Collision (Course) Insurance - Part Three
Jan 1, 2019 18:37:58 GMT -5
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Post by Joey "The Handyman" Handy on Jan 1, 2019 18:37:58 GMT -5
Collision (Course) Insurance - Part Three
Joey was leaving Loki's office, getting ready to do some slight "detective work" revolving around why the top rope snapped during the Kyle Shane/ Gerard Angelo main event.
"I hope you know what you're doing." Loki muttered as Joey snapped the door shut.
It hadn't fallen on deaf ears.
"Me too, boss," answered Joey quietly before heading down the hallway.
Little did he know, Loki wasn't addressing Joey at all. A tall, enshrouded figure popped out of the shadows just enough for an outline to be seen. The silhouette was that of a tall man with a top hat and broad shoulders.
"We need to find out if he da one," shadow spoke, a thick Creole accent making it close to difficult for Loki to comprehend. "Da udder guy be convinced he da one we need."
"What's going to happen if he is?" queried PCW's General Manager.
"We gon' have to wake him up." The man stepped out of the shadows. His face was made up to resemble a skull. His arms were tattooed from shoulder to wrist. His black tank top shirt and pants added to his foreboding presence.
Loki must have been imagining things when he did step into the light, because he could have sworn that the man's shadow smiled and winked at him before dissipating back into its proper shape.
"Meaning what, exactly?" Loki's brain puzzled over what he had just seen, almost not hearing the response.
"I not gon' tell you," the man stated matter-of-factly. "If I do dat, you gon' try to stop us."
"I'm not convinced that I shouldn't anyways."
"It gon' happen whedder you involved or not. Best you let us do it dis way, dan any udder way."
"Just don't hurt the guy," Loki declared. "He's got a rough enough home life."
"Pain be part o' da process," instructed the man. "To get to his heavenly gifts, he mus' first go troo hell. That just the way deez t'ings be."
"You're sure he's going to join the roster?"
"I am." Both men were silent for a few seconds. Finally, the large man started back towards the shadows from whence he appeared. "If we wrong, your soul be clean o' dis. I make sure o' dat."
Loki watched the man leave without another word, his face etched in worry. "That's not how this world works," he muttered under his breath.
A while back, I had the technicians teach me how to look at footage for just such occurrences. Since the entertainment industry is heavily unionized, he knew we could both get into trouble for him doing that, we did it on our own time. Eventually, we were found out, but the union steward circumvented it by testing and certifying me in it after I passed with flying colors.
What can I say? It's a talent I have. I identify easier with inanimate objects than I do with people. If it's mechanical or technical, I usually have no problem getting down its operation. But I digress.
I came here to the media room to review the footage from Collision Course 7, from every camera angle possible, if necessary. I plugged the thumb drive Loki gave me into a USB slot and began the process of reviewing the entire show. I don't know if it was vanity, or a desire to learn, but I decided to watch my match with Alexa a couple of times.
I had just landed a series of kickboxing blows that had Alexa backing into a corner. I had just smashed her with a European uppercut that reeled her head on its axis. However, when she returned her gaze, I could have sworn that her face contorted into something... unnatural, something demonic.
Just rewatching the footage made the memory resurface in my mind like acid reflux from bad Taco Bell burritos. I shook my head in real time much in the same fashion as I did in the match I was viewing. Did I really see that? I convinced myself that it was just one too many kicks to the noggin during the fray. It wouldn't be the first time that had happened to me.
I refocused my search, putting that brow beating I received behind me. I had different camera angles going on different monitors simultaneously. I reviewed the even at normal speed, glossing from screen to screen like my son playing his Fortnite games in his room. He would sometimes allow me to watch for a bit, but I would get bored and move on, leaving him to his entertainment. I would watch him observe three screens as if it were nothing. To me, this was almost dizzying work.
"That's why I get paid the big bucks, I guess," I mumbled to myself jokingly.
About midway through the main event, I was certain I saw a small shadow on the turnbuckle that broke. It was just a millisecond, perhaps even a figment of my imagination, but I was sure I saw something. I rewound the video just a few seconds, going through every angle on that corner frame-by-frame.
