Post by Rated R on Nov 25, 2012 17:31:47 GMT -5
”The more successful the villain, the more successful the picture”
- Alfred Hitchcock
< *** >
Every story needs a bad guy, because as human beings we seek conflict. We seek the battle between right and wrong, we thrive on it, need it, crave it. It’s a horrible truth but a truth none the less. The greatest heroes of our time, be they real or fictional, were only great because they had some grand nemesis to battle against and while we fixate on the hero, our minds truly lie with the villain by the end of the story. I for one have never really met a truly good man that I wanted to succeed, never watched a truly good hero that I felt like routing for. It’s the moral ambiguity of a person’s existence that draws me in, that battle between right and wrong, between the internal hero and villain, that’s what makes a person memorable, that’s what makes us want to watch.
Even in our business, where the lines between face and heel, between good guy and bad guy, are crossed so frequently it is rarely the hero that people tune in to watch. Without the villain to initiate them the hero would never do anything, they would sit around and talk about the good old times, remind us all of the many great things they have done in the past. A hero has no ambition beyond stopping the villain and without a bad guy to push them, then they would be nothing. They would stand for nothing; they would hold ideals that didn’t matter because there would be nobody to oppose them.
It is for this very reason that I am perfectly happy to be called a villain.
You see people believe that just because I do things differently that I must be wrong, that I must be crazy or sociopathic or just plain disturbed. The truth of the matter is I never do anything simply to antagonise people. I don’t walk around attacking people for the sake of it, I don’t go around sticking needles into people just so I can claim to be a crazy son of a b***h, to come out and say that people should watch me because I’m going to do something crazy. No, I do things because they have to be dome. I hurt people because they oppose me, because they challenge what I have worked so hard to achieve and for this I am called wrong in the head.
Do you people truly believe that I released that video last week simply to prove to you all that I’m some messed up nut job? Do you people truly believe that I showed everybody how I f****d Yukio Blaze’s wife three years ago simply to humiliate him, to embarrass and antagonize him? No, I did it because he opposed me. I did it because three weeks ago Yukio Blaze turned up and he interrupted me over something that happened years ago. He showed up because I failed at putting him down when I had the chance and he wanted to rub my nose in it. If anything Yukio Blaze is the villain of our story because he made a personal attack on me, I simply responded.
But you people don’t see it that way and why? Because Yukio Blaze has a brown nose from spending all day kissing your asses. He comes out and he claims to do what he does because of the fans and that makes him someone worth cheering for while I am booed simply for telling the truth and demanding the respect that you all should have given me years ago. Of course the truth is Yukio Blaze is just like the rest of us. He attacked me two weeks ago when my back was turned and forced me to respond by showing everyone exactly what sort of women his whore of a wife is. Sorry Thunder, but it’s true, your sister is a slut.
But alas I have been chosen as the villain and that is that. I don’t care, hero or villain I will do what needs to be done. But one thing I do need to make clear is that you’re constant claims of my mental instability are starting to irritate me. You see there was a time when I had… let’s say sociopathic tendencies, a time when I was driven out of my mind because of my addiction, but that time has long since passed. And I think that’s a good thing, both for you and for me. A sane villain is much more interesting than a disturbed one, there’s no passing of anything I do as the acts of a disturbed man now. I don’t know whether that’s a scary thought or not, quite frankly I don’t really care. Just remember this.
I’m sane now, and I’m the villain that you’ve always wanted me to be.
< *** >
House of Hell Wrestling School
16th November 2012
Trace Demon: This is a f*****g joke!
Wayne narrowly avoids the glass as it shatters against the wall of our office. Yes, it was a little bit too close but it wasn’t like I was trying to hit him. If I was trying then he’d have glass in his forehead right now and I’d have a lawsuit on my hands. I’d been having such a good day as well, laughing about how much I’d screwed with Yukio Blaze and his life (and physically screwed his wife, let’s not forget that), taking the piss out of Xavier Pierce and this stupid public speaking thing he’s been trying to talk me into and then I go and open up my e-mails and this is what I see. This? God damn it.
Wayne McGurk: Do you mind throwing the glass away from me next time?
I’ll throw my glass where I want to thank you very much.
Trace Demon: Look at this, just f*****g look at this.
I slide the laptop across the desk so that he can see the horror that I have just seen, the horror that I cannot forget. It’s worse than that video involving the two girls, one cup and… oh come on, I don’t need to describe that, you’ve all see it by now. It only takes him a few seconds of scrolling down the page to see exactly what has put me in such a foul, glass shattering mood. And as well all know, a glass shattering mood is the absolutely worst mood of them all.
Trace Demon & Yukio Blaze vs. Braden Munroe & Tabitha Owens.
Wayne McGurk: I warned you.
Trace Demon: This is not the time to be telling me that you told me so, alright? Actually, the time for that is never.
Wayne McGurk: Well I did.
He just can’t help himself, every opportunity he gets to show that he’s got any kind of intelligence he has to take it. I get it, I do, he obviously must feel inferior always having to work in a room with such a superior specimen as myself, but still, that’s really no excuse to go around acting like an egotistical cocky ass.
Wayne McGurk: I warned you, you go gunning for Xavier Pierce and he’s going to fight back. First making you defend the International Championship last week…
I still have no idea who that Cameron Stone kid is. Did they find him on the street? He certainly smelt like they found him on the street. I had to have like a dozen showers because of that dude.
Wayne McGurk: And now this tag match.
