Post by Deleted on Apr 24, 2017 15:13:03 GMT -5
04/11/2017
New York, NY | Atlanta, GA
(Off-camera)
“I still don’t think I can shake the past couple of months.”
It is a solemn, spine-freezing statement made by Bryan Williams. His brief time in Alpha Wrestling Empire, though enjoyable, consisted of moments that had been doused in black paint and kerosene.
What had meant to be another platform for the tremendous success of the Gen Now group to carry over from Four Corners Wrestling had ended up casting an unsavory shadow on their popularity. Part of Bryan was thankful that the AWE had unexpectedly closed up shop, as it put a grinding halt to what could have made him a hated figure.
Being a heel? Fine. There were plenty of wrestling bad guys who could fairly easily transition back to their home turf and be lauded the same as if they’d never even had a match anywhere else before. But the course that they were undertaking: the manipulation of a delicate mind such as Hubert Smalls…
“It was a horrible idea from the start.”
...that meant more than just your typical shenanigans. The occasional cheating, commenting on the odor of certain crowds, a bludgeoning or two using an inanimate object -- all forgivable offenses. A steel-wool scrubbing of the brain of a man with a personality disorder? Not so much. Even if the means to an end were to be for his best interest, the path that his counterpart on the other side of the Skype box wanted to go down to achieve it still seemed heartless.
Stefanie Lane, the roommate and general caretaker of the subject at hand, had her eyelids lowered as she shook her head at the monitor. Strands of her blond hair hung loosely over her face as she adjusted herself to an Indian-style position on the couch of the Valley Stream apartment. She attempted to reason with Bryan, using her longer relationship with Smalls as the basis of her argument.
“Look, I get where you’re coming from and all, but you and me had this talk before, Bryan,” she mulls. “The hotel incident, what happened in the locker room: those episodes have happened before. And they’re gonna continue to happen regardless of whether or not it was because we set…”
“YOU set,” Bryan interrupts, correcting the story.
Stefanie sighs, throwing her arms in the air. “Whatever.”
“The point is that Hubert’s had a meltdown because Wal-Mart was out of his favorite flavor of Slim Jim. He’s almost DESTROYED a vet’s office because he genuinely thought they were hurting Tail Earnhardt when he was just going to get his annual rabies shot. But he calms down, and then he’s back to being happy in mere minutes. He’s just like a child, Bryan, and that’s the way it is -- I’ve learned that there’s no long term damage that can be done,” she reasons.
Bryan, his hand positioned over his mouth in thought as he listens to Miss Lane, places it down to his leg. Casting a glance out of the window of his Loews guestroom overlooking Midtown Atlanta, he responds.
“Even if he never remembers those things,” he says, solemnly, “it still doesn’t make it right.”
Stefanie nods, although still defiant and determined to bring her own sense of rationale into the conversation. “Do you think it’s right for someone that talented and that beloved by an audience barely being able to afford to keep a roof over his head?”
“He was well on his way to making a great living without us having to get involved,” Bryan responds.
“Maybe so, but you know this business a lot better than me,” she interjects, “and it’s fairly difficult to promote a guy who would rather lose than hurt someone. And if we didn’t do something to bring out even a little aggression in him...you know good and well someone else would have ended up manipulating him. And I’d rather it be people who genuinely care about him than someone like that cunt Kimitsu who’d parade him around like a puppet for their own self-interest.”
Bryan blinks slowly, reaching down and pulling his knees close to his chest. He really did not like this woman, and in his heart he couldn’t be completely sure that the only self-interested cunt in the picture wasn’t the woman in her late 30s he currently saw on his laptop monitor. He knew that he did care about Hubert, though. Every fan, every worker, every crew member with some semblance of a soul cared about him.
But he agreed with her, nonetheless. He lacked aggression due to his childlike selflessness, all because he had nothing to fight for. As ironic as it was, Hubert Smalls, whose mental state required that someone look out for him at all times...his only mission was to protect the feelings of the ones he loved. And he loved everyone.
However, his mind for the business had led him to this scheduled conversation with Miss Lane. He had an idea as to how to bring out the ferocity that Hubert had buried in his psyche, but to bring it out in a way that didn’t involve exploiting his fragility. As Stefanie had mentioned, Hubert had once lost his marbles over the inclination that his beloved therapy cat was suffering an ounce of pain. Hell, he might have torn Ana limb from limb if she hadn’t used smoke and mirrors explaining her attack on Bindy Trent the way that she did.
“That’s exactly why he needs a partner,” Bryan suggests.
Stefanie grins. “You’d mentioned that in your text. But I don’t see why a tag team is the solution, here.”
“It’s simple, for three reasons. One, he needs someone he can count on to look after him,” he begins to list, counting the points off on his fingers. “In Union Battleground, he’s fine, since that place isn't a moral cesspool. But if you want him over with us in Four Corners, you’re talking about an entirely different breed of cast. Those deviants won’t think twice about trying to take advantage of him, and we can’t always be there to watch his back. A partner is going to take that responsibility, because they’ll be in it for the same reason you want Hubert in it: success.”
