Post by The Future on Jul 30, 2016 9:05:37 GMT -5
DEFIANCE RP: THE LAST 3 STEPS
Pt. 1 - ADMISSION
The camera pans in on the exterior of an inner-city apartment complex…dingy, grungy, worn…
We find ourselves somewhere in the bowels of Argent City, it’s night & the streets are sticky
from summer condensation. Rain could be on its way, but so could another 5 days of sweat & stink…
On this night, the tenement is unusually dim, as all the lights on the top floor (of 21) are out entirely save for 1.
The white-glow halo of the sole bright spot gives off phosphorescence in a way that no natural lighting can.
We are graced by the hum of a blacklight, illuminating the modest apartment’s living room to show a raggedy
leather armchair, a scratchy coffee table scattered with chips and empty bottles, a tattered cloth couch (not a loveseat)
with holes covered up with duct tape & a floor completely slopped with newspaper pages, plastic bags and empty syringes.
Our camera shifts over to the darkened frame of the doorway leading from the living room to the kitchen.
A silhouette fills the frame, both door & camera, his cape waving behind him just like the curtain
which hangs over the windowsill now agape & flapping in the crisp night breeze.
The white trim of the man’s mask is caught by the blacklight, as is the lettering of the logo on his chest- ‘F’.
He slinks his way over, past the lifeless TV set, past the beat-up coffee table, to the leather recliner,
where he plops down violently. Crouching over into view of the lens now,
he begins to motion his mouth to make waves—
“Well, I admit. You almost had me…you almost made me a fool my very first night back home…
but you didn’t, did you? Close only counts in horseshoes & hand jobs, eh, Vass?
Just know, I don’t take kindly to shortcomings.
You should know all about those, Vass.
After all, isn’t this where your father fled after he came so close to reaching the summit himself?”
Future leans back from his crouched stance, reclining back on the lazy-boy, revealing a poster behind him-
a wrestler donning black tights with pink accents, a white and black singlet top with pink lettering,
holding up proudly above him, the WFWF championship.
a wrestler donning black tights with pink accents, a white and black singlet top with pink lettering,
holding up proudly above him, the WFWF championship.
“That was a lifetime ago. A universe removed from today, this present pain
which makes you chase phantoms & highs. I know what it’s like to chase…
to chase dreams & cures & quick fixes. It’s all I’ve done for the last 10 years.
I know where you are right now…”
Future swings his right foot forward, the heavy heel of his boot catching a plastic container on top
a Ziploc bag, which ricochets into an empty syringe, flame-marked spoon & hollow soda can.
a Ziploc bag, which ricochets into an empty syringe, flame-marked spoon & hollow soda can.
“All of these remains. All these corpses of held dreams.
Did he lead your way?
Was he your teacher in all things?
I bet his failures led him to desperate places, too, Vass.
Made him flee from his place in the world, from you, from your family.
Was losing that big a deal to him? Falling from the top of the card,
did that hit him so damn hard he had to bolt to the bag just like you?
Or is that something entirely new?
Did you choose?
Or did it choose you?
Is it something inherent, deep, deep down in the blood that grabs us…
keeps us captive & makes us repeat the same mistakes as them.
I can’t say I’m foreign to the feeling, Vass.
I know what it’s like to carry the cross in your coding.”
Future, lifting the frayed tape from his wrist, reveals deep, deep marks of scar-tissuing…
the light dancing off the whited-out raised trails of skin which stand bubbled as braille.
“I know what it’s like to punish yourself for someone else’s sins…”
Rising from his chair, with one solid swing of his right hand, he clubs all the empty cans & refuse off the coffee table.
“But
, man, I’ve also made my own. I own up to that…”Future grabs at an empty pill bottle, the label scuffed & scratched so the name is illegible.
“I can admit to self-medication being the quickest way out.
That when they prescribed me a cure, it became a crutch.
That the high is understanding…it asks no questions,
it expects nothing of you but to ride it…
I can say I chased for quite a while, myself, Vass.
It made me feel invincible & dead at once.
I don’t know how I got out…of that darkness.
That grimdark-pitchblack nothing where all I felt was numb
& all I wanted was to stay away from remembering.
But you see, Vass, you have to go back…
you have to go in…in order to heal.”