Trace Demon: It’s like he wants me out of this number one contender tournament before it even starts. It almost makes me think that there’s some teenage kid who thinks he runs the place and is stopping me from challenging for a title because he’s got a grudge.
Wayne McGurk: There is, he’s called Xavier Pierce.
Not the name I was thinking of.
Trace Demon: Teaming with Yukio Blaze. This is just going to be humiliating, I mean I’m Trace Demon, I’m the International Championship and now I have to share a team with a smelly homeless person. I mean fighting one last week was fine, I’m happy to beat up hobos, but teaming with one? That’s just cruel and unusual punishment, it’s going to kill my reputation!
Wayne McGurk: Wait, that’s what you’re angry about?
Trace Demon: Yeah, what else would it be?
Wayne McGurk: The fact that you’re teaming with a man who wants to tear you limb from limb because you showed a sex tape of you and his wife? I mean surely that’s the real worry here.
Oh poor misguided Wayne McGurk, never really did have an eye for the bigger picture, or the smaller picture really, he’s always been a kind of let’s just see what happens guy. I respect it to a degree, I’ve just always been more of a ‘always have a plan’ kind of guy, I don’t like being caught off guard and I sure as hell don’t like not being in control. Sure, I guess his way of life netted him a hot if a little bit sociopathic wife and a kind of cool if a little bit annoying daughter, but then it also landed him half a dozen boxes full of Trace Demon t-shirts in his garage, so you know, I guess the awesome shirts must make all the rest that little bit better.
Trace Demon: Come on, you don’t seriously think I’m worried about Yukio Blaze as a threat do you? I mean maybe to my immune system, he’s probably got a ton of STD’s and fungal bacteria crawling about him. Good thing I got to Robyn before he did otherwise I’d have to book myself in for some kind of chemical bath.
Wayne McGurk: You’re unbelievable.
I get the feeling that it would be arrogant to say thank you.
Trace Demon: Why thank you.
Did it anyway.
Wayne McGurk: He wants to kill you, like literally kill you.
Trace Demon: Instead of that theoretical jokey killing that we all do once in a while.
Wayne McGurk: Probably with a mace.
Trace Demon: There are worse ways to go.
Wayne McGurk: Look, you pushed him too far, you messed with the man’s family, you don’t do that. You don’t cross that line. When you’re in the ring, what you do to people in there, that’s you’re business. Fine, hurt people to win matches, you get paid for that, but there’s no excuse to wreck a man’s marriage just so that you can get off on watching him suffer.
Trace Demon: I didn’t do it because I wanted to screw his life up…
I kind of did. Don’t tell anybody.
Trace Demon: I did it because the guy has to learn that he’s in over his head. This is a war Wayne, and in war you use whatever ammunition you have available. You don’t want to be the man with his back against the wall staring down a barrel of a gun; you want to be the man pulling the trigger, you want to be the man watching the fear take over as he sees his life pass before his eyes. And anyway, I didn’t get off on his misery.
He looks at me, expecting some kind of punch line. He knows me too well.
Trace Demon: I got off when I was screwing his wife.
He shakes his head in disbelief, an action which is so pointless and overdone that it really doesn’t have any dramatic effect anymore. He heads for the door, walking out of the room as if to tell me that I’ve crossed a line. Sometimes I think my line and everyone else’s are completely different. He does pause to shout something back at me.
Wayne McGurk: One day you’ll take something other than violence and misery seriously.
Trace Demon: Where’s the fun in that?
And he’s gone, and I’m left alone with my thoughts and that one tag team match staring back at me.
Trace Demon: F*****g Yukio Blaze.
F*****g Yukio Blaze indeed.
< *** >
The Glorious Household of Trace Demon
18th November 2012
The apartment is still a massive tip after Eliza’s party. Although if I’m honest I’m really stretching the use of the word party. In my mind a party involves copious amounts of alcohol, several drunk college girls, a bar brawl and, depending on whether it’s a Saturday night or not, a good old fashioned orgy. Of course your daughter’s first birthday doesn’t exactly go down like that. Instead you invite all the other parents that your girlfriend forced you to be friends with to bring their crying kids around to your house and try not to shoot yourself. Because that’s what parents find fun… apparently.
Trace Demon: I don’t understand how it happened; I mean seriously, how did he trick me into this? I mean Xavier Pierce, tricking me.
Alexa looks at me with a glare; she clearly isn’t buying my well-acted charade.
Alexa Munroe: You accepted the speaking gig because you didn’t want to be here when my mother visited, didn’t you?
Trace Demon: No, it was that dang dirty Xavier Pierce. The man should be shanghaied for tricking me into such an outrageous event.
Seriously, I should be winning an Oscar right now.
Alexa Munroe: You’re just scared what she’s going to say about your sex tape being aired on live television.
I sense a slight hint of passive aggressiveness right there.
Trace Demon: Hey, you said you were fine with the sex tape.
Alexa Munroe: I told you what you do when you’re wrestling is your business, I don’t know Yukio Blaze, I don’t know his wife, and we weren’t together when you screwed her on camera.
I’ve got to say she’s taking this whole sex tape thing really well considering she wasn’t in it, or maybe that’s what makes it acceptable. Is it acceptable to make a sex tape with someone else when you’re single and then show it when you’re with someone? This is a real moral quandary that I have found myself in. Not even the greatest philosophers in the entire world would be able to work it out.
Alexa Munroe: My mom won’t see it that way though.
Trace Demon: I am not scared of your mother.
