Trace Demon that Mak Cross doesn't deserve to be in the same ring as his partner Cam Nitta, let alone, myself or Penny Shannon or god forbid Scarlett Quinn.
And I guess that, because it's so clear that Mak Cross is absolutely pathetic, I should feel sorry for Cam Nitta. But I don't. Right now, by sticking with Mak, not only is Cam showing that he's just as unambitious, but he's also making it blindingly obvious that he's a complete moron.
If Cam keeps sitting by and watching his friend not even try to take advantage of his chances, then he's going to go down with the ship. Maybe I could understand that if he was genuinely loyal to Mak, but in recent weeks it has become pretty clear that, that isn't the case.
I'm going to take immense pleasure in watching Reverend Shadow and Penny Shannon rip these two men to pieces and once Penny and Shadow are done with them, I'm going to take immense pleasure in helping to finish these two jokers off inside the Battleground cage.
I used to respect both of them, but recently they've shown me and everyone else what a bunch of ungrateful, moronic, spoilt children they really. Not a tear will be shed when Trace Demon, Penny Shannon, Reverend Shadow and Joe Bishop run their asses out of this promotion. And what makes it even more enjoyable, is that getting rid of them isn't really the motive for any of those four people, it's just that with the two of them at each others throats, they've made it so easy that it's difficult to pass that opportunity up.
It really is this simple, if Trace Demon, Penny Shannon, Reverend Shadow and myself can co-exist for one night, then you're probably not going to hear the names Mak Cross or Cam Nitta uttered in a WFWF ring again and rightfully so.
---
Joe had intended to go up and watch some of the show with Alex, he knew he was going to go up and watch the Penny/Wayne match with his new acquaintance and that he would for the first time in almost half a year make a genuine connection with another human being, but he had hoped he wouldn't have to wait until after the six-man tag team match.
Unfortunately for him things haven't exactly been going to plan as of late and all the signs were suggesting that today would be no different. After being swamped by fans upon his arrival and forced to sign autographs, Joe Bishop began to make his way up to the private box that as a WFWF employee he was entitled to... but had never had a chance to use before.
But there's always someone there to mess things up.
Bishop comes face to face with the eternally smug Daniel Knight.
“Hey Joe”
“What do you want?”
“We need you to do a quick interview to help promote Battleground.”
“Will it take long?” Bishop asks reluctantly.
“Oh no, it'll just take a couple of minutes.”
Bishop struggles deciding whether or not he's willing to give up a few minutes of his time. “Fine, I guess if it's not going to take too long I can help you out.”
“Thanks.”
That interview lasted a good 45 minutes, and by the time it was finished Bishop had to start preparing for his match.
---
Harry Houdini claimed that he could take any punch to the stomach, without feeling pain. In reality he was able to prepare himself for any punch and this allowed him to withstand the blows. And it worked, until one day he was taken by surprise, punched in the gut and ended up dying as a result of a ruptured appendix.
I must be an optimist. I don't think of myself as being a particularly positive person, but only an optimist can have gone through everything I've gone through, found themselves in such a lonely place, yet still believe that they can turn their life around.
Only an optimist could still believe that they're going to revive their social life and achieve everything they've ever dreamed of inside the squared circle.
A pessimist, heck even a realist would have given up months ago. But I still keep trying to get things right, I still keep trying to get to a place that looks so far away right now.
When a pessimist gets kicked in the teeth it never hurts quite so much. I guess they expect it, they know that they're going to get knocked down. They don't let themselves believe. I'm not like that.
I keep telling myself that things are going to get better, that I'm going to turn my life around. Every time I get kicked in the teeth it hurts, more and more each time. Because even though I should have, I didn't see that foot flying towards my face. I wasn't prepared for it.
I wish I was a pessimist.
---
I honestly can't remember an awful lot of the match itself, I remember being whipped into the corner of the ring by Mak Cross. I think I was running on instinct for a little while after that and when I finally did get my act together I got a chair smashed over my head by the National Champion. So I don't remember an awful lot of what happened during the match itself. At least not until the closing moments.
Joe Bishop crawled onto the apron to take his place alongside Trace Demon, blood pouring down his face. Demon and Bishop both stand on the apron, arms outstretched, desperate for Penny Shannon to get across to the other side of the ring and allow one of them to enter the match.
