Post by Zane on Feb 6, 2014 23:35:24 GMT -5
Part 1: Year Zero
Time: The day after Horizons.
He took the jar from its customary resting place, feeling its cool familiarity against his skin. It hadn’t been removed for years, sitting in the cabinet in silent understanding that it would be brought back out into the warmth of daylight when it was again needed. He’d always had a feeling that the time would come and part of him welcomed that. There was also a part of him that was very happy to leave his old friend where it had been resting since he put it there many years ago. He knew that unscrewing the worn metal lid was a portent of much darker things.
This time would be no different.
In spite of his conflicted feelings on the matter, he knew that it was the necessary next step of the course that had been embarked on. He had stood backstage at “Horizons” and watched as Zane had gone through another war with Eden Morgan. He’d watched as his two students had tried to destroy each other yet again. He knew that unlike many of their previous matches that this time they had faced each other with no hate or malice behind their strikes. This was business. Zane was the Champion and wanted to retain what he’d bled for. Eden was the challenger and former Champion and she wanted to reclaim what she had lost. It was a fair set of circumstances for both and their strikes showed it.
There was no malice in them.
You could always tell when there was malice between adversaries because the strikes sounded different. Their strikes hadn’t had that sound at “Horizons”. The music that they produced didn’t carry the same tune to it. This was violence without malice. It was competition in its purest form.
A competition like that shouldn’t have ended as it did.
Both competitors deserved better than that.
They deserved better than the chickenshit interference of Cypress Morgan.
He could have stopped it.
He could have warned Zane that it was coming.
He could have stepped in and given Morgan a good thrashing for his transgression against the purity of the spectacle he was denigrating with his presence.
To do anything other than what he’d done would have been wrong.
The lesson had to be learned.
One does not offer a deal that is centered around honor to a man who has none. It never works out well. He hadn’t known when or where Morgan would choose his spot to steal the World Championship, but the night that Zane had made the deal with him, he had known that it would happen eventually. It was an inevitability that Zane should have seen coming but hadn’t. Colin had explained it best when he had said it to Eden.
"Some lessons just need to be learned the hard way."
Cypress Morgan’s actions after the World Championship match at “Horizons” had been Zane’s “hard way”.
He’d known that it was coming and true to himself, Cypress had played his part.
Cowards always reveal themselves in the end and Zane needed to learn that for himself. When Zane finally regained consciousness after the “Heart Punch” that had stole the World Championship from him, there had been a look in his eyes that hadn’t surfaced in months. It was the consuming and insatiable fire of banal rage. It was the look that Zane had always had in his eyes when he had first stepped through the doors of the training center in Chicago. It had never been quelled; it was too much a part of who Zane was internally. It had been contained though.
Once Zane had awakened and realized what had happened, the top of that container had been removed and the fire had been allowed to taste the sustenance of hatred once again.
No words had been spoken when he’d found Zane sitting on the bench in the blinding snow with his head down and no hood to cover it. It had seemed as if Zane had been hoping that the frigid air outside would help to cool down the conflagration that was eating him alive from within. His teacher had known otherwise. Nonetheless, at that moment something else had been presented to him.
An opportunity.
Just as he had seen the rage that had been caused Cypress and his betrayal remove the lid that kept the uncontrolled berserker locked within Zane, so too did he understand that unscrewing the lid to his bottle symbolized something else. It symbolized that everything with Zane had come full circle. It was now time to do what had needed to be done all along. The betrayal that Zane had suffered signaled that it was finally time to rebuild him from the ground up.
The threads released between the bottle and the lid and he smelled that smell again. It brought back a flood of memories. Some good. Some bad. Most great. The last time he had opened this jar it had been to avenge the attempted murder of his best friend. This was different. This wasn’t about revenge.
This was about self-awareness.
The rest were just details.
He opened his eyes and smiled. It was time.
It was “Year Zero”.
Part 2: Repaving the Road
Time: Late 2004.
He hadn’t been to the small cabin in over a decade. The last time he had opened its doors he had just finished tracking down Colin Zale after his break from reality. The sight that had visited him here had been something that even he hadn’t expected to find. His best friend had corkscrewed completely off of the deep end, so far over that even Spyder hadn’t recognized him.
Zale’s brown hair was long, well past his shoulders, wild looking and completely covered his face. His clothes were ratty, torn and filthy. He had shoes on his feet, but they were scratched up and holes were starting to form. When he had said his friend’s name, the man who looked back at him wasn’t Colin Zale; it was the whirlwind of madness that he had become. In spite of that, Spyder could still see his friend behind the tempest of insanity that clouded his eyes. He was still in there and Spyder had sworn to protect him from everything that he could, even him own fractured psyche.
Zale had been in mid swing when Spyder had said his name. In his dirty hand was a meat cleaver. Spyder didn’t need to see what he was cutting in order to know. The cabin reeked of it. The lampshades, drapes and furniture coverings were made out of it and he could almost taste it in the air. It would have made Ed Gein smile.
It smelled like human.
It tasted like death.
In the end, the monstrosity that Colin Zale had become had turned and faced him with the cleaver in hand and a maniacal glint in his eyes. He’d taken two quick steps, salivating through the mouth that had been contorted into an insane approximation of a happy grin. He’d spoken two quick words at that moment.
"More food."
That was when his feet had suddenly refused to move. The look of confusion that had come over his face at that moment would have been comical had it not been buried under so much tragedy. He had tried to lift his foot but couldn’t, as if some invisible force was nailing it in place. He’d reached over with his free hand and tugged at it violently and when it hadn’t moved he’d balled his hand into a fist and pummeled his own thigh with it in the hopes of freeing it. When that hadn’t worked, he looked up at Spyder and howled in pure fury before speaking another guttural two-word phrase.
"Your fault."
Spyder merely nodded his head slowly and said nothing in reply. Zale had turned his head sideways at that moment and then looked back down, slamming his fist into his leg over and over again while repeated the phrase “Your fault” with increasing ire behind it. He’d finally looked up, whipping his head up and staring right at Spyder while pointing the filthy and bloody cleaver at him. Again, he uttered the two words. This time they came out as an angry growl.
"Your...fault."
This time Spyder had replied and had answered with four words of his own.
"No, Colin." He'd said. "Your fault."
This caused the shade of Colin to turn its head in confusion again and reply with a guttural single word response.
"How ?"
Spyder replied with a few seconds of silence before finally responding.
"It's your fault because the you that you’ve become wants to do something that the man you’ve always been would never do. It's something that my friend would never do."
Zale responded with another loud roar and suddenly leaped from the spot that he had previously been anchored to. He covered the short distance with exceptional speed, all the while roaring like a madman with the cleaver held high over his head. As he closed the final few steps, he’d bellowed a single word.
"KILL !!!!"
As his friend leaped across the room, Spyder had removed that jar from his pocket and untwisted the cap. He let the cap hit the floor, which it did with a high, metallic “ping” before coming to rest. He’d placed two fingers into the jar, lifted his hand and closed his eyes long enough to rub the ghost white grease paint across the center of his face. From there he had opened his eyes and lifted his fingers, placing them on his left temple and running his hand in a counter clockwise motion from his left temple, down around his jaw and up the right side of his face. As he re-established line of sight on the tortured form that his closest friend in the world had become, he’d seem something in the back of his eyes, coming out from behind the tempest of insanity that had engulfed the soul behind them.