Future, pulling the wrist tape back over his reminder, kicks closed the leg of the recliner
& turns his sight back toward the kitchen’s swinging cape. He jogs full-burst toward the opening,
darting his arms out in front of him like an Olympic diver, the shape of a perfect spear,
as he swims out of frame and back into the night…
& turns his sight back toward the kitchen’s swinging cape. He jogs full-burst toward the opening,
darting his arms out in front of him like an Olympic diver, the shape of a perfect spear,
as he swims out of frame and back into the night…
Pt 2 – REHAB
We regain our figurative footing at the entrance to a massive-white-brick building on the outskirts of town.
It is at the end of its own private cul-de-sac, the only brick & stone monolith on the block.
The engraved lettering on the outside of this place reads:
‘Wernicke-Korkasoff Sanitarium’
Footsteps make their way up the rain-kissed pavement toward the Asylum’s front door,
his boots treading the asphalt river as Jesus walked on water…he quickens his pace
toward the locked chains on the double-arched entryway, but one quick swing
of his Futcharang’s kitana-like edge breaks it open.
The camera follows his waving-cape lead as we make our way
into the sternum of a dusty sarcophagus of a facility.
It is at the end of its own private cul-de-sac, the only brick & stone monolith on the block.
The engraved lettering on the outside of this place reads:
‘Wernicke-Korkasoff Sanitarium’
Footsteps make their way up the rain-kissed pavement toward the Asylum’s front door,
his boots treading the asphalt river as Jesus walked on water…he quickens his pace
toward the locked chains on the double-arched entryway, but one quick swing
of his Futcharang’s kitana-like edge breaks it open.
The camera follows his waving-cape lead as we make our way
into the sternum of a dusty sarcophagus of a facility.
“This is where they kept her…
For years, they let her just…waste here.
They made her stew in it, sit in that degenerative plague like it was helping her.
Stripped everything away from us—er, her…from her.
I know that it was necessary at first, that they had to commit her
so that she’d stop poisoning us…they did it for good reason.
But there was no reason to treat her like that & call it rehabilitation.
To call the electrodes to her temporal lobe treatment.
To name her drugs medication.
When I came to visit, she had no recollection of me.
Of who she was to me, what she did to me.
In a way, that worked beautifully…
But in so many other ways, they took something from us…
took her from me. Took my entire life up to that point & threw it in a meat grinder.
So…I know what it’s like, Vass. I know what it’s like to feel like you have nothing
to show for all your suffering. That you could never live up to the standard you’ve made
in your own head for what they’d want from you…but it’s not on us anymore.”
Pt 3 – RECOVERY
Future makes his way into the bowels of the room deepest into the Sanitarium,
the ‘Surgical Procedure/Treatment Room’, where he slams at the swinging
door like a punching bag, nearly tearing it from its hinges.
The door swings erratically back toward the cameraman, who shields himself
& gulps deeply, readying for whatever awaits them both in this forsaken room.
the ‘Surgical Procedure/Treatment Room’, where he slams at the swinging
door like a punching bag, nearly tearing it from its hinges.
The door swings erratically back toward the cameraman, who shields himself
& gulps deeply, readying for whatever awaits them both in this forsaken room.
“You see where we are, Vass? Not only in this room, but in our journey.
Last week, I took you there. Took you to the edge of a place you didn’t
know you had in you, the horizon of a winner.
You can be that, Vass.
You are that…
Seek it out, man. Reach back into that cortex & feel for it.
Find the shards of you that glistened before you dirtied them
with all this crap…all their baggage.
...this is where they took her…
Took all their ‘patients’ to receive corrective treatment.
It could be the radiation they exposed her to in this room finally exorcised her demons.
Wiped clean her faulty parts for a new start…
But that would be over-simplifying.
Perhaps this is where it all started for me…
That when the disease took hold & they gave me blood transfusions from my only
living relative…they invested those parts of her in me instead.
I know that when I recovered…when I tore through all the meds
& kept grasping for more…when I could finally walk again,
I came back here. To visit her…to thank her.
And you know what? She still had no clue who I was.
No explanation for the tubes in her arms,
the scars on her neck, stitches in her head &
the memories stripped, forever missing from her
& implanted in me as some Albatross…
A sick form of penance paid for life given back…
My punishment.
I carry the pieces of her that hurt her too much to even face…
Memories of him…of how it was…before.