I am, she’s ten times more dangerous than Braden Munroe, Yukio Blaze, the entire New Epoch and Phillip Schneider put together. Also, she’s uglier, if that’s even possible.
Trace Demon: Plus there is no chance that she has seen that sex tape, no chance at all.
Alexa Munroe: My brother e-mailed it to her.
Trace Demon: Your brother watched the sex tape? Well that’s just weird, I feel violated, how do you not feel violated, you’re entire family has now probably seen me giving it to another woman.
Alexa Munroe: And to think, you’re the father of my child.
Trace Demon: Clearly you need to make some better life choices.
Alexa Munroe: Clearly. I still don’t see why you’re doing this. Would you really rather speak at a comic book convention than be here with my mother.
We both burst out into full on laughter. What a ridiculous question. I’d rather be in a grave full of barbed wire than be here with her mother. Although to be fair, with some of the people in the WFWF, that could certainly happen.
Trace Demon: Look, it’s a good way of scouting out my match this week.
Alexa Munroe: How is speaking in front of a few thousand people scouting for your match?
Trace Demon: Because they’re all comic book fans. I’m going to use them as a sounding board for some witty puns that I can use in my match against Munroe and his sidekick, the incredible dull but oddly attractive girl wonder.
Alexa Munroe: That’s not her name.
Trace Demon: It should be though.
Alexa Munroe: Fine, but pick something up for Emily while you’re there.
God damn it, gift shopping, I hate gift shopping.
Trace Demon: Emily!
I shove some more clothes in my bag while I wait for her to enter. I think five Trace Demon t-shirts will be enough, I’m only going to end up burning them on stage and asking someone if they want to try being the human torch for the day.
Emily Hall: What?
I spin to find Emily leaning in the doorway. She’s probably been on the phone to Scarlett all day. That s**t is getting weird. I don’t even like speaking to Scarlett for more time than I have to, though really I don’t like speaking to anyone for more time than I absolutely have to. Bloody people, always so annoying.
Trace Demon: Gift ideas from a comic convention, shoot.
Emily Hall: I have no idea what you’re talking about.
Trace Demon: I’m just going to grab you some Batwoman trades. I hear she’s gay now.
Emily Hall: Why would you even bring that up?
Oh god, it must be that time of the month. I should mark it down on the calendar like I do with Alexis’ so I can make sure that I just so happen to have to work this week every month from now until the end of the time, or when she moves out, you can never tell which will come first with teenagers these days.
Trace Demon: Because it’s either that or The Walking Dead, and I’m not lining Kirkman’s pockets, not after that last debacle at his cheesecake tasting night.
Emily Hall: You’re ridiculous, just get what you want, I don’t care.
She storms off back to her room.
Trace Demon: Can you believe that out of everybody on the WFWF roster with kids, I’m probably the best father slash legal guardian?
Alexa Munroe: No, I don’t believe that.
Trace Demon: Well I am. Not a lot of competition though. Right, I’m off to speak to a load of nerds about why they’d have preferred Brandon Munroe to me, say hello to your mother for me.
Or you know, shoot her in the head. It’s the only way to be certain that she’s dead.
< *** >
Just Another Comic Book Convention
19th November 2012
I’ve done a lot of interviews, a lot of big public speaking events, even a lot of talk shows, but one thing that I’ve never done is speak in front of a load of comic book fans at a comic book convention. There’s a lot of similarities between wrestling and comic books, you’ve got your heroes and villains, your epic conflicts, the bunghole of an authority figure that’s constantly trying to screw up your life because he used to be an arms dealer and doesn’t have a clue what he’s doing. Okay, so that last one isn’t in every comic book, but it’s certainly going on in my life, therefore it’s important. But as I was saying, speaking at a comic book convention isn’t exactly my idea of fun, especially when it’s a public question and answer session and all the questions are really stupid.
Questioner: Marvel or DC?
Trace Demon: Doesn’t matter, they’ll probably both be rebooting next week anyway, next?
Questioner: Favourite manga series?
Trace Demon: I have no idea what that is.
Questioner: Well it’s…
Trace Demon: I wasn’t asking, next.
I was half tempted not to show up, but then apparently I’d be in violation of the verbal agreement that Xavier Pierce made with the guys running the place. And while I don’t care one bit about Xavier Pierce, I do care about the possibility of being sued because my usual legal representative is on holiday with his wife and the step-daughter that I banged a few years ago. Don’t worry, she was legal. I checked.
Questioner: Favourite comic book character?
Trace Demon: I’d say Constantine, but I’m pretty sure DC just screwed him over with a reboot so let’s go with Joker.
Questioner: Sexiest comic book character?
Trace Demon: Why would you even ask me that, that’s just weird. You realize they’re drawings on pages right? Anyway, next, and can we make it wrestling related so I don’t feel like I’m wasting my time?
I have to say I feel a little bit out of place standing on this stage, not because I don’t enjoy speaking, I love that more than life itself, but because I really don’t belong at a comic book convention. Have you tried wrestling for three companies, raising a one year old daughter, looking after a soon to be seventeen year old and still find time to read comics? I haven’t because I like sex too much, but I’m sure it’s difficult.
Questioner: Yukio Blaze or Braden Munroe?
Trace Demon: In a competition of who stinks worst, Yukio Blaze, in a competition of who is better… well they’re both pretty s**t.
I should probably remember not to say s**t anymore what with all the kids that are in here.
Odd Convention Girl: Are Braden Munroe and Tabitha Owens as cool as they look?
Trace Demon: I didn’t know they looked cool. In fact it’s a miracle I know who they are at all.