He felt the air move as the cleaver came down, splitting it with only the slightest “whoosh” to mark its passing. He’d heard the metallic clang as it buried itself in the small and rutted wood table that sat to his left and then felt the weight of Zale crash into him. He felt himself get engulfed by his friend’s powerful arms at that moment as well.
The gesture had worked.
He looked down at Colin’s dirt covered face to find the madness in his eyes momentarily retreat, only to be replaced by a self-loathing misery that almost took Spyder to his knees. He looked down at his friend and saw him again for the first time in nearly a year. When the words finally came from his mouth, they were choked with agony.
"Please..."
Had he not steeled himself against what he knew he would surely be feeling, this moment and the sound of his friend dying inside would have surely brought him to his knees. The tone of Zale's next two words did nothing to dissuade him from the justice of any of his decisions leading up to this moment.
"Help...me."
Spyder had only nodded once before pulling his arm free and pulling another item from his pocket.
A syringe.
"I'm sorry, brother." Was all he said before driving the needle home.
Moments later, Colin Zale was unconscious. The drug had brought him momentary peace. It was not to last, as even Zale’s sleep had been tortured and intermittedly throughout the drive to the psychiatric facility, he’d let out yells of both agony and terror before settling down to silence again. Spyder had hated every moment of it. He didn’t hate Colin for being loud. He hated watching his brother suffer.
He hated himself more for not being able to do anything to ease his agony.
Colin had needed months of therapy, medicinal treatments and long periods of prolonged rest in order to begin to claw his way out of the terrible abyss that he’d fallen into headfirst. The Colin Zale that he’d taken from the woods had to be broken down and patiently reconstructed. Not every psychologist had had the stomach for it. Quite a few walked away from it, pronouncing him irretrievably lost. Spyder wouldn’t accept it and with the help of Dirge and his seemingly endless resources, they’d found a Doctor who was willing to fight the fight and pull Zale from his own personal hell.
Coming to the present day, Zane had been similar in his own way and when they stepped into the cabin, Spyder had once again pulled the jar from his pocket and held it out. Zane responded by turning his head in same confused manner, but the murderous rage behind his eyes wasn’t directed at Spyder. He was standing at the precipice that Colin had been standing at. This time there was someone there to hold him back from it.
Zane would have to be rebuilt as well and the face paint was the medium.
He would repave the road in Zane’s mind.
Part 3: Perspectives of Evil
Time: February 2, 2014. 15:30.
"Zane Scott is an evil man." I said with an indifferent shrug. "Yet evil IS a perspective in many ways."
The man across from the table from me raised a curious eyebrow before it creased into a furrow of annoyance. He sat silently for a moment before letting out a long, protracted breath. It was a bit melodramatic. It was also very true to his character.
"Why must you always be so obtuse ?"
His retort draws a slight smile of amusement from me. Needless to say, this was not the reaction that he was hoping for and it did nothing to foster progress in the conversation. Our relationship had always been highly contentious and at one point even incredibly violent. In spite of that, he always sought me out for conversation when those around him proved too boring for his liking. He needed me.
In spite of his irritation at how "obtuse" I am.
"So if evil is nothing more than a perspective," He said. "Than why bother with Zane Scott at all ? Why not just let him fall down the proverbial rabbit hole into that evil ? What difference will your involvement with him make ?"
I sat for a moment and just looked at him while the room moved around us. It was important to be judicious in my wording, as he did not care at all for Zane and thought that my interference in his latest situation would do nothing but drag me into what he called "The festering shit hole of Zane’s existence". Ironically, years ago he’d have embraced that existence and used it for his own ends. It was an irony that he was incapable of seeing.
Perhaps it was for just that reason that I chose to involve myself in it. Didn’t a man deserve better than to be cast aside because the circumstances of his life had given him no greater opportunity to succeed in spite of himself than Zane had been given ?
"Why should Zane be perpetually cursed by what appears to be circumstance ?" I replied. "How is that just ?"
He replied with another exasperated sigh.
"What does "just" have to do with this ?" He asked irritably. "Zane made a stupid decision with a dishonest man and now he's paying the price for it. Where's the injustice in that ?"
It was straightforward logic. Flawed and yet straightforward. It was also fair in its own way and most people would be loath to disagree with it. I am not most people. There is a definite flaw in it. It is based on the false premise that all things that happen to those deemed “evil” by society are fair occurrences by definition.
This arrogant assumption is incorrect.
It is also, in itself, evil.
It wasn't surprising coming from him, or even particularly revealing.
It was who he was, regardless of how he saw himself.
I chose to point this out; in spite of the fact of the reaction that I knew it would draw.
"Is it not presumptuous and self important of you to make such a distinction based merely on your own perception of the man and his situation ? Yours is by no means an objective point of view, after all. Nor is your situation one that ever involved taking the moral high ground."
He closed his eyes and shook his head before his fist came crashing down onto the surface of the table and his eyes flew open, blazing with anger.
"And just what the hell does what I think of him have to do with this ?" He hissed through clenched teeth.
"Absolutely everything." I replied in a matter of fact tone.
His eyes narrowed in response.
"Speak." He replied tersely.
Even in his current position, he still found a way to be arrogant and officious.
"Very well." I responded. "You state that everything that has happened to Zane gains implied automatic justification because Zane is perceived to be evil. This statement is in and of itself unjust and perhaps even a bit evil by implication. Who are you, or I for that matter, to say that Zane is evil ? Sure, he does thing that are less than savory by nature and he serves a man who has no doubt organized, manipulated, conducted, schemed and profited from evil deeds. He revels in violence and bloodshed for their own sake and loves to play mind games with people. Life is an expression of power to him. To most, your assertion that he's worthless, or at the very least "evil", is more than fair."
"I didn't call him "worthless"." My conversational partner replied.
"Not this time, no." I replied. "You have on many occasions though."
The narrowness of his eyes remained in place but the rest of him noticeably relaxed, slouching slightly in the chair.
"Ok." He responded. "Following that logic, let's say that Zane isn’t in fact "evil" and is just severely misguided. Does that justify anything that he's done in his life ?"
This time I raised my eyebrow quizzically. It wasn’t the question itself that caused the response, but the tortured line of thought behind it. For a man as intelligent as he is, it was absurdly simplistic.
"No." I replied.
"See." He said with a smile. "Zane is therefore evil and your argument is invalid."
"No." I answered, briefly shaking my head in disagreement. "Not at all. You're posing a question to me that attempts to limit the course of the response by its choice of wording. That by default makes it invalid. You’re cheating in order to get the response that you desire. That’s intellectually and ethically dishonest."
He replied with a shake of his head and took a deep breath.
"No." He replied. "It merely states that the presumption that Zane is not at fault for his actions is incorrect because he still had the ability to choose differently than he did, yet he made those decisions anyway. That, by definition, is evil."
I shook my head again, displeased by the simplistic sophistry he had chosen.
"I never said that he wasn't "at fault" for it." I replied. "But to posit that he is evil because he made a set of bad choices because of the experiences that he'd had before and that those bad choices made him evil because he could have done differently is again an application of flawed logic."
"How so ?" He replied somewhat testily. "You're just talking in circles."
"Allow me to answer your question and statement with a question."
He lifted his hand and gestured towards me with an open palm.
"By all means."