So it surprised Bishop when Trace Demon pushed his arm away just as Penny Shannon got close to making the tag. Within a few minutes though, Bishop was watching Penny pin Mak Cross and was part of the team that had all of the momentum going in to the Battleground match.
And then Yukio Blaze and Reverend Shadow were added to the equation and everything was up in the air again. But that was the last thing on Joe Bishop's mind at that moment.
---
You've got to question the sanity of any man that would actively align themselves with Trace Demon when, on the face of it, they're getting nothing out of it. Even if I don't agree with the different reasons people have for entering this Battleground, I understand why each participant is about to put themselves through this ordeal. At least I understand why every participant apart from Reverend Shadow is doing it.
I find it incredibly difficult to wrap my head around it. In fact it's quite unnerving to be teaming with a man whose motives are completely inexplicable. How am I supposed to know that I can trust a guy who is quite deliberately siding with the devil... for no real reason. That's not exactly the sort of person I was taught to trust.
But unfortunately this match is one where you have to rely on the three people you're in the ring with, even if you don't particularly like them. You have to trust that they're not going to stab you in the back because if you think like that, even for a second, you've lost.
So I'm going to give this guy, who must have a screw loose, the benefit of the doubt.
I'm going to trust that the WFWF's messiah has been taken in by the devil and fully intends to do his bidding.
I know for certain that I can trust Penny Shannon, I know that if Trace is going to stab me in the back that it's going to happen after he's got his grubby little paws on the WFWF. You Shadow? I know little about you, I watched you on TV when I was a young teen. I don't know if you're trustworthy. But if you know anything about me, you'll know that costing me this opportunity wouldn't be a very wise move.
---
A quick sprint from the curtains to the locker room gave Bishop enough time to rummage through his bag and find his old AFC Wimbledon shirt, which was instantly covered in the blood that was still pouring out of the wound on his head. Bishop, his sight a little hindered by his own blood, eventually managed to get the shirt on and turned around.
“Oh god!”
Bishop didn't have a clue who was standing in front of him, but the voice seemed to suggest that it was a woman.
“Come with me, we need to get that cleaned up.”
Bishop wiped the blood away from his eyes, giving him the gift of sight for a few milliseconds. It was long enough for him to work out that one of the WFWF doctors was standing in front of him.
“Don't worry about it, I'm fine”, he said hoping that she'd let him get away with that.
“You're fine?” Bishop nodded, “how many fingers am I holding up?” she asked, holding a miscellaneous number of fingers in front of the blood soaked face of Joe Bishop.
“Fine.”
“Come on, I'll clean that” she points at the gash on his head looking horrified (welcome to the WFWF, I'm sure you'll cope with the Battleground match just fine), “and get you stitched up”. The doctor grabs the arm of Bishop and leads him down the corridor.
“Is this going to take long?” Bishop asks.
“Not if you want it doing badly.”
Ugh.
---
I guess it's difficult to know when to let go. When to finally call it a day. I've got years ahead of me, but I'm not naïve. I completely understand why the washed up, O.A.P, midcarders for life simply can't let go. I completely understand why they keep coming back and try to break that glass ceiling even though it's clear for all to see, that as much as the mindless drones that fill out arenas week in week out cheer them, they're never going to be the star they always dreamed of becoming.
I can completely understand why Yukio Blaze is going to let himself be annihilated by Trace Demon again, even though there's zero chance that he's any better than he was the last time he had his ass handed to him.
I guess we all have trouble letting go of the things that have meant so much to us over the years. We can try to replace that feeling, we can try to replicate it, but we know it's not going to happen.
I pitty Yukio really. It's a sad story. What you're going to be watching, if you pay your money and tune in to Battleground, is a tired, broken-down man, risking his life for something that he's never going to get. I'm not a robot, I genuinely do have emotions and unlike Trace I actually do think that's pretty depressing.
But, unfortunately 'Your Random Hero' is one of four men that stands between me and a shot at ending Trace Demon's undefeated streak. Which is something I'm sure he'd be happy to see me do. The downside for him is that in order to do that, I'm going to have to make sure that he's once again going to lose in front of his loyal fans.
And sadly, to make sure that happens... things might end up getting a little messy.