Also this one’s a girl, shouldn’t she be like cos-playing or something if she wanted to be here? I mean that’s a rule right, I definitely thought girls at a convention had to dress up in a slutty costume because they didn’t know anything about comics. At least that’s what Tony Harris told me.
Odd Convention Girl: Well yeah, I mean they’ve always got those awesome attires. Plus they’re amazing in the ring. Hey, aren’t you facing them this week, I think you’re going to lose.
Brazen, I like that. Still, my ego will not stand for this.
Trace Demon: You think I’m going to lose?
Odd Convention Girl: Well, yeah.
Trace Demon: Alright, let me explain this in a way that I think you’ll understand.
And remember not to use the word s**t, that’d probably lead to some complaints and then I might not get paid. I’d hate to have to shank someone to get my money, not again.
Trace Demon: This week’s match is going to be like the Killing Joke. You’ve all read that right? Of course you have. You see in this story I’m the Joker, obviously, and Braden Munroe is my James Gordon, just for one night. Now I’m going to take what he loves most, poor little Tabitha Munroe, and I’m going to turn her into the stories Barbara Gordon. Now I’m going to stand in that ring and I’m going to deliver such a horrible, barbaric beating to that girl that she’s not going to be able to walk away. I’m going to cripple her, and I’m going to make sure that Munroe watches me do it. Now you might be wondering what Yukio Blaze’s role is in all of this, I mean I know I sure am, he isn’t Batman material after all.
A few people have already started leaving during my little rant. It was probably the bit where I said I was going to cripple a girl; a twelve year old probably doesn’t want to hear that. But during it all I keep my eyes on the girl who asked the question, the girl who I swear is more bewitched with my words than anyone has ever been before.
Trace Demon: No, I think he’s the toxic liquid; he’s the thing that’s driven me insane, made me into a crazed villain. So how about we all just raise our glasses to this match and say… here’s to crime.
< *** >
It’s a strange one this week. Very, very strange. You see I’ve never been one for tag team wrestling, I’ve never really trusted anyone enough. Yes, I was the WFWF Tag Team Champion with Thunder but the entire time I was in that ring with him all I could think about was how I was going to take him out if he crossed me. My mind works like that, I can’t work with other people, I have to fight them, I have to go to war with them. And the reason for that is that I understand people, I understand how people’s minds work. You can tell me that I’m selfish, that I’m sociopathic, that I’m a monster, a villain even, but the plain and simple truth is that we’re all like that; we are all interested only in ourselves.
The reason you call me a villain is that I accept that, I do not hide it beneath false promises and false respect. I am open about who I am, about what I want and what I am willing to do to get it. And that is the only different between me and Yukio Blaze, the only difference between me and Braden Munroe, the only different between me… and all of you. I know what I am. You sit there and you might say that you want what is best for the world but we both know you don’t, we both know that the only thing you want is what is best for you. And more power to you, there’s not a damn thing wrong with that. What wrong is how you all treat me like a villain simply because I do not lie about myself.
But none of that matters, what matters is this match. Because you see the truth is, and we all know this is a fact, this isn’t a tag team match. This isn’t two on two, this is a damn handicap match. This is everyone against me, because on one side of the ring you’ve got Trace Demon, the villain of the piece, the grand instigator of chaos. And on the other side you’ve got all the people that want to beat me. You’ve got Braden Munroe, you’ve got his little piece Tabitha Owens, you’ve got Yukio Blaze, you’ve got Xavier Pierce and you’ve got every single one of you putrid little fans who are scared that the truth that I preach is going to make you all realize the truth about your pathetic little lives!
So when I step into that ring in Denver, Colorado I know what I’m walking into. I’m walking into the ring with three people, all of whom have the exact same agenda – to hurt me, to beat me, to damn well kill me. I’m fighting against the odds, I don’t see how I’m the f*****g villain here, but it doesn’t damn well change the facts that I’m stepping into a damn ambush set up by a power mad dictator who is just out to screw me over because he can’t admit that I am the better man. So he throws me into the ring, forces me to team with the man who, you know, I humiliated last week, and tells us to fight against two people who haven’t been seen in god knows how long. F*****g justice you know, doesn’t exit.
Braden Munroe, Tabitha Owens, you like your comic books. Fair play I mean what else have you got going for you? I know a bit about comic books, I know that they need heroes and villains and that usually, when it comes down to it, the heroes win. Nobody really wants to read a comic book where the villain wins at the end because then they’d have to face the facts that in real life, the good guys, don’t always win. Because it doesn’t matter if you are a hero or a villain in this world, it doesn’t matter a damn bit. It matters what you are willing to do. It matter how far you are willing to take this. Me, I’ll take it all the way. I will cripple you both, I’ll feed you to the damn dogs, it doesn’t matter to me. You consider yourselves heroes, but it’s just a word, just a damn word that doesn’t mean a thing.
And Yukio Blaze, we’ve got to team this week. I never thought I’d say that. But I think I’ve found the perfect way to handle this so that we can win, I really do. I think I have found the perfect tactic and it’s all thanks to your wife. It’s an idea I had when I was watching myself screw her from behind on my big screen television. We’re going to handle this match the same way we handled Robyn. I’m going to get in there first, I’m going to do things that you’ve never even heard of before and when I’m done, you can have my scraps. Don’t feel bad that you won’t be able to match up to the high expectations that I’ve set out, nobody ever can.
So that’s it I think, the end of our story, for now. I’ll leave you with this – alas, goodbye, adieu, because in Colarado… I’m going to break your f*****g necks.
