Post by LACKLAN on Jan 19, 2019 1:19:48 GMT -5
"Tell me," says the large man, his voice low and menacing, "when you pray to God, does He listen to you?”
The purple haze of the dream fills the vision, but we can see clear enough. A bulky man wearing a long billowing cloak with sleeves hanging past his free hand, his face covered by an alabaster mask, holds a smaller man in glasses by the front of his shirt. The thin man’s feet dangle two feet above the ground.
“I doubt it.”
His voice is rough, as if he regularly gargled rocks every morning in place of salt. He pulls the man closer to him, close enough for the breath coming out underneath the mask to hit him in the face.
“But…”
He raises his free hand and pulls back the hood hiding his face. The thin man’s eyes go wide behind his glasses as the bald pate, full of ugly red and purple burn scars, find light to complete the image of the Mountain King.
“...you may wish to begin praying anew."
FLASH
Screaming.
Lots of screaming.
Men with shortly shorn hair, each wearing matching black uniforms with silver pins, tie the thin man to a wooden cross, his feet bound together at the ankles. His shirt is unbuttoned to reveal several fresh slashes of red, thin lines of crimson already coming to the surface. His glasses lay upon the floor below his feet, frame bent and glass broken. Still more of the men in black empty canisters of gasoline throughout the building, coating walls and creating pools.
Several POPS crunch through the air and pierce the screams from the man as heavy black boots step down on the glasses, the weight of the large man flattening and breaking. He steps in front of the thin man, his robe waving with a SWISH before settling, and the thin man looks up at him with weak eyes.
"Listen...I...I don't know...what this is about, but..."
He trails off as he notices the wall of black surrounding him. The men have finished their mission: Every inch of the building drips in gasoline.
"This, Mr Hawthorne," says the large man with that gravelly voice, “is about revenge. About showing a child of a man what happens when you touch...when you hurt...what matters.”
"I hear there's a party tonight. Mind if I join?"
FLASH
Ava Quinn was a slight young woman. Her bleached hair was brown at the roots, she wore so much white base makeup as to make her appear a jester, and quite a bit of her pale curves shown in a tight leather bodice and skirt.
"Ms. Quinn."
The large man’s voice suddenly sounds somewhat breathless. Ava smiles as she enters the room, her eyes shining as she looks at the man. As she approaches, their height difference so great that she barely reaches the bottom of his impossibly broad chest, her eyes flicker to the side, and the lust in them changes to anger.
"You..." she says with true avarice dripping from her voice. If the thin man, Mr. Hawthorne, was scared witless before, a look of pure horror comes to his face now.
"Ava? Ava Quinn? What are-"
The large man’s fist connecting with his face quickly silenced Mr. Hawthorne.
"You do not utter her name," says the man coldly. He turns to Ava and offers her his arm. Her eyes back on him, Ava's face brightens again and she takes his arm with a giggle. The man turns them to face the thin man on the cross once more. "Miss Quinn is here to exact revenge for herself. And, ultimately, show you what happens to people who harm the people and things that..."
The man’s masked gaze goes down to Ava, who stares up at him with a twinkle in her mad eye.
"...matter to me."
Ava giggles and shivers.
"I don't suppose you still have your hammer, Ms. Quinn?"
“Réellement!”
Ava bends down and reaches into the boots which reach to her knees and pulls out a small rock hammer. She gives the large man a triumphant smile as she holds it out to him. The man in the mask turns towards his men and nods. Two approach the crucifix and, one taking hold of a pinky and the other a thumb, splay the man’s fingers open on his right side. The large man in the mask squeezes Ava’s hand and nods towards the thin man.
“Let the hammer fall.”
With a squeal of delight, Ava takes her arm from the large man and runs towards the thin man on the crucifix, the tiny rock hammer already raised into the air.
FLASH
Aveline Lacklan gasps.
Mouth wide, she takes in a deep breath and cries out. Her eyes bug out, the green surrounded by fields of white which try to take in as much light as possible to help her gather her bearings. All she sees is darkness, but slowly forms begin to take shape. The mantel full of licking orange and red at the far wall, the fire roaring the warmth into her bones on a snowing January Sunday in Maine. The glint of cups and vases along that mantel, some several generations old, catching the light from the fire. The movement of servants, silent and doing their best to be unseen, captured at the edges of sight. Before her, the long dinner table filled with its inlaid crystal panels. Below her, a half-empty bottle of wine.
”Oh, ma tête…”
The Frenchwoman drops her face into her hands, eyes clenched, fingers immediately rubbing her temples. But then her eyes go wide again as she remembers her drunken dream.
”Mon mari!”