I know that everyone loves an underdog. No one wants to see people who are clearly a level above, crap on the little guy. But this isn't a work of fiction, this is the real world and in the real world a guy like Yukio Blaze, well a guy like Yukio, just doesn't win.
It's probably fair to say that I'm pretty similar to Yukio in some respects. I'm also something of an underdog, no one expects me to reach the top, when I step in to the ring with Trace Demon people only expect one result. But there's one key difference between Blaze and myself. That difference, is that when I was a scruffy little kid who spent his time playing Tony Hawks and watching WFWF shows on VHS, he was trying to become the best wrestler in the world. For Yukio, it's never going to happen, his potential has well and truly been reached and he's now slipping further and further down the ladder, getting further and further past his prime. Clinging to a memory of a time when he could call himself the 6th or 7th best wrestler in the world. But for me, the future's bright, I've got time on my side, I can still achieve everything that he wanted to, but never could.
That's the difference between you and me. But I want you to know that I'm not going to enjoy proving it, I'm not going to feel like a big man when I beat you down in to the dirt if we come face to face in that cage. I'm not going to enjoy it like Trace Demon enjoyed doing it little over a month ago. I just hope that after it's over, you get the message, that maybe it's time to hang up the boots and let the kids get on with it. You were a mentor six years ago, and that was great, but now you're a joke and you need to call it a day. It's harsh, but it's true. Sit back, enjoy retirement and keep an eye out for the match with Trace Demon that I'm about to earn, I hope you'll like what you see.
---
An increasingly uneasy Joe Bishop allowed her to finish up the last few stitches, before finally being allowed to leave. He exited to the corridor unsure of whether or not the show was even still going on. He soon got his answer, when 'Come Out & Play' blasted out of the loud speakers and Christa Adina announced that Scarlett Quinn was the winner of the nights main event.
Usually you get two or three minutes after that before fans start to filter out of the arena. So Bishop knew that if this salvation was going to come today, or at least if he was going to give himself another chance of rescuing himself from the position he found himself in, he was going to have to get up to his box and explain to Alex. Who he had turned in to the one person who could save him, even if that wasn't true.
Bishop scrambled up a flight of steps, still clearly affected by the loss of blood as he tried to navigate his way up to his private box.
He stumbled, desperately down the corridor. Sure that this is the last chance for resurrection. Sure that what must have seemed relatively insignificant to anyone else was the defining moment of his life.
Finally Bishop got to the door of the box, took a deep breath and pushed the door open, where he was met by...
...an empty room.
In that moment, everything that he had been bottling up, losing touch with Jake and Jessica, his failure to achieve what he really wanted in the WFWF, his countless failed attempts to fix his numerous problems came tumbling out in on fit of rage. First went the chair with a kick that sent it smashing in to the glass that overlooked the arena, followed by an arm swept the empty glasses and food off the table and on to the floor.
Bishop slumped to the ground his back scraping against the wall, his arms pressed behind his head and tears streaming down his face. The hope that remained shattered.
It shouldn't have mattered. And I know it had nothing to do with Alex a guy I knew little about. But I thought maybe I could fix things, I thought maybe I was a step closer to doing just that. I know fully well my reaction was about Jessica and Jake. It was my chance to finally let out the frustration and anger I felt, the anger that was really directed at my own door. I knew I had pushed the only two people I've ever really loved away and left myself alone, empty, broken. I tried to tell myself that they could be replaced, that the feeling could be replicated, but I knew that when I pushed them away, any hope I was clinging too was fabricated, it was nothing more than a defence mechanism.
I had finally given up on fixing it.
Throughout my life I've depended on two things, the few people I've let in to my life and professional wrestling. And when things are running smoothly in one of those areas, I can just about survive. Right now I've only got the one lifeline and if that is lost. If Xavier Pierce wins at Battleground and decides to send me packing...
I'll have nothing. No lifeline, no... no life. For everyone else this match is huge, it's about their survival in the WFWF, whether they'll be able to put food on their families tables or whether they've got one last run at stardom left in them. For me, it's much more important than that. It's about my survival, full stop.
---
Obviously every WFWF wrestler wants to be a champion. That's hardly breaking news, we wouldn't be professional wrestlers if we didn't. But I can't say that the opportunity to become the National Champion is one that particularly excites me.
Of course I'd like to be the National Champion again. After the embarrassing conclusion to my last run with that belt, I absolutely want to right the wrongs.