"Very well." I said with a short nod. "Is Cypress Morgan evil ?"
"Well, he does call himself "The All American Asshole". Good people don't tend to do that, so I'd be inclined to say "yes". Why ? Do you consider him to be evil ?"
"No." I replied. "Just very banal."
"And the difference is ?" He responded.
"Cypress Morgan sees everything he does as having some sort of justification. He may claim to be an evil mastermind, but he isn't. True evil would make him shit himself if he ever saw it."
"That's all well and good, but it doesn't explain your point of view and the difference between he and Zane."
"It does." I replied. "Cypress does everything that he does because it makes him feel powerful. In this regard he sounds very much like Zane. The differences between them are more subtle than that."
"Do tell."
"Cypress Morgan is by all means an intelligent man, perhaps even highly intelligent. Zane Scott is not. He's not stupid mind you, in his own way his brain works at a very high level."
I paused for a moment to consider my words.
"Cypress has had a lifetime to learn the simple difference between "right" and "wrong" and he has made the conscious choices to follow the path that he follows. Being a biker by no means makes him “evil”, nor does being inherently violent. He is in fact a very caring family man and has repeatedly shown it. He’s loyal to his friends and causes and will fight to the death for them. Those are not the actions of an evil man. They are the actions of a man who bases everything on how they can help him achieve is goals. Those goals are basic. They aren’t "evil". People just see them as such because he uses violence as the means to get what he wants."
"And Zane ?"
"Zane was never given the chance to learn those distinctions." I replied. "He may be consciously aware of them, but they hold no intrinsic meaning to him. Zane grew up in a world where violence was a necessity for survival, no a conscious choice. He was never given a chance to develop his mind because he has always been treated like a weapon. Look at the path his life has taken. He was kicked out of high school and was taken in by the criminal element of a city that at the time was besieged by out of control crime and gang violence. Those men took him and turned the large, powerful and emotionally needy child that he was into a personal weapon against their enemies. He learned to equate power and affection as being the same thing. Why would he learn the difference between “right” and “wrong” when those he’d have learned those distinctions from had no use for them ?"
He pursed his lips thoughtfully and tapped his finger against the surface of the table a couple of times before responding.
"So you're saying that Zane isn't evil because he was never given the chance to be anything else ?"
I declined by head to one side before looking straight back at him again.
"Yes." I replied. "Partially anyway."
"Ok." He said. "So what’s the rest ? Even Dirge used him as no more than a means to an end."
"That's true." I answered. "Dirge though did teach him a few ethical values, such as loyalty and honor towards those you respect. He also taught him that violence for its own sake is useless and a sign of weakness."
"Yeah." He replied snidely. "And look where that got him. Zane threw him out of a window."
"Yes, he did." I answered. "Take that situation though. Until being introduced to Paul Grevane and Cypress Morgan, Zane had been far more controlled and was showing signs of progressing as a person. All it took to throw him back into his habitual ways was to introduce two men who represented what he had grown up with. Past behavior and habit are inherently narcotic in the respect that they are hard to break one’s self of. Once you establish those baselines, it is very, very easy to revert to them. That’s exactly what Zane did."
I paused for a moment and smiled inwardly. What I was about to do to him wasn't nice, but I couldn’t resist it.
"I don't take that incident at face value though. There is too much of that narrative that is too easy to be true."
The look in his eyes had told me that completely taken the bait.
"Such as ?"
I lifted my hand and waved the question away.
"That's a conversation for another time." I replied. "It's not pertinent to this conversation."
"I think it is."
"You're wrong." I answered with a shrug. "Move on. I won't discuss it here."
"Then why did you mention it, knowing that I'd want to discuss it."
I smirked in response.
"You obnoxious son of a bitch." He replied irritably. "You did that on purpose."
"Of course I did." I admitted with a smile. "And you walked right into it."
"I don't know why I tolerate this." He growled.
"Because you enjoy it." I replied with a shrug.
"Stop patting yourself on the back and get to the point." He snarled angrily.
"Very well." I replied. "Do you see what I'm getting at by saying that Zane isn't "evil", so much as he is a product of his experiences ?"
"Yes." He answered. "I still don't entirely buy it though. It's too easy."
"Only because it doesn't fit your narrative and forces you to challenge your simplistic views of the world. Most people are uncomfortable being challenged in that way. It's always been one of your most glaring weaknesses."
"You're not ?"
"Have I ever been uncomfortable with anything out of the ordinary ?"
"No." He replied. "I've always hated that about you. You've definitely always marched to the tune of your own drummer. I've always assumed that it's why you and Zale get along so well. You're both from the same abrasive cloth."
I declined my head, taking the remark as a compliment.
"Thank you."
"Whatever." He replied. "So what's next for him ?"
"Next ?" I asked. "There is no next. This isn't an instruction manual. It's a process."
"Ok." He retorted. "That doesn't change my question. What's next ?"
"Who's to say that there has to be a pre-determined "next" ?" I queried. "It'll go wherever it needs to go and I'll nudge it along accordingly."
"And what of UGWC ?" He asked. "What's next there ?"
"Donovan Hastings and Cypress Morgan." I replied with a shrug. "Something that he will falsely see as catharsis."
"It won't be ?"
"Catharsis is never that easy." I replied. "You should know that."
I stood up from the chair and looked down at him through the plexi glass that separated us. Over the years his one dark black hair had taken on streaks of white and gray. The predatory look in his cold, dark eyes remained as ever. I looked down at him and smiled.
"I'll be seeing you again." I stated, turning around and taking a few steps towards the door before turning around and looking at him with a mocking smirk.
"John."
Part 4: Faces
A person’s face says a lot about them, more often than not. Regardless of how one tries to hide his or herself behind it and use it as a mask, the more perceptive amongst us tend to see right through it. This can be due to something small, like the barely perceptible twitch of an eye or the brief loss of control that leads of the failure of the façade. The eyes themselves are often said to be “windows to the soul”. Regardless of how one tries to hide their face, in the end they often end up revealing more than they intend to.
Those of painted face know this better than most.
Masks are an expression of the inward being. They are a hard, physical representation of what someone sees himself or herself as inside. The thing with masks is that they can be lifted on and off and aren’t physically a part of the body, even if only briefly. Paint is used the same way. It covers and masks while reflecting what’s beneath it. Unlike masks though, paint is more revealing for the reason that while it can be removed, it cannot be removed easily. It is a long and laborious process to do so. One is also layering their inner self on their outer shell with paint. It is a far more personal means of expression.
Spyder had known this for years.
He used it as tool of intimidation and psychological advantage. Of course, the fact that he had always been a physically gigantic man at six feet, eight inches tall and nearly three hundred pounds certainly didn’t hurt. Neither did his nearly inhuman ability to suffer and dispense pain. These are all just small details to the larger fact that the motif that his face took on when he painted it was a reflection of his inner being.
That inner being was dangerous.
That inner being was vicious.
That inner being was truth, in all of its ugliness.
Spyder had accepted this aspect of his being years ago. When one can face down what is within, nothing without can ever cause the slightest degree of fear. He was living proof of that.
That was the big place where he and Zane differed.