Each click ticked a frame away, as I studied what I was looking at with the vigilance of a forensics detective. Finally, I came upon what I had thought I'd seen. The... whatever it was... was out of focus, like a every photo of Sasquatch in history, but the shape was there in plain sight.
It was about a foot tall, dark grey skin, pointed ears, and abnormally long legs and arms. In the next frame, the thing had bent down as if taking a bite out of the hardware. The next picture showed it upright again, and sneering at the very camera I was looking back at him with. Its mouth was filled with teeth that would make the average shark jealous. The next frame, it was gone completely.
My mind reeled. I sat there in the booth, winding the footage back a few seconds and watching it over and over again like an addict, trying to wrap my head around what the actual fuck I was looking at. I made prints of the frames from every angle that I could, including a blow-up that was blurry and digitized, but still discernible.
I gathered the prints into a pile, the close-up placed on top. I studied the creature in disbelief, still unable to grasp the situation. I know I've seen something like this thing somewhere, but my brain just couldn't justify it.
I slouched back in the chair, my hands pulling my hair back in frustration. My eyes were unwilling to look at the thing any longer, so they wandered around the room for anything, that wasn't the pictures I'd printed out, to glance at.
The boys in the media booth kept a selection of DVD movies here for them to entertain themselves with when there wasn't anything to do. I had once made a remark that they were almost wizard level at their ability to multi-task without losing focus on anything. I would also joke that my boy would make a great media guy someday, if I could get him to focus. Like father, like son.
Then my eyes came to rest on a movie that was from my own childhood. I gaped at the cover in disbelief. I knew I was looking at the very thing in the footage, but how is that possible? There was only one way to know for sure. I had to get home and check the books left to me by my nana.
I scooped up the pictures and the movie, tossing them indiscriminately into my toolbox and using the padlock that I rarely ever used. I folded my coat over my arm and exited the media booth, locking the door behind me, completely forgetting the USB drive left live on the screens.
I had nearly made it outside, when I finally remembered the drive. I set my box and coat down by the door, setting back to get the device before anyone else could get to it. Lord knows what kind of PR mountain would have to be climbed if that ever got out to the public.
As I made my way down the hallway, I saw a light orange flicker coming from within one of the press boxes, the one usually reserved for Phinehas Grimm. I knew he had already left, and the glow looked dangerously like a small fire, so I knew I should investigate, just in case.
My hand stopped on the knob after I heard voices coming from inside the room. It was a woman and a voice I was all too familiar with: Seromine's. I couldn't quite make out what they were saying to each other. Quietly, I turned the key in the lock, freeing the knob to spin.
"Let's pray for him, shall we?" sang the woman.
"Yes," I heard Seromine hiss, "Let's pray for poor ol' Phinehas and Frank and Richard! Better yet...let's pray for..."
I had opened up the door enough to catch their attention. The woman's face contorted skeletal, her eyes sinking deeply as she glowered at me. Seromine's head snapped, no HINGED back, like the lid of a box, his upside down gaze beaming death deep into my soul.
"SINNER!" He growled at me.
That had been enough. I slammed the door shut, quickly wishing I could barricade them inside while I escaped. The flight instinct in my mind went into overdrive, but I did my best to remain calm.
"Nope," I reassured myself. "Nope. Didn't see that." I wrestled with my sanity now more than I had with Alexa in the ring. What the hell was going on with me? Why was I seeing these things?
Running in full sprint, I got to my destination. I fumbled with the keys to the media room once more, finally managing to unlock the door. The room was in a shambles. The monitors I had been looking at less than five minutes ago were smashed to pieces. Wires were sticking out of the control console and sparking like they were just daring me to come closer. The computer I had the USB plugged into had a huge chunk of it missing now where the device once jutted.
"Oh, fuck." That was the only reaction my brain could muster while glancing the carnage in that room. I would probably catch the blame for that mess, but without knowing where the schematics for the wiring were, I wouldn't even be able to patch that up properly without something vital getting destroyed.
I decided that discretion was the better part of valor, disconnecting the power sources to the controls so that a fire didn't ACTUALLY start. I got the room as repaired and cleaned as I dared to without a technician getting involved.
