Post by T-Robosaurus Rex on Dec 4, 2014 14:02:47 GMT -5
Calypso Desmona is interrupted whilst polishing the Lord of Pains throne (not a euphemism) by a knock at the door. She puts down her cloth and turns to walk when Donovan shouts out from another room.
Donovan: CAL! THERE'S SOMEONE AT THE DOOR!
She rolls her eyes.
Calypso – I KNOW!
Donovan – BUT OWEN ISN'T HERE! I DON'T KNOW HOW TO USE THE LOCK!
Calypso – I'M JUST GOING NOW!
Donovan – OK!
She walks a few more paces towards the door before being interrupted again.
Donovan – WHAT ABOUT MY THRONE? HAVE YOU FINISHED CLEANING IT?
Calypso – NOT YET, I'LL FINISH AFTER I GET THE DOOR.
Donovan – ARE YOU INSANE? WHAT IF IT'S SOMEBODY IMPORTANT!
Calypso – LIKE WHO?
Donovan – IT DOESN'T MATTER! IF WE HAVE COMPANY I MUST BE ABLE TO HOLD COURT IN MY THRONE, AND I CAN'T VERY WELL DO THAT WHILST IT IS COVERED IN TODDLER PUKE.
Calypso – 'I WARNED YOU ABOUT FEEDING THEM CHOCOLATE AND BOUNCING THEM ON YOUR KNEE'S.'
Donovan – 'I NEED A NEW CAPE! NO MATTER HOW MUCH I SCRUB IT'S NOT COMING OUT'
Calypso – WHAT? I'M GOING TO GET THE DOOR.
Donovan – ABSOLUTELY NOT! NO THRONE OR CAPE, THEY'LL THINK I'M A HEATHEN! PLUS THEY'VE PROBABLY GONE NOW.
Calypso however has already made it to the door.
Donovan: WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU FEEDING THEM?
She opens the door to find whoever knocked has gone away.
Calypso – THEY'VE GONE!
Donovan – TOLD YOU!
Before closing the door she glances down and sees a box, as she bends to pick it up she calls back to Donovan.
Calypso – THEY LEFT A PACKAGE.
Donovan – A PACKAGE?
She lifts it up and to her surprise, almost causing her to drop the box, Donovan is standing directly behind her with an eager smile on his face.
Donovan – IS IT MY CAPE?
Calypso – You don't need to shout any more.
Donovan – OK, but is it my cape?
Calypso – Your what?..You didn't ask for a new one until after the knock at the door.
Donovan looks at her blankly.
Donovan – So?
Cal stares at him in disbelief and rolls her eyes.
Calypso – No, it's addressed to the 'Hastings Twins'...
Donovan's shoulders slump in disappointment.
Calypso – 'It says not to be opened until their 18th birthday. Strange.
Donovan looks at the box and his eyes narrow.
Donovan – That's Travis' handwriting.
He takes the box of her and rips it open, on top there is a letter, he exchanges a look with Cal before opening it:
Dear Donovan II and Donovita,
I'm sure when you're old enough to read this you will have heard of me on many occasions, but it is only polite to introduce myself; I am Travis Roberts, I used to be your father's friend.
Before I start to expand why I have penned this note for you both, I must apologise for any errors in grammar that I make. I mean, sure, you're just toddlers now, but when you are old enough to read and comprehend this such errors may prejudice your thinking. Like your father I am an Entertainment Professional, writing has never been my strong point.
(On a side note if either of you are interested in becoming Grammar Defenders in the future I have enclosed a business card that was slipped under my door the other month. Their customer satisfaction scores are through the roof, and they're the best practitioners in the area.)
I feel I need to apologise to you both, you will have grown up and heard many stories of why what happened, happened, but you will not have heard it from me. The explanations and stories fed to you as you have grown are diseased with bias and hindsight, but I can guarantee this document is not. For as I write this the night that defines your childhood has not yet happened, but it is on the Horizon.
I first met your father when we worked together in a company called Global Impact Wrestling, my arrival coincided with the greatest period in the companies history, and despite him being a part of the company before I arrived I will freely admit to not paying much attention to your father. At that point in time nobody did.