Zane was afraid of who he really was, even if he couldn’t admit it to himself. It was why he reverted to rage as his response to everything that didn’t go his way. Anger is easier than introspection and Zane would never grow and progress if he couldn’t get past that. Spyder couldn’t allow that, because Zane had so much potential. He’d just learned to accept that he was nothing more than a walking weapon. That aspect of Zane’s life annoyed Spyder immensely. He would see to it that Zane found himself. It would take a lot of work to wash away the years of caked on mental and emotional shit that Zane was nearly crippled by, but it would happen.
Spyder was not one to shy away from any challenge.
To do this, many things would need to happen. Many things already had happened and Zane had changed a lot because of it. Anger was still his default reaction. That would take a lot of work to break him of. Anger is the most narcotic of the emotions because it is the easiest. It’s the easiest to tap into and draw from and the rush that it produces feels better and more useful than it actually is. It’s a very deceptive concoction in the end and Zane had been fully deceived by it.
He was its slave.
On the positive side, Zane had regained control over himself. It had taken a lot of work and would take a lot more, but he was better now than he had been. He was no longer quick to jump head first into everything and rush at it full bore. Zane was methodical now. He wasn’t necessarily “patient” in the understood meaning of the term, and that would take far more time to accomplish.
Zane was patient for Zane.
That was a victory in itself.
Over the last few weeks, Zane had sat and watched hours of James Spyder and Colin Zale matches and promos. At first he had been impatient and bored with it, demanding to know why he had to be subjected to it. He wasn’t unwilling to see the point; he was incapable of seeing it. He’d never been allowed to develop the level of self-awareness that would allow for that to happen. Spyder accepted this with silence and the occasional disapproving look. He didn’t bark, batter or demean Zane in any way. He treated him with the silence that you would give to an impertinent child in order to get it to quiet down and pay attention.
In the end that’s what Zane really was.
He was a child that was never allowed to be a child.
He needed to experience that, at least to some degree, in order to really figure himself out. Granted, there would be no playing with children’s toys or playing Little League Baseball or Pop Warner Football. Zane was too physically imposing for that. He was well beyond that stage physically. This wouldn’t be typical childhood development. What Zane really needed was something to elemental that it was almost absurd.
Zane needed to experience what it was like to be something more than a weapon.
Zane needed to know what it was like to be a normal human.
In time Zane’s paint would reflect him.
For now it would serve as a warning.
Part 5: Axioms and Lords: The Confluence of Perception
"There is a saying," Spyder explained to Ooley. "It states; "All cats are gray in the dark"."
Ooley raised a suspicious eye at the remark, not immediately responding to it. When he did, his response was unsurprising.
"What in the hell does that have to do with anything, Bug ?" He spat back. "Rain Blot hasn't been seen in weeks. Louis and Ol' Bob couldn't give less of a fuck about "cats" if we wanted to."
Spyder viewed Ooley indifferently. His rantings about his baseball bat we of no concern to him.
"If you had even a slightly functional brain, you would understand how that saying relates to this situation."
"Are you calling Ol'Bob stupid, Bug ?" Ooley replied irritably. "Don't make Ol' Bob put you and "Louis" on a first name basis."
This time Spyder did respond, he rolled his cold gray eyes before settling them back on the Human Resources Director of UGWC.
"Keep your overgrown toothpick at your side." Spyder replied indifferently, lifting his Croquet Mallet up and laying it on Ooley's desk. "Neither it, nor you impress me in the slightest."
He paused for a moment.
"It's also a foolish way to conduct a negotiation."
Ooley's face flushed a deep red and his left hand balled into a fist on his desk.
"Get to your point, Bug." He growled.
Spyder replied to his irritation with a grin.
"You and your sidekick want Zane to show up and "Infinity" and have promised to fire him if he doesn't." He answers. "We both know that firing Zane would be a gigantic mistake for this company, not that such would stop you from doing so. You've shown a consistent history of stupidity and impertinent decision making."
"Your point ?" Ooley growled through clenched teeth.
"My point." Spyder replied. "Is that you know that Zane makes your company money. You also know that while "Cypress Morgan versus Donovan Hastings" is a good match that will bring in viewers and therefore money, this Triple Threat Match between the two of them and Zane is a gold mine waiting to be exploited. Even at your most incoherent moments you can't deny this and your greed wants to see it happen. Your threat of terminating Zane's contract is an empty one at best."
Ooley begins to lift "Louis" up but thinks better of it and lowers his hand before glaring across the desk at Spyder.
"Will Rain Blot be at "Infinity" ?" He demands.
"You'll find out when everyone else does." Spyder replies impassively. "That element of uncertainty is his greatest weapon at the moment."
Ooley's eyes almost bulge out of his head at the response, but he manages to regain his self control.
"So tell Ol'Bob, Bug." He asks with mock civility. "What do you think of the current situation ?"
Spyder sits silently for a few moments, his expression impossible to read.
"I think that you have absolute chaos on your hands." He replies. "It would do you well to get a handle on it, and you're assuming that you can manipulate events so that you can put someone you can control in that position. That's a very risky plan that is predicated on a lot of foolish assumptions."
"Such as ?" Ooley growls.
"Such as the assumption that you have someone in the "Global Challenge" who is sympathetic towards you." Spyder replies. "Even if you do, which is by no means evident, you will have to deal with Cypress, Jet and their cronies afterward and you have shown no ability to do that in the past. Face it Bob, you and Dexter have no power in the company that you are said to control. Right now, DMW and PMN are in full control."
"You're wrong, Bug." Ooley responds. "It's only a matter of time before Bamboo, Crazy Opie and the rest of them are put in their place."
"Don't kid yourself any more than you already have, Bob." Spyder responds. "You and Dexter made a gigantic mistake by offering up the "Creative Director" position to whoever won the "Global Challenge". You have no allies here and you're surrounded by enemies. A smart man would have found a more tactically feasible way to assure his control over the company."
"Are you offering Rain to us to counter Bamboo, Opie and their lot ?" He presses.
This time Spyder actually laughs.
"Not at all." He replies. "I wouldn't side with you and neither would Zane. Remember, Bob, you requested this meeting. Not us."
"Ol'Bob thought that you and Rain could be made to see reason." Ooley replies angrily. "Instead all you do is babble on about cats. Ol' Bob wants you to get to the point and get the hell out of his office."
"The point of my usage of that saying is this, Bob." Spyder explains calmly. "Is that you and Vines are assuming that you can control everything. You are sitting in the darkness assuming that all of your threats are equal to each other. They're not. Dragon and Pax are a distraction that will eventually run out of steam on its own. One will turn on the other and that will be that. The "Devil's Most Wanted" and "Piercing Media" alliance is the bigger threat, but since you and Vines are grasping around in the dark, these two metaphorical cats both look "gray", instead of having distinct characteristics. It's this assumption that both threats are equal that is your biggest problem. Your are not only blind to it, but to other threats that are looming in the dark. Zane and are not ignorant to the reality of the situation."
"And what is this "reality" ?" Ooley demands.
Spyder stands up from his chair, lifting his Croquet Mallet up from Ooley's desk and resting it on his right shoulder.
"You'll find out soon enough." Spyder says with a dangerous chuckle. "You'll find out soon enough."
With that, Spyder turns and walks from Ooley and Vines office, passing the less assertive of the pairing on his way out. He looks down at the diminutive and sycophantic executive with a dangerous grin.
"You guys are so good for a cheap laugh."
Spyder continues down the hallway as Vines steps into his office, looking at Ooley in confusion.
"I don't care if it costs us money." He says. "This place is less creepy when they're not around."