Between the wrecked room and my hallucinations, my anxiety was at an all-time high. I was ready to get home to my kids, and yes, even my wife. I knew she'd make fun of me, or even institutionalize me, if I told her about this, but she was still somewhat of a calming presence in my life when she wanted to be. The problem was, she rarely, if ever, wanted to be nowadays.
I surveyed the damage one last time before latching and locking the door. I wanted this day behind me. My gut instincts told me that this wasn't an ending, but a beginning, and I wasn't going to enjoy this journey at all.
As I walked the long way back to where I had left my tool box and coat, all I could imagine was that big, beautiful paycheck I had just earned with the thrashing Alexa had given me going up in smoke. Nadine was going to be pissed. "Good thing our couch is comfortable," I remarked inwardly. "Maybe Buck will keep me company."
The thought of the big, fuzzy, fur-baby that passed for the family dog eased my mind just a bit. I wasn't his favorite person in the house, but at least he could be bribed with beef jerky and beer if need be. I would lay on the couch, snapping it to a Slim Jim and Budweiser, and there he'd...
My coat lay in shreds by the door, down flying in the air drafts from the doors like a reminder that it was my fault their purpose had devolved. The padlock on my toolbox, a Master lock made from tempered steel, you know, the kind of lock they used to fire bullets into in their commercials to demonstrate how durable their product was, looked like it had been chewed through as though were made of candy.
Other than being scattered to the winds, I'm assuming for daring to try and interfere with the creatures, my tools were accounted for and unharmed. The pictures and the movie were an entirely different story. Both had been torn to smithereens as if they'd been fed through a shredding machine with no fucks left to give for uniformity.
At this point, all I could do was shake my head in disbelief at it all. I knelt at the box, slowly scooping the evidence I had gathered into a pile so that I could sweep it, and the remnants of my coat, up. I collected my tools, taking a silent inventory as I did, in case I missed something. After this last bout of housekeeping, I walked out, locking up behind me.
My mind was going in a thousand different directions, but my lips barely moved. Even the chill of the night failed to register with me as I awaited the taxi to take me to the airport. I felt defeated, just as I had after my match, even though I had technically won it. I was seeing things I couldn't explain. Moreover, I had evidence that they were real. Now that was all gone.
No one would believe me.
No one except my nana, God rest her soul.
*******
(Back just after Collision Course was in the books)
Joey was leaving Loki's office, getting ready to do some slight "detective work" revolving around why the top rope snapped during the Kyle Shane/ Gerard Angelo main event.
"I hope you know what you're doing." Loki muttered as Joey snapped the door shut.
It hadn't fallen on deaf ears.
"Me too, boss," answered Joey quietly before heading down the hallway.
Little did he know, Loki wasn't addressing Joey at all. A tall, enshrouded figure popped out of the shadows just enough for an outline to be seen. The silhouette was that of a tall man with a top hat and broad shoulders.
"We need to find out if he da one," shadow spoke, a thick Creole accent making it close to difficult for Loki to comprehend. "Da udder guy be convinced he da one we need."
"What's going to happen if he is?" queried PCW's General Manager.
"We gon' have to wake him up." The man stepped out of the shadows. His face was made up to resemble a skull. His arms were tattooed from shoulder to wrist. His black tank top shirt and pants added to his foreboding presence.
Loki must have been imagining things when he did step into the light, because he could have sworn that the man's shadow smiled and winked at him before dissipating back into its proper shape.
"Meaning what, exactly?" Loki's brain puzzled over what he had just seen, almost not hearing the response.
"I not gon' tell you," the man stated matter-of-factly. "If I do dat, you gon' try to stop us."
"I'm not convinced that I shouldn't anyways."
"It gon' happen whedder you involved or not. Best you let us do it dis way, dan any udder way."
"Just don't hurt the guy," Loki declared. "He's got a rough enough home life."
"Pain be part o' da process," instructed the man. "To get to his heavenly gifts, he mus' first go troo hell. That just the way deez t'ings be."
"You're sure he's going to join the roster?"
"I am." Both men were silent for a few seconds. Finally, the large man started back towards the shadows from whence he appeared. "If we wrong, your soul be clean o' dis. I make sure o' dat."
Loki watched the man leave without another word, his face etched in worry. "That's not how this world works," he muttered under his breath.