It wasn't until a good eight months or so, in the middle of my record breaking Global Championship reign, that he crossed my radar. Somehow, the details of which really are irrelevant, he had earned a shot at my title. This was a baffling set of events as all most people knew him for at that point was a glorious period where he didn't speak and repeatedly threw a tennis ball against the wall. He might have feuded with Gabrielle Montgomery as well, but the tennis ball topped that by a mile.
(And don't for one moment think your father was responsible for the gimmicks popularity, you see the ball he used was a Wilson, The Official Ball of the US Open, #1 in tennis and America's favourite tennis ball. I have enclosed two within this package.)
Needless to say I dispatched of your father like I did every other challenger to my championship, his title challenge is not what caught my attention, no it was the aftermath. Your father refused to acknowledge that he was beaten, claimed he was co-Global Heavyweight Champion, and inserted himself into my business at any available opportunity. This endeared him to me, much like the scrappy chihuahua that won't back off the pit bull even after having it's jaw bitten off.
In his association with myself your father began to gain more popularity, in spending so much time studying my athletic prowess his own knowledge of the sport grew exponentially, he was suddenly a contender. This lead to him winning the Battleground Match and setting up another match for the Global Heavyweight Championship, which was still held by yours truly.
Horizons 2009 was the most important night of your fathers career, it was the night that made him, the night he would dine off of for the rest of his career, it was the night he did the impossible and took the Global Heavyweight Championship from Travis Roberts. Credit where credit is due, I had held that title for the entire year (bar one week) since the past Horizons where I was victorious in a brutal triple threat Hell in a Cell match. I had defended it against all that came for it, from Randy Boolzian, Alex Kiseragi, Moss Edwards and more, in Ladder, I Quit and Exploding Deathmatch of Doom matches. I had been beaten down for a year solid, and no-one could take my title from me. But Donovan did, after a year of throwing tennis balls and feuding with people who's names I have forgotten, he did what no-one else could. Credit where it is due.
After that defeat I saw your father in a new light, gone was the animosity, here was a man who had worked so hard to earn my friendship and respect, now that I no longer had the weight of being the standard bearer of the company, how could I not give him the approval he so desperately craved? It was at that moment TWiSTeD was reborn.
With me at his side your father had almost as successful a title reign as I had, he unified the GIW Global Heavyweight Championship and the LWF World Heavyweight Championship to become UGWC's first World Champion, but promptly lost it to Phrixus Deimos before Phrixus Deimos was a threat to anyone. He did however reclaim it, only to drop it to Jet Somers shortly after at Horizons 2010. What a difference a year makes.
Horizons 2010 was a watershed moment for the Industry, not only had the Championship fallen into the hands of a man who was promptly the target of an assassination attempt (He was shot in the middle of the ring, I'm still not sure why), it was also the event at which I decided to retire. Two crushing blows in one night.
Without me by his side your father fell back into his prior pattern of obscurity. His first major feud after losing the title was with Enigma, an individual that made JK look like a real star, and he then went on to waste his time feuding with an Angel over a Church, and a Boring Asian-American over a Gym. Arguably the high point of the following years was losing a title shot against Moss Edwards at a Pay-Per-View named after something out of Star Trek. I think you'd agree it hardly stacks up to defeating one of the greatest in the industry at the biggest show of the year.
Watching this was hard for me, as I said your father and I had grown close, and to see him ritually humiliate himself live in front of our audience, on a near monthly basis, was as uncomfortable as it was embarrassing. I had truly believed, even after he managed to lose to Jet Somers, that your father was as close as anyone could be to filling the hole I had left in the industry, but with each passing month I felt more and more foolish.
Was this all my fault? Had I put too much pressure on your father to emulate the impossible? It was clear to everyone in the business that the chasm my retirement left could not be filled by just one individual, but your father was determined that he could rise to the occasion. With such an unachievable goal at the forefront of his desires, it was inevitable that he would undergo some performance issues.