And I'm aware that it seems pretty ungrateful to say that I'm not excited by a shot at what I believe is the fourth most important belt in our industry, but it's the truth. Twice already I have become the National Champion, I've proved that I'm above the no-names that play tug of war over that belt in the opening match of every single show.
I mean you just have to look at my reward should I win that belt to see why I'm not frothing at the mouth. If I get this belt, then I can defend it next week against one of Andrew Carter, Beau Bowens or Jayson Garrett. Hardly a step up from facing guys like Trace Demon and teaming with the likes of Penny Shannon.
Somehow I've ended up getting another shot at the belt I outgrew a long, long time ago.
But I know that Trace Demon isn't going to be overly concerned about the fact that I'm not exactly motivated by a shot at the National Championship when it's his belt I want. Because I'll have all the motivation I need standing opposite me in the ring come Battleground.
I may not know an awful lot about the current National Champion, in fact up until a couple of weeks ago he wasn't even a blip on my radar.
But it has become clear that Devilkiller has a problem with me. A couple of weeks ago Devilkiller interrupted what was a big moment for me. The moment that I pinned Mak Cross and proved to the entire world that I am better than a man who almost got himself to the top of the ladder at Psycho Circus. Not only did he spoil what was a huge moment in my career, he also left me a bloody mess in the six man tag team match last week.
Now I'm not opposed to winning the National Championship, no one has a problem with adding another trophy to the cabinet and sure I can see that winning this match is going to give me a better chance of getting the shot at Trace Demon that I crave. But I would have been perfectly happy to do just enough, get the victory and let Devilkiller walk out of Battleground defeated but not destroyed. Now that's not an option.
Now they're going to have to carry Devilkiller out of the American Airlines Arena. On a stretcher... if he's lucky.
I'm no longer going to be satisfied with taking away from you a Championship that to you means everything and to me, means very little. I've had just a couple of interactions with you and already I want to end your career. Kudos for that I guess, you're certainly one of the more annoying wrestlers I've met. You're like Reckless, but a version of Reckless that provides entertainment at kid's birthday parties. Annoying? Yes. Intimidating? Bishop laughs, no.
Once I've finished with Devilkiller, things will finally get interesting. And whilst I intend to make the National Championship match difficult to watch, it's nothing compared to what's going to happen in the Battleground match.
That match is going to be one of the biggest battles, one of the bloodies encounters in this promotion's illustrious history.
It's a match that's going to top the Obo/McGurk iron-match, it's a match that's going to top Obo/Shadow, it's going to top The Axis vs. Chemical Reaction vs. The Survivors vs. Obo (Noticing a theme?) and Voldemort. This is a match that's going to shape the future of the biggest promotion in professional wrestling.
So many questions will be answered when these two teams meet in the middle of that ring, who is going to be the owner of the WFWF? Can Cam Nitta and Mak Cross co-exist? Was Trace Demon right to trust Penny Shannon and Joe Bishop? Can Yukio Blaze and Reverend Shadow hold their own in a WFWF that has adapted, that has evolved to a level they couldn't have even dreamed of when they first stepped into a WFWF ring?
But let's be honest. It's not really about who becomes the owner of the WFWF, it's not about whether Xavier Pierce's puppet becomes the WFWF Champion, it's not about Yukio Blaze, Reverend Shadow, Ace Bennett or any of the other has-beens that think they can step back in to the ring and compete. Heck it's not even about Devilkiller or his National Championship really.
Too often I've been in awe of guys like Yukio, Shadow, Malakai, Trace, Obo, Wayne, whoever you want to point out, I've looked up to them like they're better than me. I've allowed nights like this to be about them because I've got it in my head that they're above me and crucially I've let myself believe that they belong there. But I'm not letting that happen again.
Battleground is going to be remembered for one thing and one thing only, it's going to be remembered as the night that Joe Bishop earned a shot at Trace Demon's International Championship. It's going to be remembered as the night that Joe Bishop proved that he was, is and forever will be, perhaps not the greatest competitor in WFWF history, but the one with the most passion, the biggest heart and the greatest will to win. I know that's what I am and if I have to mutilate myself in a steel cage to prove it and to finally get the recognition I deserve, then I'll do just that. Because frankly, I've had enough of being overlooked and I'm not being knocked down again.