Time: The day after Horizons.
He took the jar from its customary resting place, feeling its cool familiarity against his skin. It hadn’t been removed for years, sitting in the cabinet in silent understanding that it would be brought back out into the warmth of daylight when it was again needed. He’d always had a feeling that the time would come and part of him welcomed that. There was also a part of him that was very happy to leave his old friend where it had been resting since he put it there many years ago. He knew that unscrewing the worn metal lid was a portent of much darker things.
This time would be no different.
In spite of his conflicted feelings on the matter, he knew that it was the necessary next step of the course that had been embarked on. He had stood backstage at “Horizons” and watched as Zane had gone through another war with Eden Morgan. He’d watched as his two students had tried to destroy each other yet again. He knew that unlike many of their previous matches that this time they had faced each other with no hate or malice behind their strikes. This was business. Zane was the Champion and wanted to retain what he’d bled for. Eden was the challenger and former Champion and she wanted to reclaim what she had lost. It was a fair set of circumstances for both and their strikes showed it.
There was no malice in them.
You could always tell when there was malice between adversaries because the strikes sounded different. Their strikes hadn’t had that sound at “Horizons”. The music that they produced didn’t carry the same tune to it. This was violence without malice. It was competition in its purest form.
A competition like that shouldn’t have ended as it did.
Both competitors deserved better than that.
They deserved better than the chickenshit interference of Cypress Morgan.
He could have stopped it.
He could have warned Zane that it was coming.
He could have stepped in and given Morgan a good thrashing for his transgression against the purity of the spectacle he was denigrating with his presence.
To do anything other than what he’d done would have been wrong.
The lesson had to be learned.
One does not offer a deal that is centered around honor to a man who has none. It never works out well. He hadn’t known when or where Morgan would choose his spot to steal the World Championship, but the night that Zane had made the deal with him, he had known that it would happen eventually. It was an inevitability that Zane should have seen coming but hadn’t. Colin had explained it best when he had said it to Eden.
"Some lessons just need to be learned the hard way."
Cypress Morgan’s actions after the World Championship match at “Horizons” had been Zane’s “hard way”.
He’d known that it was coming and true to himself, Cypress had played his part.
Cowards always reveal themselves in the end and Zane needed to learn that for himself. When Zane finally regained consciousness after the “Heart Punch” that had stole the World Championship from him, there had been a look in his eyes that hadn’t surfaced in months. It was the consuming and insatiable fire of banal rage. It was the look that Zane had always had in his eyes when he had first stepped through the doors of the training center in Chicago. It had never been quelled; it was too much a part of who Zane was internally. It had been contained though.
Once Zane had awakened and realized what had happened, the top of that container had been removed and the fire had been allowed to taste the sustenance of hatred once again.
No words had been spoken when he’d found Zane sitting on the bench in the blinding snow with his head down and no hood to cover it. It had seemed as if Zane had been hoping that the frigid air outside would help to cool down the conflagration that was eating him alive from within. His teacher had known otherwise. Nonetheless, at that moment something else had been presented to him.
An opportunity.
Just as he had seen the rage that had been caused Cypress and his betrayal remove the lid that kept the uncontrolled berserker locked within Zane, so too did he understand that unscrewing the lid to his bottle symbolized something else. It symbolized that everything with Zane had come full circle. It was now time to do what had needed to be done all along. The betrayal that Zane had suffered signaled that it was finally time to rebuild him from the ground up.
The threads released between the bottle and the lid and he smelled that smell again. It brought back a flood of memories. Some good. Some bad. Most great. The last time he had opened this jar it had been to avenge the attempted murder of his best friend. This was different. This wasn’t about revenge.
This was about self-awareness.
The rest were just details.
He opened his eyes and smiled. It was time.
It was “Year Zero”.
Part 2: Repaving the Road
Time: Late 2004.
He hadn’t been to the small cabin in over a decade. The last time he had opened its doors he had just finished tracking down Colin Zale after his break from reality. The sight that had visited him here had been something that even he hadn’t expected to find. His best friend had corkscrewed completely off of the deep end, so far over that even Spyder hadn’t recognized him.
Zale’s brown hair was long, well past his shoulders, wild looking and completely covered his face. His clothes were ratty, torn and filthy. He had shoes on his feet, but they were scratched up and holes were starting to form. When he had said his friend’s name, the man who looked back at him wasn’t Colin Zale; it was the whirlwind of madness that he had become. In spite of that, Spyder could still see his friend behind the tempest of insanity that clouded his eyes. He was still in there and Spyder had sworn to protect him from everything that he could, even him own fractured psyche.
Zale had been in mid swing when Spyder had said his name. In his dirty hand was a meat cleaver. Spyder didn’t need to see what he was cutting in order to know. The cabin reeked of it. The lampshades, drapes and furniture coverings were made out of it and he could almost taste it in the air. It would have made Ed Gein smile.
It smelled like human.
It tasted like death.
In the end, the monstrosity that Colin Zale had become had turned and faced him with the cleaver in hand and a maniacal glint in his eyes. He’d taken two quick steps, salivating through the mouth that had been contorted into an insane approximation of a happy grin. He’d spoken two quick words at that moment.
"More food."
That was when his feet had suddenly refused to move. The look of confusion that had come over his face at that moment would have been comical had it not been buried under so much tragedy. He had tried to lift his foot but couldn’t, as if some invisible force was nailing it in place. He’d reached over with his free hand and tugged at it violently and when it hadn’t moved he’d balled his hand into a fist and pummeled his own thigh with it in the hopes of freeing it. When that hadn’t worked, he looked up at Spyder and howled in pure fury before speaking another guttural two-word phrase.
"Your fault."
Spyder merely nodded his head slowly and said nothing in reply. Zale had turned his head sideways at that moment and then looked back down, slamming his fist into his leg over and over again while repeated the phrase “Your fault” with increasing ire behind it. He’d finally looked up, whipping his head up and staring right at Spyder while pointing the filthy and bloody cleaver at him. Again, he uttered the two words. This time they came out as an angry growl.
"Your...fault."
This time Spyder had replied and had answered with four words of his own.
"No, Colin." He'd said. "Your fault."
This caused the shade of Colin to turn its head in confusion again and reply with a guttural single word response.
"How ?"
Spyder replied with a few seconds of silence before finally responding.
"It's your fault because the you that you’ve become wants to do something that the man you’ve always been would never do. It's something that my friend would never do."
Zale responded with another loud roar and suddenly leaped from the spot that he had previously been anchored to. He covered the short distance with exceptional speed, all the while roaring like a madman with the cleaver held high over his head. As he closed the final few steps, he’d bellowed a single word.
"KILL !!!!"
As his friend leaped across the room, Spyder had removed that jar from his pocket and untwisted the cap. He let the cap hit the floor, which it did with a high, metallic “ping” before coming to rest. He’d placed two fingers into the jar, lifted his hand and closed his eyes long enough to rub the ghost white grease paint across the center of his face. From there he had opened his eyes and lifted his fingers, placing them on his left temple and running his hand in a counter clockwise motion from his left temple, down around his jaw and up the right side of his face. As he re-established line of sight on the tortured form that his closest friend in the world had become, he’d seem something in the back of his eyes, coming out from behind the tempest of insanity that had engulfed the soul behind them.