“Two,” he continues, extending his middle finger. “Hubert doesn’t want to brawl? Let the partner do it. He can stick to what he knows in his technical game. And that brings me to three,” he adds.
“It may take some time, but he’ll grow to trust the partner. And that instinct that he has to protect his friends is eventually going to kick in -- the damsel in distress always needs his knight and shining armor to come to the rescue. That’s where we’ll see that aggression, and it’s where he’ll learn that it’s okay to annihilate the opponent if it’s all in the name of keeping someone safe.”
Stefanie, highly impressed with the case that Bryan had built, nods in agreement. “I like what I’m hearing. But I’m curious. Who did you have in mind?”
Bryan shrugs. “That’s the part I haven’t quite figured out yet. Someone humble. Someone likeable. Someone where there’s potential chemistry. Someone who could really use a boost to stand out. Someone who understands that it’s a mutually beneficial relationship. But most importantly, someone who isn’t going to try to do what we did to him in the AWE.”
“How about Tornado?” Stefanie suggests, revealing her cards on the buy-in of the plan.
Bryan lifts a brow. “Not a bad idea. But I’m thinking someone a little more rough around the edges. He’s a good guy, but the pairing is a little too vanilla.”
“You’re probably right,” she agrees.
“But I take it with that enthusiasm, you’re for this?” Bryan questions.
Stefanie brushes her hair back away from her face. “I can’t argue with it. But I will say this,” she states with a sharp, business-like tone. “While I appreciate your help here, let’s make it very clear that I’m in the driver’s seat. If this doesn’t work out, then you need to know that I will do whatever it takes to make sure he is moving in an upward direction. And despite what a lot of you might think about how close you are to him -- he always does what I suggest. Because he knows that I know what’s best for him.”
Any warming up to Miss Lane that may have occurred in that brief window of reciprocal agreement had quickly evaporated for Bryan. Unfortunately, she was right. Not that she knew what was best for Hubert, but that he would always go back to her no matter what the consequence: she’s put in her time to earn that level of familial trust.
While he wanted to have a longer window of time to properly vet Hubert’s future partner, he knew that he needed to act quickly and trust his own instincts of character. If he let it dwell for too long, there was a good chance that Stefanie would renege and plot Smalls’ own course, which could result in disaster.
Withholding a sigh and shielding his frustration over her veiled threat, Bryan nodded.
“I understand.”
New York, NY | Atlanta, GA
(Off-camera)
“I still don’t think I can shake the past couple of months.”
It is a solemn, spine-freezing statement made by Bryan Williams. His brief time in Alpha Wrestling Empire, though enjoyable, consisted of moments that had been doused in black paint and kerosene.
What had meant to be another platform for the tremendous success of the Gen Now group to carry over from Four Corners Wrestling had ended up casting an unsavory shadow on their popularity. Part of Bryan was thankful that the AWE had unexpectedly closed up shop, as it put a grinding halt to what could have made him a hated figure.
Being a heel? Fine. There were plenty of wrestling bad guys who could fairly easily transition back to their home turf and be lauded the same as if they’d never even had a match anywhere else before. But the course that they were undertaking: the manipulation of a delicate mind such as Hubert Smalls…
“It was a horrible idea from the start.”
...that meant more than just your typical shenanigans. The occasional cheating, commenting on the odor of certain crowds, a bludgeoning or two using an inanimate object -- all forgivable offenses. A steel-wool scrubbing of the brain of a man with a personality disorder? Not so much. Even if the means to an end were to be for his best interest, the path that his counterpart on the other side of the Skype box wanted to go down to achieve it still seemed heartless.
Stefanie Lane, the roommate and general caretaker of the subject at hand, had her eyelids lowered as she shook her head at the monitor. Strands of her blond hair hung loosely over her face as she adjusted herself to an Indian-style position on the couch of the Valley Stream apartment. She attempted to reason with Bryan, using her longer relationship with Smalls as the basis of her argument.
“Look, I get where you’re coming from and all, but you and me had this talk before, Bryan,” she mulls. “The hotel incident, what happened in the locker room: those episodes have happened before. And they’re gonna continue to happen regardless of whether or not it was because we set…”
“YOU set,” Bryan interrupts, correcting the story.
Stefanie sighs, throwing her arms in the air. “Whatever.”
“The point is that Hubert’s had a meltdown because Wal-Mart was out of his favorite flavor of Slim Jim. He’s almost DESTROYED a vet’s office because he genuinely thought they were hurting Tail Earnhardt when he was just going to get his annual rabies shot. But he calms down, and then he’s back to being happy in mere minutes. He’s just like a child, Bryan, and that’s the way it is -- I’ve learned that there’s no long term damage that can be done,” she reasons.