As his run of colossal insignificance continued, and I watched him become Zane Scott's chew toy on a weekly basis I knew I had to right my wrongs. Despite the pressure and media attention it would bring with it, I knew I had to return to the ring. I had retired a legend, an icon of the business, but I was willing to risk the grand legacy of my career to save your father's.
It didn't take long for me to get back into the swing of things, I promptly won the second Battleground Match of my career, defeated Phrixus Deimos at Horizons, and then won the Global Challenge at Infinity. I had got more people talking and achieved more in the first 6 months of my return than your father had in the two and a half years since I retired.
However I had not returned for me, as I said I left a comfortable retirement to ensure your father did not become an irrelevant shadow of a past era. I did not achieve the accolades I did on my return for selfish reasons, they were key to salvaging what was left of your fathers career. I needed to prevail in Battleground so that I could have the match of my choice at Horizons and show your father that Phrixus, a man who had haunted him professionally for so long, was beatable. With that monkey off his back we could move forward.
Winning the Global Challenge was key to what came next, the formation of The Puppet Masters. As we came together on that historic night in Salt Lake City, my plan since returning came to fruition, and I was able to place your father back at the top of the mountain.
Your father had proven he was incapable of maintaining the top spot in the company without help, and it was not a pressure I felt ready to burden myself with solely again. So The Puppet Masters were a necessity. If you look back on my history I have found it difficult to let people get close to me on a professional and personal level, so you will note this was the first time I had entrusted my name and reputation in the hands of so many others. So you can see just how much I sacrificed to ensure your father regained his pride. If my friend was happy again, it was a small price to pay and I knew he'd be grateful.
This was the biggest mistake of my career.
Your father gradually forgot about the insignificance he had ventured into before my return, and started to believe the hype we had built around him. He somehow believed he had earned the World Heavyweight Championship on his own merit, forgetting my role in not just this current success, but every achievement he had ever gained.
Then when others in the group started whispering in his delusional ear he even forgot that he was my friend, he forgot the bonds of loyalty and trust we had built over the years, and happily condoned my expulsion from the group I created for him. You should watch the footage and see just how brutally our friendship died that night when considering what happened to your father.
If you have noticed a pattern you'll no what happened next. With me no longer at his side it was not long before he lost the World Heavyweight Championship again. Seeing his inevitable drift into obscurity looming down once more he did the only thing he could do in the circumstances, he challenged me to face him at Horizons 2014.
Remember that, if you don't take anything else away from this remember that it was his idea. What happened was your fathers doing, he was so desperate to save his flagging career that he wanted to repeat the most glorious night of his life when he beat Travis Roberts at Horizons. He did not consider that this was a very different man to the one he faced five years prior.
When we met in 2009 I had a respect and admiration for him, in 2014 he had systematically ensured any goodwill towards him had evaporated. In 2009 I was weary from a 12 month title reign, in 2014 I was hurting from the biggest betrayal of my professional life. Your father did not see this, he merely saw his own petty discontent and delusions of grandeur, and this is why I had to write to you.
I avoided meeting you both after you were born, I've always found it best to avoid children there is always a very real risk of absent mindedly breaking them, either physically or mentally, but I will admit this is a decision I now regret. It pains me to think I will have such a profound effect on your lives and you will never have the chance to look upon me with the hate that must fill you, spit In my face, or even ask me 'Why?'. I would not blame you for any action you may take. This is why I was compelled to write this letter, to try and answer any of the questions you must have had for all these years.
So the next time you have to endure watching your father spill his meal down his front despite eating through a straw, or the next time he starts to fit and mutter my name whilst your mother frantically tries to give him his medication, or even every time you have to change his diaper, you will at least know why it had to be this way. I'm sorry for the pain and anguish I have inevitably caused you both growing up, you and your mother were the innocent casualties of your fathers selfish betrayal, that was never my intention. He really left me no choice.
Yours sincerely,
Travis Roberts
(P.S. Speaking of Diaper's are the ones you currently fit your father with absorbent enough to retain the urination of a fully mature rhinoceros? Can they hold in the smell of former GIW World Heavyweight Champion, and E-Honda look-a-like Komosube's epic faeces? No? Then he should try Depend for Men, say goodbye to chaffing and leakage, the official diaper of 'The Blessed One' Travis Roberts' former opponents. Trial pack included in package)
Donovan: CAL! THERE'S SOMEONE AT THE DOOR!