He felt the air move as the cleaver came down, splitting it with only the slightest “whoosh” to mark its passing. He’d heard the metallic clang as it buried itself in the small and rutted wood table that sat to his left and then felt the weight of Zale crash into him. He felt himself get engulfed by his friend’s powerful arms at that moment as well.
The gesture had worked.
He looked down at Colin’s dirt covered face to find the madness in his eyes momentarily retreat, only to be replaced by a self-loathing misery that almost took Spyder to his knees. He looked down at his friend and saw him again for the first time in nearly a year. When the words finally came from his mouth, they were choked with agony.
"Please..."
Had he not steeled himself against what he knew he would surely be feeling, this moment and the sound of his friend dying inside would have surely brought him to his knees. The tone of Zale's next two words did nothing to dissuade him from the justice of any of his decisions leading up to this moment.
"Help...me."
Spyder had only nodded once before pulling his arm free and pulling another item from his pocket.
A syringe.
"I'm sorry, brother." Was all he said before driving the needle home.
Moments later, Colin Zale was unconscious. The drug had brought him momentary peace. It was not to last, as even Zale’s sleep had been tortured and intermittedly throughout the drive to the psychiatric facility, he’d let out yells of both agony and terror before settling down to silence again. Spyder had hated every moment of it. He didn’t hate Colin for being loud. He hated watching his brother suffer.
He hated himself more for not being able to do anything to ease his agony.
Colin had needed months of therapy, medicinal treatments and long periods of prolonged rest in order to begin to claw his way out of the terrible abyss that he’d fallen into headfirst. The Colin Zale that he’d taken from the woods had to be broken down and patiently reconstructed. Not every psychologist had had the stomach for it. Quite a few walked away from it, pronouncing him irretrievably lost. Spyder wouldn’t accept it and with the help of Dirge and his seemingly endless resources, they’d found a Doctor who was willing to fight the fight and pull Zale from his own personal hell.
Coming to the present day, Zane had been similar in his own way and when they stepped into the cabin, Spyder had once again pulled the jar from his pocket and held it out. Zane responded by turning his head in same confused manner, but the murderous rage behind his eyes wasn’t directed at Spyder. He was standing at the precipice that Colin had been standing at. This time there was someone there to hold him back from it.
Zane would have to be rebuilt as well and the face paint was the medium.
He would repave the road in Zane’s mind.
Part 3: Perspectives of Evil
Time: February 2, 2014. 15:30.
"Zane Scott is an evil man." I said with an indifferent shrug. "Yet evil IS a perspective in many ways."
The man across from the table from me raised a curious eyebrow before it creased into a furrow of annoyance. He sat silently for a moment before letting out a long, protracted breath. It was a bit melodramatic. It was also very true to his character.
"Why must you always be so obtuse ?"
His retort draws a slight smile of amusement from me. Needless to say, this was not the reaction that he was hoping for and it did nothing to foster progress in the conversation. Our relationship had always been highly contentious and at one point even incredibly violent. In spite of that, he always sought me out for conversation when those around him proved too boring for his liking. He needed me.
In spite of his irritation at how "obtuse" I am.
"So if evil is nothing more than a perspective," He said. "Than why bother with Zane Scott at all ? Why not just let him fall down the proverbial rabbit hole into that evil ? What difference will your involvement with him make ?"
I sat for a moment and just looked at him while the room moved around us. It was important to be judicious in my wording, as he did not care at all for Zane and thought that my interference in his latest situation would do nothing but drag me into what he called "The festering shit hole of Zane’s existence". Ironically, years ago he’d have embraced that existence and used it for his own ends. It was an irony that he was incapable of seeing.
Perhaps it was for just that reason that I chose to involve myself in it. Didn’t a man deserve better than to be cast aside because the circumstances of his life had given him no greater opportunity to succeed in spite of himself than Zane had been given ?
"Why should Zane be perpetually cursed by what appears to be circumstance ?" I replied. "How is that just ?"
He replied with another exasperated sigh.
"What does "just" have to do with this ?" He asked irritably. "Zane made a stupid decision with a dishonest man and now he's paying the price for it. Where's the injustice in that ?"
It was straightforward logic. Flawed and yet straightforward. It was also fair in its own way and most people would be loath to disagree with it. I am not most people. There is a definite flaw in it. It is based on the false premise that all things that happen to those deemed “evil” by society are fair occurrences by definition.
This arrogant assumption is incorrect.
It is also, in itself, evil.
It wasn't surprising coming from him, or even particularly revealing.
It was who he was, regardless of how he saw himself.
I chose to point this out; in spite of the fact of the reaction that I knew it would draw.
"Is it not presumptuous and self important of you to make such a distinction based merely on your own perception of the man and his situation ? Yours is by no means an objective point of view, after all. Nor is your situation one that ever involved taking the moral high ground."
He closed his eyes and shook his head before his fist came crashing down onto the surface of the table and his eyes flew open, blazing with anger.
"And just what the hell does what I think of him have to do with this ?" He hissed through clenched teeth.
"Absolutely everything." I replied in a matter of fact tone.
His eyes narrowed in response.
"Speak." He replied tersely.
Even in his current position, he still found a way to be arrogant and officious.
"Very well." I responded. "You state that everything that has happened to Zane gains implied automatic justification because Zane is perceived to be evil. This statement is in and of itself unjust and perhaps even a bit evil by implication. Who are you, or I for that matter, to say that Zane is evil ? Sure, he does thing that are less than savory by nature and he serves a man who has no doubt organized, manipulated, conducted, schemed and profited from evil deeds. He revels in violence and bloodshed for their own sake and loves to play mind games with people. Life is an expression of power to him. To most, your assertion that he's worthless, or at the very least "evil", is more than fair."
"I didn't call him "worthless"." My conversational partner replied.
"Not this time, no." I replied. "You have on many occasions though."
The narrowness of his eyes remained in place but the rest of him noticeably relaxed, slouching slightly in the chair.
"Ok." He responded. "Following that logic, let's say that Zane isn’t in fact "evil" and is just severely misguided. Does that justify anything that he's done in his life ?"
This time I raised my eyebrow quizzically. It wasn’t the question itself that caused the response, but the tortured line of thought behind it. For a man as intelligent as he is, it was absurdly simplistic.
"No." I replied.
"See." He said with a smile. "Zane is therefore evil and your argument is invalid."
"No." I answered, briefly shaking my head in disagreement. "Not at all. You're posing a question to me that attempts to limit the course of the response by its choice of wording. That by default makes it invalid. You’re cheating in order to get the response that you desire. That’s intellectually and ethically dishonest."
He replied with a shake of his head and took a deep breath.
"No." He replied. "It merely states that the presumption that Zane is not at fault for his actions is incorrect because he still had the ability to choose differently than he did, yet he made those decisions anyway. That, by definition, is evil."
I shook my head again, displeased by the simplistic sophistry he had chosen.
"I never said that he wasn't "at fault" for it." I replied. "But to posit that he is evil because he made a set of bad choices because of the experiences that he'd had before and that those bad choices made him evil because he could have done differently is again an application of flawed logic."
"How so ?" He replied somewhat testily. "You're just talking in circles."
"Allow me to answer your question and statement with a question."
He lifted his hand and gestured towards me with an open palm.
"By all means."
"Very well." I said with a short nod. "Is Cypress Morgan evil ?"