- Alfred Hitchcock
< *** >
Every story needs a bad guy, because as human beings we seek conflict. We seek the battle between right and wrong, we thrive on it, need it, crave it. It’s a horrible truth but a truth none the less. The greatest heroes of our time, be they real or fictional, were only great because they had some grand nemesis to battle against and while we fixate on the hero, our minds truly lie with the villain by the end of the story. I for one have never really met a truly good man that I wanted to succeed, never watched a truly good hero that I felt like routing for. It’s the moral ambiguity of a person’s existence that draws me in, that battle between right and wrong, between the internal hero and villain, that’s what makes a person memorable, that’s what makes us want to watch.
Even in our business, where the lines between face and heel, between good guy and bad guy, are crossed so frequently it is rarely the hero that people tune in to watch. Without the villain to initiate them the hero would never do anything, they would sit around and talk about the good old times, remind us all of the many great things they have done in the past. A hero has no ambition beyond stopping the villain and without a bad guy to push them, then they would be nothing. They would stand for nothing; they would hold ideals that didn’t matter because there would be nobody to oppose them.
It is for this very reason that I am perfectly happy to be called a villain.
You see people believe that just because I do things differently that I must be wrong, that I must be crazy or sociopathic or just plain disturbed. The truth of the matter is I never do anything simply to antagonise people. I don’t walk around attacking people for the sake of it, I don’t go around sticking needles into people just so I can claim to be a crazy son of a b***h, to come out and say that people should watch me because I’m going to do something crazy. No, I do things because they have to be dome. I hurt people because they oppose me, because they challenge what I have worked so hard to achieve and for this I am called wrong in the head.
Do you people truly believe that I released that video last week simply to prove to you all that I’m some messed up nut job? Do you people truly believe that I showed everybody how I f****d Yukio Blaze’s wife three years ago simply to humiliate him, to embarrass and antagonize him? No, I did it because he opposed me. I did it because three weeks ago Yukio Blaze turned up and he interrupted me over something that happened years ago. He showed up because I failed at putting him down when I had the chance and he wanted to rub my nose in it. If anything Yukio Blaze is the villain of our story because he made a personal attack on me, I simply responded.
But you people don’t see it that way and why? Because Yukio Blaze has a brown nose from spending all day kissing your asses. He comes out and he claims to do what he does because of the fans and that makes him someone worth cheering for while I am booed simply for telling the truth and demanding the respect that you all should have given me years ago. Of course the truth is Yukio Blaze is just like the rest of us. He attacked me two weeks ago when my back was turned and forced me to respond by showing everyone exactly what sort of women his whore of a wife is. Sorry Thunder, but it’s true, your sister is a slut.
But alas I have been chosen as the villain and that is that. I don’t care, hero or villain I will do what needs to be done. But one thing I do need to make clear is that you’re constant claims of my mental instability are starting to irritate me. You see there was a time when I had… let’s say sociopathic tendencies, a time when I was driven out of my mind because of my addiction, but that time has long since passed. And I think that’s a good thing, both for you and for me. A sane villain is much more interesting than a disturbed one, there’s no passing of anything I do as the acts of a disturbed man now. I don’t know whether that’s a scary thought or not, quite frankly I don’t really care. Just remember this.
I’m sane now, and I’m the villain that you’ve always wanted me to be.
< *** >
House of Hell Wrestling School
16th November 2012
Trace Demon: This is a f*****g joke!
Wayne narrowly avoids the glass as it shatters against the wall of our office. Yes, it was a little bit too close but it wasn’t like I was trying to hit him. If I was trying then he’d have glass in his forehead right now and I’d have a lawsuit on my hands. I’d been having such a good day as well, laughing about how much I’d screwed with Yukio Blaze and his life (and physically screwed his wife, let’s not forget that), taking the piss out of Xavier Pierce and this stupid public speaking thing he’s been trying to talk me into and then I go and open up my e-mails and this is what I see. This? God damn it.
Wayne McGurk: Do you mind throwing the glass away from me next time?
I’ll throw my glass where I want to thank you very much.
Trace Demon: Look at this, just f*****g look at this.
I slide the laptop across the desk so that he can see the horror that I have just seen, the horror that I cannot forget. It’s worse than that video involving the two girls, one cup and… oh come on, I don’t need to describe that, you’ve all see it by now. It only takes him a few seconds of scrolling down the page to see exactly what has put me in such a foul, glass shattering mood. And as well all know, a glass shattering mood is the absolutely worst mood of them all.
Trace Demon & Yukio Blaze vs. Braden Munroe & Tabitha Owens.
Wayne McGurk: I warned you.
Trace Demon: This is not the time to be telling me that you told me so, alright? Actually, the time for that is never.
Wayne McGurk: Well I did.
He just can’t help himself, every opportunity he gets to show that he’s got any kind of intelligence he has to take it. I get it, I do, he obviously must feel inferior always having to work in a room with such a superior specimen as myself, but still, that’s really no excuse to go around acting like an egotistical cocky ass.
Wayne McGurk: I warned you, you go gunning for Xavier Pierce and he’s going to fight back. First making you defend the International Championship last week…
I still have no idea who that Cameron Stone kid is. Did they find him on the street? He certainly smelt like they found him on the street. I had to have like a dozen showers because of that dude.
Wayne McGurk: And now this tag match.
Trace Demon: It’s like he wants me out of this number one contender tournament before it even starts. It almost makes me think that there’s some teenage kid who thinks he runs the place and is stopping me from challenging for a title because he’s got a grudge.