She rolls her eyes.
Calypso – I KNOW!
Donovan – BUT OWEN ISN'T HERE! I DON'T KNOW HOW TO USE THE LOCK!
Calypso – I'M JUST GOING NOW!
Donovan – OK!
She walks a few more paces towards the door before being interrupted again.
Donovan – WHAT ABOUT MY THRONE? HAVE YOU FINISHED CLEANING IT?
Calypso – NOT YET, I'LL FINISH AFTER I GET THE DOOR.
Donovan – ARE YOU INSANE? WHAT IF IT'S SOMEBODY IMPORTANT!
Calypso – LIKE WHO?
Donovan – IT DOESN'T MATTER! IF WE HAVE COMPANY I MUST BE ABLE TO HOLD COURT IN MY THRONE, AND I CAN'T VERY WELL DO THAT WHILST IT IS COVERED IN TODDLER PUKE.
Calypso – 'I WARNED YOU ABOUT FEEDING THEM CHOCOLATE AND BOUNCING THEM ON YOUR KNEE'S.'
Donovan – 'I NEED A NEW CAPE! NO MATTER HOW MUCH I SCRUB IT'S NOT COMING OUT'
Calypso – WHAT? I'M GOING TO GET THE DOOR.
Donovan – ABSOLUTELY NOT! NO THRONE OR CAPE, THEY'LL THINK I'M A HEATHEN! PLUS THEY'VE PROBABLY GONE NOW.
Calypso however has already made it to the door.
Donovan: WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU FEEDING THEM?
She opens the door to find whoever knocked has gone away.
Calypso – THEY'VE GONE!
Donovan – TOLD YOU!
Before closing the door she glances down and sees a box, as she bends to pick it up she calls back to Donovan.
Calypso – THEY LEFT A PACKAGE.
Donovan – A PACKAGE?
She lifts it up and to her surprise, almost causing her to drop the box, Donovan is standing directly behind her with an eager smile on his face.
Donovan – IS IT MY CAPE?
Calypso – You don't need to shout any more.
Donovan – OK, but is it my cape?
Calypso – Your what?..You didn't ask for a new one until after the knock at the door.
Donovan looks at her blankly.
Donovan – So?
Cal stares at him in disbelief and rolls her eyes.
Calypso – No, it's addressed to the 'Hastings Twins'...
Donovan's shoulders slump in disappointment.
Calypso – 'It says not to be opened until their 18th birthday. Strange.
Donovan looks at the box and his eyes narrow.
Donovan – That's Travis' handwriting.
He takes the box of her and rips it open, on top there is a letter, he exchanges a look with Cal before opening it:
~~~
Dear Donovan II and Donovita,
I'm sure when you're old enough to read this you will have heard of me on many occasions, but it is only polite to introduce myself; I am Travis Roberts, I used to be your father's friend.
Before I start to expand why I have penned this note for you both, I must apologise for any errors in grammar that I make. I mean, sure, you're just toddlers now, but when you are old enough to read and comprehend this such errors may prejudice your thinking. Like your father I am an Entertainment Professional, writing has never been my strong point.
(On a side note if either of you are interested in becoming Grammar Defenders in the future I have enclosed a business card that was slipped under my door the other month. Their customer satisfaction scores are through the roof, and they're the best practitioners in the area.)
I feel I need to apologise to you both, you will have grown up and heard many stories of why what happened, happened, but you will not have heard it from me. The explanations and stories fed to you as you have grown are diseased with bias and hindsight, but I can guarantee this document is not. For as I write this the night that defines your childhood has not yet happened, but it is on the Horizon.
I first met your father when we worked together in a company called Global Impact Wrestling, my arrival coincided with the greatest period in the companies history, and despite him being a part of the company before I arrived I will freely admit to not paying much attention to your father. At that point in time nobody did.