I know you carry around your past with you, Vass.
Like saddlebags strapped to some mule you’re tasked
to bring to term on your way up this mountain of suffering.
But it doesn’t HAVE to be like that…
We can exorcise those memories, that past life.
We can take control of our own path, our collective destinies.
…but that starts by getting rid of the medicine.
By ridding yourself of that universal dopamine,
the mind control that keeps us held to the same
self-diagnoses our families failed to outrun…”
Future makes his way into the main chamber of the operation room, where we find
a large metal bed with several restraints & braces & leather straps.
A full table of high-grade tools lay to his right, caked in dust and cobwebs.
He grabs a piece of machinery which resembles a circular saw, sans the hand-guard.
It is the only piece of weaponry in the room that gleams as bright as the light that projects off of it.
Future plugs the saw into a socket on the wall, and rests it on the table next to the bed…
a large metal bed with several restraints & braces & leather straps.
A full table of high-grade tools lay to his right, caked in dust and cobwebs.
He grabs a piece of machinery which resembles a circular saw, sans the hand-guard.
It is the only piece of weaponry in the room that gleams as bright as the light that projects off of it.
Future plugs the saw into a socket on the wall, and rests it on the table next to the bed…
“Vass, we might feel sometimes like we’re not in control…”
Future lays down on the steel-bed, restraining his legs with the creased leather straps.
“Especially when we let things take over us…
But we are in control…
Always.”
Future flicks on the saw & its whirring begins to hum loud as several factories in symphony.
“To beat me, Vass…you need to first beat the demons dormant in you…
And I don’t just mean the drugs, friend…
I mean the memories.”
Future takes the handle of the buzzsaw, pulsating & seething…
“Because I learned something from watching my mother…
It’s that when she was wiped clean, although she lost a lot…
From then on, she never suffered.”
Moving the blades of the saw ever-closer to his face, then his temple, with every word…
“Maybe all it takes is a soft-reset…a fresh start…”
The saw moves so close to the straps of Future’s mask that it tears the poly-
carbonate stitching apart from the leather facade, which would reveal his
face if he were sitting at any angle other than flat on his back…
carbonate stitching apart from the leather facade, which would reveal his
face if he were sitting at any angle other than flat on his back…
“But shit, what do I know?
I mean, I almost lost to a rookie the other day…so…”
Seemingly come to his senses now, Future turns the saw abruptly in the other direction,
toward his feet & to the restraints around his ankles—snapping them.
He makes an about-face, turning his now revealed identity away from camera’s view.
Throwing the still-whirring saw down to the ground, a few teeth chip on the marble
floor & it sputters a gnawing sound until its chewing grows quiet & dies.
toward his feet & to the restraints around his ankles—snapping them.
He makes an about-face, turning his now revealed identity away from camera’s view.
Throwing the still-whirring saw down to the ground, a few teeth chip on the marble
floor & it sputters a gnawing sound until its chewing grows quiet & dies.
“I’m sick but I’m not that sick…
Seems like you carry the sickness, too, Vass…
But like I said, what you’re doing isn’t treatment…it’s escape.
But I promise that when you come face-to-face with this face,
with your future
with THE Future…
You won’t be able to run anymore.
Because this time it’s not a quick-cradle that will soothe
the screams & coo you to sleep. It won’t be a fast roll-up to
roll up your anxieties to wipe the slate clean like a bad trip’s throw-up.
It’s gonna take a whole lot more than beginner’s spunk to rid you of this memory…
Because some demons can’t be exorcised or faced until you call them by name…”
Future throws a Futch-arang at the light projecting through-
out the surgery room, leaving everything unidentifiable…
out the surgery room, leaving everything unidentifiable…
“And you will learn mine, for real this time, Vass.
Clear away your nightmares…
Because some dreams aren’t just visions...
when they come true.
So stand back...
Because the Future...
is coming...
through…”
By the time the cameraman finds common sense enough to turn on the pitch-light on
his camera, the room is already swept clean of all noise. The hanging light above
the operation table swings uneasily & the door to the room left rocking
back-&-forth like a pendulum.
his camera, the room is already swept clean of all noise. The hanging light above
the operation table swings uneasily & the door to the room left rocking
back-&-forth like a pendulum.
I dont know good luck 