Wayne McGurk: There is, he’s called Xavier Pierce.
Not the name I was thinking of.
Trace Demon: Teaming with Yukio Blaze. This is just going to be humiliating, I mean I’m Trace Demon, I’m the International Championship and now I have to share a team with a smelly homeless person. I mean fighting one last week was fine, I’m happy to beat up hobos, but teaming with one? That’s just cruel and unusual punishment, it’s going to kill my reputation!
Wayne McGurk: Wait, that’s what you’re angry about?
Trace Demon: Yeah, what else would it be?
Wayne McGurk: The fact that you’re teaming with a man who wants to tear you limb from limb because you showed a sex tape of you and his wife? I mean surely that’s the real worry here.
Oh poor misguided Wayne McGurk, never really did have an eye for the bigger picture, or the smaller picture really, he’s always been a kind of let’s just see what happens guy. I respect it to a degree, I’ve just always been more of a ‘always have a plan’ kind of guy, I don’t like being caught off guard and I sure as hell don’t like not being in control. Sure, I guess his way of life netted him a hot if a little bit sociopathic wife and a kind of cool if a little bit annoying daughter, but then it also landed him half a dozen boxes full of Trace Demon t-shirts in his garage, so you know, I guess the awesome shirts must make all the rest that little bit better.
Trace Demon: Come on, you don’t seriously think I’m worried about Yukio Blaze as a threat do you? I mean maybe to my immune system, he’s probably got a ton of STD’s and fungal bacteria crawling about him. Good thing I got to Robyn before he did otherwise I’d have to book myself in for some kind of chemical bath.
Wayne McGurk: You’re unbelievable.
I get the feeling that it would be arrogant to say thank you.
Trace Demon: Why thank you.
Did it anyway.
Wayne McGurk: He wants to kill you, like literally kill you.
Trace Demon: Instead of that theoretical jokey killing that we all do once in a while.
Wayne McGurk: Probably with a mace.
Trace Demon: There are worse ways to go.
Wayne McGurk: Look, you pushed him too far, you messed with the man’s family, you don’t do that. You don’t cross that line. When you’re in the ring, what you do to people in there, that’s you’re business. Fine, hurt people to win matches, you get paid for that, but there’s no excuse to wreck a man’s marriage just so that you can get off on watching him suffer.
Trace Demon: I didn’t do it because I wanted to screw his life up…
I kind of did. Don’t tell anybody.
Trace Demon: I did it because the guy has to learn that he’s in over his head. This is a war Wayne, and in war you use whatever ammunition you have available. You don’t want to be the man with his back against the wall staring down a barrel of a gun; you want to be the man pulling the trigger, you want to be the man watching the fear take over as he sees his life pass before his eyes. And anyway, I didn’t get off on his misery.
He looks at me, expecting some kind of punch line. He knows me too well.
Trace Demon: I got off when I was screwing his wife.
He shakes his head in disbelief, an action which is so pointless and overdone that it really doesn’t have any dramatic effect anymore. He heads for the door, walking out of the room as if to tell me that I’ve crossed a line. Sometimes I think my line and everyone else’s are completely different. He does pause to shout something back at me.
Wayne McGurk: One day you’ll take something other than violence and misery seriously.
Trace Demon: Where’s the fun in that?
And he’s gone, and I’m left alone with my thoughts and that one tag team match staring back at me.
Trace Demon: F*****g Yukio Blaze.
F*****g Yukio Blaze indeed.
< *** >
The Glorious Household of Trace Demon
18th November 2012
The apartment is still a massive tip after Eliza’s party. Although if I’m honest I’m really stretching the use of the word party. In my mind a party involves copious amounts of alcohol, several drunk college girls, a bar brawl and, depending on whether it’s a Saturday night or not, a good old fashioned orgy. Of course your daughter’s first birthday doesn’t exactly go down like that. Instead you invite all the other parents that your girlfriend forced you to be friends with to bring their crying kids around to your house and try not to shoot yourself. Because that’s what parents find fun… apparently.
Trace Demon: I don’t understand how it happened; I mean seriously, how did he trick me into this? I mean Xavier Pierce, tricking me.
Alexa looks at me with a glare; she clearly isn’t buying my well-acted charade.
Alexa Munroe: You accepted the speaking gig because you didn’t want to be here when my mother visited, didn’t you?
Trace Demon: No, it was that dang dirty Xavier Pierce. The man should be shanghaied for tricking me into such an outrageous event.
Seriously, I should be winning an Oscar right now.
Alexa Munroe: You’re just scared what she’s going to say about your sex tape being aired on live television.
I sense a slight hint of passive aggressiveness right there.
Trace Demon: Hey, you said you were fine with the sex tape.
Alexa Munroe: I told you what you do when you’re wrestling is your business, I don’t know Yukio Blaze, I don’t know his wife, and we weren’t together when you screwed her on camera.
I’ve got to say she’s taking this whole sex tape thing really well considering she wasn’t in it, or maybe that’s what makes it acceptable. Is it acceptable to make a sex tape with someone else when you’re single and then show it when you’re with someone? This is a real moral quandary that I have found myself in. Not even the greatest philosophers in the entire world would be able to work it out.
Alexa Munroe: My mom won’t see it that way though.
Trace Demon: I am not scared of your mother.
I am, she’s ten times more dangerous than Braden Munroe, Yukio Blaze, the entire New Epoch and Phillip Schneider put together. Also, she’s uglier, if that’s even possible.