It wasn't until a good eight months or so, in the middle of my record breaking Global Championship reign, that he crossed my radar. Somehow, the details of which really are irrelevant, he had earned a shot at my title. This was a baffling set of events as all most people knew him for at that point was a glorious period where he didn't speak and repeatedly threw a tennis ball against the wall. He might have feuded with Gabrielle Montgomery as well, but the tennis ball topped that by a mile.
(And don't for one moment think your father was responsible for the gimmicks popularity, you see the ball he used was a Wilson, The Official Ball of the US Open, #1 in tennis and America's favourite tennis ball. I have enclosed two within this package.)
Needless to say I dispatched of your father like I did every other challenger to my championship, his title challenge is not what caught my attention, no it was the aftermath. Your father refused to acknowledge that he was beaten, claimed he was co-Global Heavyweight Champion, and inserted himself into my business at any available opportunity. This endeared him to me, much like the scrappy chihuahua that won't back off the pit bull even after having it's jaw bitten off.
In his association with myself your father began to gain more popularity, in spending so much time studying my athletic prowess his own knowledge of the sport grew exponentially, he was suddenly a contender. This lead to him winning the Battleground Match and setting up another match for the Global Heavyweight Championship, which was still held by yours truly.
Horizons 2009 was the most important night of your fathers career, it was the night that made him, the night he would dine off of for the rest of his career, it was the night he did the impossible and took the Global Heavyweight Championship from Travis Roberts. Credit where credit is due, I had held that title for the entire year (bar one week) since the past Horizons where I was victorious in a brutal triple threat Hell in a Cell match. I had defended it against all that came for it, from Randy Boolzian, Alex Kiseragi, Moss Edwards and more, in Ladder, I Quit and Exploding Deathmatch of Doom matches. I had been beaten down for a year solid, and no-one could take my title from me. But Donovan did, after a year of throwing tennis balls and feuding with people who's names I have forgotten, he did what no-one else could. Credit where it is due.
After that defeat I saw your father in a new light, gone was the animosity, here was a man who had worked so hard to earn my friendship and respect, now that I no longer had the weight of being the standard bearer of the company, how could I not give him the approval he so desperately craved? It was at that moment TWiSTeD was reborn.
With me at his side your father had almost as successful a title reign as I had, he unified the GIW Global Heavyweight Championship and the LWF World Heavyweight Championship to become UGWC's first World Champion, but promptly lost it to Phrixus Deimos before Phrixus Deimos was a threat to anyone. He did however reclaim it, only to drop it to Jet Somers shortly after at Horizons 2010. What a difference a year makes.
Horizons 2010 was a watershed moment for the Industry, not only had the Championship fallen into the hands of a man who was promptly the target of an assassination attempt (He was shot in the middle of the ring, I'm still not sure why), it was also the event at which I decided to retire. Two crushing blows in one night.
Without me by his side your father fell back into his prior pattern of obscurity. His first major feud after losing the title was with Enigma, an individual that made JK look like a real star, and he then went on to waste his time feuding with an Angel over a Church, and a Boring Asian-American over a Gym. Arguably the high point of the following years was losing a title shot against Moss Edwards at a Pay-Per-View named after something out of Star Trek. I think you'd agree it hardly stacks up to defeating one of the greatest in the industry at the biggest show of the year.
Watching this was hard for me, as I said your father and I had grown close, and to see him ritually humiliate himself live in front of our audience, on a near monthly basis, was as uncomfortable as it was embarrassing. I had truly believed, even after he managed to lose to Jet Somers, that your father was as close as anyone could be to filling the hole I had left in the industry, but with each passing month I felt more and more foolish.
Was this all my fault? Had I put too much pressure on your father to emulate the impossible? It was clear to everyone in the business that the chasm my retirement left could not be filled by just one individual, but your father was determined that he could rise to the occasion. With such an unachievable goal at the forefront of his desires, it was inevitable that he would undergo some performance issues.
As his run of colossal insignificance continued, and I watched him become Zane Scott's chew toy on a weekly basis I knew I had to right my wrongs. Despite the pressure and media attention it would bring with it, I knew I had to return to the ring. I had retired a legend, an icon of the business, but I was willing to risk the grand legacy of my career to save your father's.