"Well, he does call himself "The All American Asshole". Good people don't tend to do that, so I'd be inclined to say "yes". Why ? Do you consider him to be evil ?"
"No." I replied. "Just very banal."
"And the difference is ?" He responded.
"Cypress Morgan sees everything he does as having some sort of justification. He may claim to be an evil mastermind, but he isn't. True evil would make him shit himself if he ever saw it."
"That's all well and good, but it doesn't explain your point of view and the difference between he and Zane."
"It does." I replied. "Cypress does everything that he does because it makes him feel powerful. In this regard he sounds very much like Zane. The differences between them are more subtle than that."
"Do tell."
"Cypress Morgan is by all means an intelligent man, perhaps even highly intelligent. Zane Scott is not. He's not stupid mind you, in his own way his brain works at a very high level."
I paused for a moment to consider my words.
"Cypress has had a lifetime to learn the simple difference between "right" and "wrong" and he has made the conscious choices to follow the path that he follows. Being a biker by no means makes him “evil”, nor does being inherently violent. He is in fact a very caring family man and has repeatedly shown it. He’s loyal to his friends and causes and will fight to the death for them. Those are not the actions of an evil man. They are the actions of a man who bases everything on how they can help him achieve is goals. Those goals are basic. They aren’t "evil". People just see them as such because he uses violence as the means to get what he wants."
"And Zane ?"
"Zane was never given the chance to learn those distinctions." I replied. "He may be consciously aware of them, but they hold no intrinsic meaning to him. Zane grew up in a world where violence was a necessity for survival, no a conscious choice. He was never given a chance to develop his mind because he has always been treated like a weapon. Look at the path his life has taken. He was kicked out of high school and was taken in by the criminal element of a city that at the time was besieged by out of control crime and gang violence. Those men took him and turned the large, powerful and emotionally needy child that he was into a personal weapon against their enemies. He learned to equate power and affection as being the same thing. Why would he learn the difference between “right” and “wrong” when those he’d have learned those distinctions from had no use for them ?"
He pursed his lips thoughtfully and tapped his finger against the surface of the table a couple of times before responding.
"So you're saying that Zane isn't evil because he was never given the chance to be anything else ?"
I declined by head to one side before looking straight back at him again.
"Yes." I replied. "Partially anyway."
"Ok." He said. "So what’s the rest ? Even Dirge used him as no more than a means to an end."
"That's true." I answered. "Dirge though did teach him a few ethical values, such as loyalty and honor towards those you respect. He also taught him that violence for its own sake is useless and a sign of weakness."
"Yeah." He replied snidely. "And look where that got him. Zane threw him out of a window."
"Yes, he did." I answered. "Take that situation though. Until being introduced to Paul Grevane and Cypress Morgan, Zane had been far more controlled and was showing signs of progressing as a person. All it took to throw him back into his habitual ways was to introduce two men who represented what he had grown up with. Past behavior and habit are inherently narcotic in the respect that they are hard to break one’s self of. Once you establish those baselines, it is very, very easy to revert to them. That’s exactly what Zane did."
I paused for a moment and smiled inwardly. What I was about to do to him wasn't nice, but I couldn’t resist it.
"I don't take that incident at face value though. There is too much of that narrative that is too easy to be true."
The look in his eyes had told me that completely taken the bait.
"Such as ?"
I lifted my hand and waved the question away.
"That's a conversation for another time." I replied. "It's not pertinent to this conversation."
"I think it is."
"You're wrong." I answered with a shrug. "Move on. I won't discuss it here."
"Then why did you mention it, knowing that I'd want to discuss it."
I smirked in response.
"You obnoxious son of a bitch." He replied irritably. "You did that on purpose."
"Of course I did." I admitted with a smile. "And you walked right into it."
"I don't know why I tolerate this." He growled.
"Because you enjoy it." I replied with a shrug.
"Stop patting yourself on the back and get to the point." He snarled angrily.
"Very well." I replied. "Do you see what I'm getting at by saying that Zane isn't "evil", so much as he is a product of his experiences ?"
"Yes." He answered. "I still don't entirely buy it though. It's too easy."
"Only because it doesn't fit your narrative and forces you to challenge your simplistic views of the world. Most people are uncomfortable being challenged in that way. It's always been one of your most glaring weaknesses."
"You're not ?"
"Have I ever been uncomfortable with anything out of the ordinary ?"
"No." He replied. "I've always hated that about you. You've definitely always marched to the tune of your own drummer. I've always assumed that it's why you and Zale get along so well. You're both from the same abrasive cloth."
I declined my head, taking the remark as a compliment.
"Thank you."
"Whatever." He replied. "So what's next for him ?"
"Next ?" I asked. "There is no next. This isn't an instruction manual. It's a process."
"Ok." He retorted. "That doesn't change my question. What's next ?"
"Who's to say that there has to be a pre-determined "next" ?" I queried. "It'll go wherever it needs to go and I'll nudge it along accordingly."
"And what of UGWC ?" He asked. "What's next there ?"
"Donovan Hastings and Cypress Morgan." I replied with a shrug. "Something that he will falsely see as catharsis."
"It won't be ?"
"Catharsis is never that easy." I replied. "You should know that."
I stood up from the chair and looked down at him through the plexi glass that separated us. Over the years his one dark black hair had taken on streaks of white and gray. The predatory look in his cold, dark eyes remained as ever. I looked down at him and smiled.
"I'll be seeing you again." I stated, turning around and taking a few steps towards the door before turning around and looking at him with a mocking smirk.
"John."
Part 4: Faces
A person’s face says a lot about them, more often than not. Regardless of how one tries to hide his or herself behind it and use it as a mask, the more perceptive amongst us tend to see right through it. This can be due to something small, like the barely perceptible twitch of an eye or the brief loss of control that leads of the failure of the façade. The eyes themselves are often said to be “windows to the soul”. Regardless of how one tries to hide their face, in the end they often end up revealing more than they intend to.
Those of painted face know this better than most.
Masks are an expression of the inward being. They are a hard, physical representation of what someone sees himself or herself as inside. The thing with masks is that they can be lifted on and off and aren’t physically a part of the body, even if only briefly. Paint is used the same way. It covers and masks while reflecting what’s beneath it. Unlike masks though, paint is more revealing for the reason that while it can be removed, it cannot be removed easily. It is a long and laborious process to do so. One is also layering their inner self on their outer shell with paint. It is a far more personal means of expression.
Spyder had known this for years.
He used it as tool of intimidation and psychological advantage. Of course, the fact that he had always been a physically gigantic man at six feet, eight inches tall and nearly three hundred pounds certainly didn’t hurt. Neither did his nearly inhuman ability to suffer and dispense pain. These are all just small details to the larger fact that the motif that his face took on when he painted it was a reflection of his inner being.
That inner being was dangerous.
That inner being was vicious.
That inner being was truth, in all of its ugliness.
Spyder had accepted this aspect of his being years ago. When one can face down what is within, nothing without can ever cause the slightest degree of fear. He was living proof of that.
That was the big place where he and Zane differed.
Zane was afraid of who he really was, even if he couldn’t admit it to himself. It was why he reverted to rage as his response to everything that didn’t go his way. Anger is easier than introspection and Zane would never grow and progress if he couldn’t get past that. Spyder couldn’t allow that, because Zane had so much potential. He’d just learned to accept that he was nothing more than a walking weapon. That aspect of Zane’s life annoyed Spyder immensely. He would see to it that Zane found himself. It would take a lot of work to wash away the years of caked on mental and emotional shit that Zane was nearly crippled by, but it would happen.