*******
A while back, I had the technicians teach me how to look at footage for just such occurrences. Since the entertainment industry is heavily unionized, he knew we could both get into trouble for him doing that, we did it on our own time. Eventually, we were found out, but the union steward circumvented it by testing and certifying me in it after I passed with flying colors.
What can I say? It's a talent I have. I identify easier with inanimate objects than I do with people. If it's mechanical or technical, I usually have no problem getting down its operation. But I digress.
I came here to the media room to review the footage from Collision Course 7, from every camera angle possible, if necessary. I plugged the thumb drive Loki gave me into a USB slot and began the process of reviewing the entire show. I don't know if it was vanity, or a desire to learn, but I decided to watch my match with Alexa a couple of times.
I had just landed a series of kickboxing blows that had Alexa backing into a corner. I had just smashed her with a European uppercut that reeled her head on its axis. However, when she returned her gaze, I could have sworn that her face contorted into something... unnatural, something demonic.
Just rewatching the footage made the memory resurface in my mind like acid reflux from bad Taco Bell burritos. I shook my head in real time much in the same fashion as I did in the match I was viewing. Did I really see that? I convinced myself that it was just one too many kicks to the noggin during the fray. It wouldn't be the first time that had happened to me.
I refocused my search, putting that brow beating I received behind me. I had different camera angles going on different monitors simultaneously. I reviewed the even at normal speed, glossing from screen to screen like my son playing his Fortnite games in his room. He would sometimes allow me to watch for a bit, but I would get bored and move on, leaving him to his entertainment. I would watch him observe three screens as if it were nothing. To me, this was almost dizzying work.
"That's why I get paid the big bucks, I guess," I mumbled to myself jokingly.
About midway through the main event, I was certain I saw a small shadow on the turnbuckle that broke. It was just a millisecond, perhaps even a figment of my imagination, but I was sure I saw something. I rewound the video just a few seconds, going through every angle on that corner frame-by-frame.
Each click ticked a frame away, as I studied what I was looking at with the vigilance of a forensics detective. Finally, I came upon what I had thought I'd seen. The... whatever it was... was out of focus, like a every photo of Sasquatch in history, but the shape was there in plain sight.
It was about a foot tall, dark grey skin, pointed ears, and abnormally long legs and arms. In the next frame, the thing had bent down as if taking a bite out of the hardware. The next picture showed it upright again, and sneering at the very camera I was looking back at him with. Its mouth was filled with teeth that would make the average shark jealous. The next frame, it was gone completely.
My mind reeled. I sat there in the booth, winding the footage back a few seconds and watching it over and over again like an addict, trying to wrap my head around what the actual fuck I was looking at. I made prints of the frames from every angle that I could, including a blow-up that was blurry and digitized, but still discernible.
I gathered the prints into a pile, the close-up placed on top. I studied the creature in disbelief, still unable to grasp the situation. I know I've seen something like this thing somewhere, but my brain just couldn't justify it.
I slouched back in the chair, my hands pulling my hair back in frustration. My eyes were unwilling to look at the thing any longer, so they wandered around the room for anything, that wasn't the pictures I'd printed out, to glance at.
The boys in the media booth kept a selection of DVD movies here for them to entertain themselves with when there wasn't anything to do. I had once made a remark that they were almost wizard level at their ability to multi-task without losing focus on anything. I would also joke that my boy would make a great media guy someday, if I could get him to focus. Like father, like son.
Then my eyes came to rest on a movie that was from my own childhood. I gaped at the cover in disbelief. I knew I was looking at the very thing in the footage, but how is that possible? There was only one way to know for sure. I had to get home and check the books left to me by my nana.
I scooped up the pictures and the movie, tossing them indiscriminately into my toolbox and using the padlock that I rarely ever used. I folded my coat over my arm and exited the media booth, locking the door behind me, completely forgetting the USB drive left live on the screens.
I had nearly made it outside, when I finally remembered the drive. I set my box and coat down by the door, setting back to get the device before anyone else could get to it. Lord knows what kind of PR mountain would have to be climbed if that ever got out to the public.
As I made my way down the hallway, I saw a light orange flicker coming from within one of the press boxes, the one usually reserved for Phinehas Grimm. I knew he had already left, and the glow looked dangerously like a small fire, so I knew I should investigate, just in case.