It didn't take long for me to get back into the swing of things, I promptly won the second Battleground Match of my career, defeated Phrixus Deimos at Horizons, and then won the Global Challenge at Infinity. I had got more people talking and achieved more in the first 6 months of my return than your father had in the two and a half years since I retired.
However I had not returned for me, as I said I left a comfortable retirement to ensure your father did not become an irrelevant shadow of a past era. I did not achieve the accolades I did on my return for selfish reasons, they were key to salvaging what was left of your fathers career. I needed to prevail in Battleground so that I could have the match of my choice at Horizons and show your father that Phrixus, a man who had haunted him professionally for so long, was beatable. With that monkey off his back we could move forward.
Winning the Global Challenge was key to what came next, the formation of The Puppet Masters. As we came together on that historic night in Salt Lake City, my plan since returning came to fruition, and I was able to place your father back at the top of the mountain.
Your father had proven he was incapable of maintaining the top spot in the company without help, and it was not a pressure I felt ready to burden myself with solely again. So The Puppet Masters were a necessity. If you look back on my history I have found it difficult to let people get close to me on a professional and personal level, so you will note this was the first time I had entrusted my name and reputation in the hands of so many others. So you can see just how much I sacrificed to ensure your father regained his pride. If my friend was happy again, it was a small price to pay and I knew he'd be grateful.
This was the biggest mistake of my career.
Your father gradually forgot about the insignificance he had ventured into before my return, and started to believe the hype we had built around him. He somehow believed he had earned the World Heavyweight Championship on his own merit, forgetting my role in not just this current success, but every achievement he had ever gained.
Then when others in the group started whispering in his delusional ear he even forgot that he was my friend, he forgot the bonds of loyalty and trust we had built over the years, and happily condoned my expulsion from the group I created for him. You should watch the footage and see just how brutally our friendship died that night when considering what happened to your father.
If you have noticed a pattern you'll no what happened next. With me no longer at his side it was not long before he lost the World Heavyweight Championship again. Seeing his inevitable drift into obscurity looming down once more he did the only thing he could do in the circumstances, he challenged me to face him at Horizons 2014.
Remember that, if you don't take anything else away from this remember that it was his idea. What happened was your fathers doing, he was so desperate to save his flagging career that he wanted to repeat the most glorious night of his life when he beat Travis Roberts at Horizons. He did not consider that this was a very different man to the one he faced five years prior.
When we met in 2009 I had a respect and admiration for him, in 2014 he had systematically ensured any goodwill towards him had evaporated. In 2009 I was weary from a 12 month title reign, in 2014 I was hurting from the biggest betrayal of my professional life. Your father did not see this, he merely saw his own petty discontent and delusions of grandeur, and this is why I had to write to you.
I avoided meeting you both after you were born, I've always found it best to avoid children there is always a very real risk of absent mindedly breaking them, either physically or mentally, but I will admit this is a decision I now regret. It pains me to think I will have such a profound effect on your lives and you will never have the chance to look upon me with the hate that must fill you, spit In my face, or even ask me 'Why?'. I would not blame you for any action you may take. This is why I was compelled to write this letter, to try and answer any of the questions you must have had for all these years.
So the next time you have to endure watching your father spill his meal down his front despite eating through a straw, or the next time he starts to fit and mutter my name whilst your mother frantically tries to give him his medication, or even every time you have to change his diaper, you will at least know why it had to be this way. I'm sorry for the pain and anguish I have inevitably caused you both growing up, you and your mother were the innocent casualties of your fathers selfish betrayal, that was never my intention. He really left me no choice.
Yours sincerely,
Travis Roberts
(P.S. Speaking of Diaper's are the ones you currently fit your father with absorbent enough to retain the urination of a fully mature rhinoceros? Can they hold in the smell of former GIW World Heavyweight Champion, and E-Honda look-a-like Komosube's epic faeces? No? Then he should try Depend for Men, say goodbye to chaffing and leakage, the official diaper of 'The Blessed One' Travis Roberts' former opponents. Trial pack included in package)
?