Trace Demon: Plus there is no chance that she has seen that sex tape, no chance at all.
Alexa Munroe: My brother e-mailed it to her.
Trace Demon: Your brother watched the sex tape? Well that’s just weird, I feel violated, how do you not feel violated, you’re entire family has now probably seen me giving it to another woman.
Alexa Munroe: And to think, you’re the father of my child.
Trace Demon: Clearly you need to make some better life choices.
Alexa Munroe: Clearly. I still don’t see why you’re doing this. Would you really rather speak at a comic book convention than be here with my mother.
We both burst out into full on laughter. What a ridiculous question. I’d rather be in a grave full of barbed wire than be here with her mother. Although to be fair, with some of the people in the WFWF, that could certainly happen.
Trace Demon: Look, it’s a good way of scouting out my match this week.
Alexa Munroe: How is speaking in front of a few thousand people scouting for your match?
Trace Demon: Because they’re all comic book fans. I’m going to use them as a sounding board for some witty puns that I can use in my match against Munroe and his sidekick, the incredible dull but oddly attractive girl wonder.
Alexa Munroe: That’s not her name.
Trace Demon: It should be though.
Alexa Munroe: Fine, but pick something up for Emily while you’re there.
God damn it, gift shopping, I hate gift shopping.
Trace Demon: Emily!
I shove some more clothes in my bag while I wait for her to enter. I think five Trace Demon t-shirts will be enough, I’m only going to end up burning them on stage and asking someone if they want to try being the human torch for the day.
Emily Hall: What?
I spin to find Emily leaning in the doorway. She’s probably been on the phone to Scarlett all day. That s**t is getting weird. I don’t even like speaking to Scarlett for more time than I have to, though really I don’t like speaking to anyone for more time than I absolutely have to. Bloody people, always so annoying.
Trace Demon: Gift ideas from a comic convention, shoot.
Emily Hall: I have no idea what you’re talking about.
Trace Demon: I’m just going to grab you some Batwoman trades. I hear she’s gay now.
Emily Hall: Why would you even bring that up?
Oh god, it must be that time of the month. I should mark it down on the calendar like I do with Alexis’ so I can make sure that I just so happen to have to work this week every month from now until the end of the time, or when she moves out, you can never tell which will come first with teenagers these days.
Trace Demon: Because it’s either that or The Walking Dead, and I’m not lining Kirkman’s pockets, not after that last debacle at his cheesecake tasting night.
Emily Hall: You’re ridiculous, just get what you want, I don’t care.
She storms off back to her room.
Trace Demon: Can you believe that out of everybody on the WFWF roster with kids, I’m probably the best father slash legal guardian?
Alexa Munroe: No, I don’t believe that.
Trace Demon: Well I am. Not a lot of competition though. Right, I’m off to speak to a load of nerds about why they’d have preferred Brandon Munroe to me, say hello to your mother for me.
Or you know, shoot her in the head. It’s the only way to be certain that she’s dead.
< *** >
Just Another Comic Book Convention
19th November 2012
I’ve done a lot of interviews, a lot of big public speaking events, even a lot of talk shows, but one thing that I’ve never done is speak in front of a load of comic book fans at a comic book convention. There’s a lot of similarities between wrestling and comic books, you’ve got your heroes and villains, your epic conflicts, the bunghole of an authority figure that’s constantly trying to screw up your life because he used to be an arms dealer and doesn’t have a clue what he’s doing. Okay, so that last one isn’t in every comic book, but it’s certainly going on in my life, therefore it’s important. But as I was saying, speaking at a comic book convention isn’t exactly my idea of fun, especially when it’s a public question and answer session and all the questions are really stupid.
Questioner: Marvel or DC?
Trace Demon: Doesn’t matter, they’ll probably both be rebooting next week anyway, next?
Questioner: Favourite manga series?
Trace Demon: I have no idea what that is.
Questioner: Well it’s…
Trace Demon: I wasn’t asking, next.
I was half tempted not to show up, but then apparently I’d be in violation of the verbal agreement that Xavier Pierce made with the guys running the place. And while I don’t care one bit about Xavier Pierce, I do care about the possibility of being sued because my usual legal representative is on holiday with his wife and the step-daughter that I banged a few years ago. Don’t worry, she was legal. I checked.
Questioner: Favourite comic book character?
Trace Demon: I’d say Constantine, but I’m pretty sure DC just screwed him over with a reboot so let’s go with Joker.
Questioner: Sexiest comic book character?
Trace Demon: Why would you even ask me that, that’s just weird. You realize they’re drawings on pages right? Anyway, next, and can we make it wrestling related so I don’t feel like I’m wasting my time?
I have to say I feel a little bit out of place standing on this stage, not because I don’t enjoy speaking, I love that more than life itself, but because I really don’t belong at a comic book convention. Have you tried wrestling for three companies, raising a one year old daughter, looking after a soon to be seventeen year old and still find time to read comics? I haven’t because I like sex too much, but I’m sure it’s difficult.
Questioner: Yukio Blaze or Braden Munroe?
Trace Demon: In a competition of who stinks worst, Yukio Blaze, in a competition of who is better… well they’re both pretty s**t.
I should probably remember not to say s**t anymore what with all the kids that are in here.
Odd Convention Girl: Are Braden Munroe and Tabitha Owens as cool as they look?
Trace Demon: I didn’t know they looked cool. In fact it’s a miracle I know who they are at all.