My hand stopped on the knob after I heard voices coming from inside the room. It was a woman and a voice I was all too familiar with: Seromine's. I couldn't quite make out what they were saying to each other. Quietly, I turned the key in the lock, freeing the knob to spin.
"Let's pray for him, shall we?" sang the woman.
"Yes," I heard Seromine hiss, "Let's pray for poor ol' Phinehas and Frank and Richard! Better yet...let's pray for..."
I had opened up the door enough to catch their attention. The woman's face contorted skeletal, her eyes sinking deeply as she glowered at me. Seromine's head snapped, no HINGED back, like the lid of a box, his upside down gaze beaming death deep into my soul.
"SINNER!" He growled at me.
That had been enough. I slammed the door shut, quickly wishing I could barricade them inside while I escaped. The flight instinct in my mind went into overdrive, but I did my best to remain calm.
"Nope," I reassured myself. "Nope. Didn't see that." I wrestled with my sanity now more than I had with Alexa in the ring. What the hell was going on with me? Why was I seeing these things?
Running in full sprint, I got to my destination. I fumbled with the keys to the media room once more, finally managing to unlock the door. The room was in a shambles. The monitors I had been looking at less than five minutes ago were smashed to pieces. Wires were sticking out of the control console and sparking like they were just daring me to come closer. The computer I had the USB plugged into had a huge chunk of it missing now where the device once jutted.
"Oh, fuck." That was the only reaction my brain could muster while glancing the carnage in that room. I would probably catch the blame for that mess, but without knowing where the schematics for the wiring were, I wouldn't even be able to patch that up properly without something vital getting destroyed.
I decided that discretion was the better part of valor, disconnecting the power sources to the controls so that a fire didn't ACTUALLY start. I got the room as repaired and cleaned as I dared to without a technician getting involved.
Between the wrecked room and my hallucinations, my anxiety was at an all-time high. I was ready to get home to my kids, and yes, even my wife. I knew she'd make fun of me, or even institutionalize me, if I told her about this, but she was still somewhat of a calming presence in my life when she wanted to be. The problem was, she rarely, if ever, wanted to be nowadays.
I surveyed the damage one last time before latching and locking the door. I wanted this day behind me. My gut instincts told me that this wasn't an ending, but a beginning, and I wasn't going to enjoy this journey at all.
As I walked the long way back to where I had left my tool box and coat, all I could imagine was that big, beautiful paycheck I had just earned with the thrashing Alexa had given me going up in smoke. Nadine was going to be pissed. "Good thing our couch is comfortable," I remarked inwardly. "Maybe Buck will keep me company."
The thought of the big, fuzzy, fur-baby that passed for the family dog eased my mind just a bit. I wasn't his favorite person in the house, but at least he could be bribed with beef jerky and beer if need be. I would lay on the couch, snapping it to a Slim Jim and Budweiser, and there he'd...
What.
The.
Fuck?
My coat lay in shreds by the door, down flying in the air drafts from the doors like a reminder that it was my fault their purpose had devolved. The padlock on my toolbox, a Master lock made from tempered steel, you know, the kind of lock they used to fire bullets into in their commercials to demonstrate how durable their product was, looked like it had been chewed through as though were made of candy.
Other than being scattered to the winds, I'm assuming for daring to try and interfere with the creatures, my tools were accounted for and unharmed. The pictures and the movie were an entirely different story. Both had been torn to smithereens as if they'd been fed through a shredding machine with no fucks left to give for uniformity.
At this point, all I could do was shake my head in disbelief at it all. I knelt at the box, slowly scooping the evidence I had gathered into a pile so that I could sweep it, and the remnants of my coat, up. I collected my tools, taking a silent inventory as I did, in case I missed something. After this last bout of housekeeping, I walked out, locking up behind me.
My mind was going in a thousand different directions, but my lips barely moved. Even the chill of the night failed to register with me as I awaited the taxi to take me to the airport. I felt defeated, just as I had after my match, even though I had technically won it. I was seeing things I couldn't explain. Moreover, I had evidence that they were real. Now that was all gone.
No one would believe me.
No one except my nana, God rest her soul.