Spyder was not one to shy away from any challenge.
To do this, many things would need to happen. Many things already had happened and Zane had changed a lot because of it. Anger was still his default reaction. That would take a lot of work to break him of. Anger is the most narcotic of the emotions because it is the easiest. It’s the easiest to tap into and draw from and the rush that it produces feels better and more useful than it actually is. It’s a very deceptive concoction in the end and Zane had been fully deceived by it.
He was its slave.
On the positive side, Zane had regained control over himself. It had taken a lot of work and would take a lot more, but he was better now than he had been. He was no longer quick to jump head first into everything and rush at it full bore. Zane was methodical now. He wasn’t necessarily “patient” in the understood meaning of the term, and that would take far more time to accomplish.
Zane was patient for Zane.
That was a victory in itself.
Over the last few weeks, Zane had sat and watched hours of James Spyder and Colin Zale matches and promos. At first he had been impatient and bored with it, demanding to know why he had to be subjected to it. He wasn’t unwilling to see the point; he was incapable of seeing it. He’d never been allowed to develop the level of self-awareness that would allow for that to happen. Spyder accepted this with silence and the occasional disapproving look. He didn’t bark, batter or demean Zane in any way. He treated him with the silence that you would give to an impertinent child in order to get it to quiet down and pay attention.
In the end that’s what Zane really was.
He was a child that was never allowed to be a child.
He needed to experience that, at least to some degree, in order to really figure himself out. Granted, there would be no playing with children’s toys or playing Little League Baseball or Pop Warner Football. Zane was too physically imposing for that. He was well beyond that stage physically. This wouldn’t be typical childhood development. What Zane really needed was something to elemental that it was almost absurd.
Zane needed to experience what it was like to be something more than a weapon.
Zane needed to know what it was like to be a normal human.
In time Zane’s paint would reflect him.
For now it would serve as a warning.
Part 5: Axioms and Lords: The Confluence of Perception
"There is a saying," Spyder explained to Ooley. "It states; "All cats are gray in the dark"."
Ooley raised a suspicious eye at the remark, not immediately responding to it. When he did, his response was unsurprising.
"What in the hell does that have to do with anything, Bug ?" He spat back. "Rain Blot hasn't been seen in weeks. Louis and Ol' Bob couldn't give less of a fuck about "cats" if we wanted to."
Spyder viewed Ooley indifferently. His rantings about his baseball bat we of no concern to him.
"If you had even a slightly functional brain, you would understand how that saying relates to this situation."
"Are you calling Ol'Bob stupid, Bug ?" Ooley replied irritably. "Don't make Ol' Bob put you and "Louis" on a first name basis."
This time Spyder did respond, he rolled his cold gray eyes before settling them back on the Human Resources Director of UGWC.
"Keep your overgrown toothpick at your side." Spyder replied indifferently, lifting his Croquet Mallet up and laying it on Ooley's desk. "Neither it, nor you impress me in the slightest."
He paused for a moment.
"It's also a foolish way to conduct a negotiation."
Ooley's face flushed a deep red and his left hand balled into a fist on his desk.
"Get to your point, Bug." He growled.
Spyder replied to his irritation with a grin.
"You and your sidekick want Zane to show up and "Infinity" and have promised to fire him if he doesn't." He answers. "We both know that firing Zane would be a gigantic mistake for this company, not that such would stop you from doing so. You've shown a consistent history of stupidity and impertinent decision making."
"Your point ?" Ooley growled through clenched teeth.
"My point." Spyder replied. "Is that you know that Zane makes your company money. You also know that while "Cypress Morgan versus Donovan Hastings" is a good match that will bring in viewers and therefore money, this Triple Threat Match between the two of them and Zane is a gold mine waiting to be exploited. Even at your most incoherent moments you can't deny this and your greed wants to see it happen. Your threat of terminating Zane's contract is an empty one at best."
Ooley begins to lift "Louis" up but thinks better of it and lowers his hand before glaring across the desk at Spyder.
"Will Rain Blot be at "Infinity" ?" He demands.
"You'll find out when everyone else does." Spyder replies impassively. "That element of uncertainty is his greatest weapon at the moment."
Ooley's eyes almost bulge out of his head at the response, but he manages to regain his self control.
"So tell Ol'Bob, Bug." He asks with mock civility. "What do you think of the current situation ?"
Spyder sits silently for a few moments, his expression impossible to read.
"I think that you have absolute chaos on your hands." He replies. "It would do you well to get a handle on it, and you're assuming that you can manipulate events so that you can put someone you can control in that position. That's a very risky plan that is predicated on a lot of foolish assumptions."
"Such as ?" Ooley growls.
"Such as the assumption that you have someone in the "Global Challenge" who is sympathetic towards you." Spyder replies. "Even if you do, which is by no means evident, you will have to deal with Cypress, Jet and their cronies afterward and you have shown no ability to do that in the past. Face it Bob, you and Dexter have no power in the company that you are said to control. Right now, DMW and PMN are in full control."
"You're wrong, Bug." Ooley responds. "It's only a matter of time before Bamboo, Crazy Opie and the rest of them are put in their place."
"Don't kid yourself any more than you already have, Bob." Spyder responds. "You and Dexter made a gigantic mistake by offering up the "Creative Director" position to whoever won the "Global Challenge". You have no allies here and you're surrounded by enemies. A smart man would have found a more tactically feasible way to assure his control over the company."
"Are you offering Rain to us to counter Bamboo, Opie and their lot ?" He presses.
This time Spyder actually laughs.
"Not at all." He replies. "I wouldn't side with you and neither would Zane. Remember, Bob, you requested this meeting. Not us."
"Ol'Bob thought that you and Rain could be made to see reason." Ooley replies angrily. "Instead all you do is babble on about cats. Ol' Bob wants you to get to the point and get the hell out of his office."
"The point of my usage of that saying is this, Bob." Spyder explains calmly. "Is that you and Vines are assuming that you can control everything. You are sitting in the darkness assuming that all of your threats are equal to each other. They're not. Dragon and Pax are a distraction that will eventually run out of steam on its own. One will turn on the other and that will be that. The "Devil's Most Wanted" and "Piercing Media" alliance is the bigger threat, but since you and Vines are grasping around in the dark, these two metaphorical cats both look "gray", instead of having distinct characteristics. It's this assumption that both threats are equal that is your biggest problem. Your are not only blind to it, but to other threats that are looming in the dark. Zane and are not ignorant to the reality of the situation."
"And what is this "reality" ?" Ooley demands.
Spyder stands up from his chair, lifting his Croquet Mallet up from Ooley's desk and resting it on his right shoulder.
"You'll find out soon enough." Spyder says with a dangerous chuckle. "You'll find out soon enough."
With that, Spyder turns and walks from Ooley and Vines office, passing the less assertive of the pairing on his way out. He looks down at the diminutive and sycophantic executive with a dangerous grin.
"You guys are so good for a cheap laugh."
Spyder continues down the hallway as Vines steps into his office, looking at Ooley in confusion.
"I don't care if it costs us money." He says. "This place is less creepy when they're not around."
2013, '18, '23 
2013 