Also this one’s a girl, shouldn’t she be like cos-playing or something if she wanted to be here? I mean that’s a rule right, I definitely thought girls at a convention had to dress up in a slutty costume because they didn’t know anything about comics. At least that’s what Tony Harris told me.
Odd Convention Girl: Well yeah, I mean they’ve always got those awesome attires. Plus they’re amazing in the ring. Hey, aren’t you facing them this week, I think you’re going to lose.
Brazen, I like that. Still, my ego will not stand for this.
Trace Demon: You think I’m going to lose?
Odd Convention Girl: Well, yeah.
Trace Demon: Alright, let me explain this in a way that I think you’ll understand.
And remember not to use the word s**t, that’d probably lead to some complaints and then I might not get paid. I’d hate to have to shank someone to get my money, not again.
Trace Demon: This week’s match is going to be like the Killing Joke. You’ve all read that right? Of course you have. You see in this story I’m the Joker, obviously, and Braden Munroe is my James Gordon, just for one night. Now I’m going to take what he loves most, poor little Tabitha Munroe, and I’m going to turn her into the stories Barbara Gordon. Now I’m going to stand in that ring and I’m going to deliver such a horrible, barbaric beating to that girl that she’s not going to be able to walk away. I’m going to cripple her, and I’m going to make sure that Munroe watches me do it. Now you might be wondering what Yukio Blaze’s role is in all of this, I mean I know I sure am, he isn’t Batman material after all.
A few people have already started leaving during my little rant. It was probably the bit where I said I was going to cripple a girl; a twelve year old probably doesn’t want to hear that. But during it all I keep my eyes on the girl who asked the question, the girl who I swear is more bewitched with my words than anyone has ever been before.
Trace Demon: No, I think he’s the toxic liquid; he’s the thing that’s driven me insane, made me into a crazed villain. So how about we all just raise our glasses to this match and say… here’s to crime.
< *** >
It’s a strange one this week. Very, very strange. You see I’ve never been one for tag team wrestling, I’ve never really trusted anyone enough. Yes, I was the WFWF Tag Team Champion with Thunder but the entire time I was in that ring with him all I could think about was how I was going to take him out if he crossed me. My mind works like that, I can’t work with other people, I have to fight them, I have to go to war with them. And the reason for that is that I understand people, I understand how people’s minds work. You can tell me that I’m selfish, that I’m sociopathic, that I’m a monster, a villain even, but the plain and simple truth is that we’re all like that; we are all interested only in ourselves.
The reason you call me a villain is that I accept that, I do not hide it beneath false promises and false respect. I am open about who I am, about what I want and what I am willing to do to get it. And that is the only different between me and Yukio Blaze, the only difference between me and Braden Munroe, the only different between me… and all of you. I know what I am. You sit there and you might say that you want what is best for the world but we both know you don’t, we both know that the only thing you want is what is best for you. And more power to you, there’s not a damn thing wrong with that. What wrong is how you all treat me like a villain simply because I do not lie about myself.
But none of that matters, what matters is this match. Because you see the truth is, and we all know this is a fact, this isn’t a tag team match. This isn’t two on two, this is a damn handicap match. This is everyone against me, because on one side of the ring you’ve got Trace Demon, the villain of the piece, the grand instigator of chaos. And on the other side you’ve got all the people that want to beat me. You’ve got Braden Munroe, you’ve got his little piece Tabitha Owens, you’ve got Yukio Blaze, you’ve got Xavier Pierce and you’ve got every single one of you putrid little fans who are scared that the truth that I preach is going to make you all realize the truth about your pathetic little lives!
So when I step into that ring in Denver, Colorado I know what I’m walking into. I’m walking into the ring with three people, all of whom have the exact same agenda – to hurt me, to beat me, to damn well kill me. I’m fighting against the odds, I don’t see how I’m the f*****g villain here, but it doesn’t damn well change the facts that I’m stepping into a damn ambush set up by a power mad dictator who is just out to screw me over because he can’t admit that I am the better man. So he throws me into the ring, forces me to team with the man who, you know, I humiliated last week, and tells us to fight against two people who haven’t been seen in god knows how long. F*****g justice you know, doesn’t exit.
Braden Munroe, Tabitha Owens, you like your comic books. Fair play I mean what else have you got going for you? I know a bit about comic books, I know that they need heroes and villains and that usually, when it comes down to it, the heroes win. Nobody really wants to read a comic book where the villain wins at the end because then they’d have to face the facts that in real life, the good guys, don’t always win. Because it doesn’t matter if you are a hero or a villain in this world, it doesn’t matter a damn bit. It matters what you are willing to do. It matter how far you are willing to take this. Me, I’ll take it all the way. I will cripple you both, I’ll feed you to the damn dogs, it doesn’t matter to me. You consider yourselves heroes, but it’s just a word, just a damn word that doesn’t mean a thing.
And Yukio Blaze, we’ve got to team this week. I never thought I’d say that. But I think I’ve found the perfect way to handle this so that we can win, I really do. I think I have found the perfect tactic and it’s all thanks to your wife. It’s an idea I had when I was watching myself screw her from behind on my big screen television. We’re going to handle this match the same way we handled Robyn. I’m going to get in there first, I’m going to do things that you’ve never even heard of before and when I’m done, you can have my scraps. Don’t feel bad that you won’t be able to match up to the high expectations that I’ve set out, nobody ever can.
So that’s it I think, the end of our story, for now. I’ll leave you with this – alas, goodbye, adieu, because in Colarado… I’m going to break your f*****g necks.