Bryan, his hand positioned over his mouth in thought as he listens to Miss Lane, places it down to his leg. Casting a glance out of the window of his Loews guestroom overlooking Midtown Atlanta, he responds.
“Even if he never remembers those things,” he says, solemnly, “it still doesn’t make it right.”
Stefanie nods, although still defiant and determined to bring her own sense of rationale into the conversation. “Do you think it’s right for someone that talented and that beloved by an audience barely being able to afford to keep a roof over his head?”
“He was well on his way to making a great living without us having to get involved,” Bryan responds.
“Maybe so, but you know this business a lot better than me,” she interjects, “and it’s fairly difficult to promote a guy who would rather lose than hurt someone. And if we didn’t do something to bring out even a little aggression in him...you know good and well someone else would have ended up manipulating him. And I’d rather it be people who genuinely care about him than someone like that cunt Kimitsu who’d parade him around like a puppet for their own self-interest.”
Bryan blinks slowly, reaching down and pulling his knees close to his chest. He really did not like this woman, and in his heart he couldn’t be completely sure that the only self-interested cunt in the picture wasn’t the woman in her late 30s he currently saw on his laptop monitor. He knew that he did care about Hubert, though. Every fan, every worker, every crew member with some semblance of a soul cared about him.
But he agreed with her, nonetheless. He lacked aggression due to his childlike selflessness, all because he had nothing to fight for. As ironic as it was, Hubert Smalls, whose mental state required that someone look out for him at all times...his only mission was to protect the feelings of the ones he loved. And he loved everyone.
However, his mind for the business had led him to this scheduled conversation with Miss Lane. He had an idea as to how to bring out the ferocity that Hubert had buried in his psyche, but to bring it out in a way that didn’t involve exploiting his fragility. As Stefanie had mentioned, Hubert had once lost his marbles over the inclination that his beloved therapy cat was suffering an ounce of pain. Hell, he might have torn Ana limb from limb if she hadn’t used smoke and mirrors explaining her attack on Bindy Trent the way that she did.
“That’s exactly why he needs a partner,” Bryan suggests.
Stefanie grins. “You’d mentioned that in your text. But I don’t see why a tag team is the solution, here.”
“It’s simple, for three reasons. One, he needs someone he can count on to look after him,” he begins to list, counting the points off on his fingers. “In Union Battleground, he’s fine, since that place isn't a moral cesspool. But if you want him over with us in Four Corners, you’re talking about an entirely different breed of cast. Those deviants won’t think twice about trying to take advantage of him, and we can’t always be there to watch his back. A partner is going to take that responsibility, because they’ll be in it for the same reason you want Hubert in it: success.”
“Two,” he continues, extending his middle finger. “Hubert doesn’t want to brawl? Let the partner do it. He can stick to what he knows in his technical game. And that brings me to three,” he adds.
“It may take some time, but he’ll grow to trust the partner. And that instinct that he has to protect his friends is eventually going to kick in -- the damsel in distress always needs his knight and shining armor to come to the rescue. That’s where we’ll see that aggression, and it’s where he’ll learn that it’s okay to annihilate the opponent if it’s all in the name of keeping someone safe.”
Stefanie, highly impressed with the case that Bryan had built, nods in agreement. “I like what I’m hearing. But I’m curious. Who did you have in mind?”
Bryan shrugs. “That’s the part I haven’t quite figured out yet. Someone humble. Someone likeable. Someone where there’s potential chemistry. Someone who could really use a boost to stand out. Someone who understands that it’s a mutually beneficial relationship. But most importantly, someone who isn’t going to try to do what we did to him in the AWE.”
“How about Tornado?” Stefanie suggests, revealing her cards on the buy-in of the plan.
Bryan lifts a brow. “Not a bad idea. But I’m thinking someone a little more rough around the edges. He’s a good guy, but the pairing is a little too vanilla.”
“You’re probably right,” she agrees.
“But I take it with that enthusiasm, you’re for this?” Bryan questions.
Stefanie brushes her hair back away from her face. “I can’t argue with it. But I will say this,” she states with a sharp, business-like tone. “While I appreciate your help here, let’s make it very clear that I’m in the driver’s seat. If this doesn’t work out, then you need to know that I will do whatever it takes to make sure he is moving in an upward direction. And despite what a lot of you might think about how close you are to him -- he always does what I suggest. Because he knows that I know what’s best for him.”
Any warming up to Miss Lane that may have occurred in that brief window of reciprocal agreement had quickly evaporated for Bryan. Unfortunately, she was right. Not that she knew what was best for Hubert, but that he would always go back to her no matter what the consequence: she’s put in her time to earn that level of familial trust.
While he wanted to have a longer window of time to properly vet Hubert’s future partner, he knew that he needed to act quickly and trust his own instincts of character. If he let it dwell for too long, there was a good chance that Stefanie would renege and plot Smalls’ own course, which could result in disaster.
Withholding a sigh and shielding his frustration over her veiled threat, Bryan nodded.
“I understand.”