Memories of the large man in black with the white mask and head of scars fill her. Tired eyes fill with light, her lips curl into a smile, and she hugs herself.
“Oh...how I miss you.”
She pushes herself from the table, the feet of the chair scraping against the bare hardwood floor, and takes the wine bottle by its neck. She walks towards the mantel, long skirts of purple and black swishing quietly in the large room. She stops before the fire, keeping distance to stay warm but not burn, and looks up at the collection of paintings above the mantel and along the wall.
“I think of that day often, mon mari. The first time you showed me your…”
The smile on her face curls a touch further and her lips fill out in a plump.
“...strength.”
She places the mouth of the bottle to her lips and tosses her head back to quaff a drink. She growls lightly at the burn in her throat as she lowers it and moves from one portrait to another. The first three were of that husband, Lord of the Manor, the Voice of God, Jean-Paul Lacklan. First as a man with long silver hair flowing to the middle of his back. The second with a bald head full of scars and a white mask covering his face. The third with a large black hood and faceplate which covered his entire head.
“While I will always be jealous of what the Oracle could give you…”
Green eyes move to the fourth and fifth portraits, that of a blonde with a face full of metal piercings and a tiny all-too-familiar albino girl wearing robes.
“...I will always be thankful of what we had. You avenged me against that...man. You helped me avenge myself. You gave me strength. You gave me YOUR strength.”
Her eyes skip over the portrait next to the albino, that of the dark girl with the braids, and quickly go to the end. The portrait of a young woman with bleached hair.
“I feel like I have aged a lifetime since that day, mon mari. My eyes...they grow tired. My bones...they ache. But I endeavor. I will do what I set out to do. I will do what I RESOLVED to do. I will bring our family together. The Lacklan Dynasty will-”
“My Queen?”
Aveline turned her head, the shuffle of her thin neck against the high collar of her gown seeming loud in the room. One of her servants bowed low before her, wisely sending his eyes to the ground so as not to meet hers.
“There is…”
His voice starts and stops, hesitation heavy.
“...someone here to see you, my Queen.”
Aveline raises one of her eyebrows.
“I am not seeing anyone right now.”
She turns back to the mantel and the portraits above.
“Send him away.”
“Um…”
The servant’s eyes stay to the floor, the hesitation still strong.
“...he says to tell you…”
His gulp is audible.
“...to remember that time you promised to let him lick your boots.”
Aveline’s eyes draw downward, her eyebrows furrowing in consternation.
“Who-”
She cuts off as her eyes pop open.
“My pig boy?”
She spins, her skirts flaring..
“MY PIG BOY! Send him in! Allez! Allez!”
She gestures frantically with her hands, the wine sloshing inside it’s vessel, as the servant backs out of the room. A barrel-chested man replaces him and Aveline skips towards him with a youthful bound.
“MY PIG BOY! WHERE HAVE YOU-”
She stops suddenly as she gets close to the man, craning her neck slightly to look up a couple of inches to his face. He was haggard, with shaggy brown hair filled with its fair share of gristle, as well as a face full of a salt-and-pepper beard dearly in need of a trim. She narrows her eyes and turns her head to the side, seeming a bird staring at a particularly tasty morsel.
“You are NOT my pig boy!”
The man shakes his head slowly.
“Sorry, Ava.”
She looks him up and down with that calculating eye.
“...Mon Dieu, tu as grossi…”
She turns to face the trio of servants waiting in the corners of the room and motions at them.
”Allez! Allez!
The servants quickly scamper out of the room as Aveline turns back to her guest.
“What happened to you? Where did my pig boy go?!”
The man stares down at the woman and shakes his head again.
“Same thing that happened to you. Same place you went, I’d wager.”
Aveline’s thin eyebrow raises again, but then so do her eyes go wide in understanding.
“I see. Who was she?”
The man reaches into his old jacket and pulls out an equally weathered leather wallet. Flipping it open, he shows her a picture of a raven-haired beauty with a streak of red in the front.
“She was beautiful. Too much makeup, though. And far too young for you.”
The man chuckles as he puts away his wallet, and even that sounds sad.
“She called it her ‘war paint.’ And like you are one to talk about age differences. But I’m not not hear to talk about Z.”
Aveline raises her eyebrow again as she brings her hand to her face and taps her lips with her forefinger.
“Why ARE you here, Tragik?”
The big man’s eyes close and his neck snaps to the side. His body shivers following the sharp twinge, and when he opens his eyes, they seem even more weary than before.
“That’s not my name anymore, Ava.”
The Frenchwoman giggles suddenly, the sound an odd tinkle of joy.
“And that is not my name anymore, either.”
The man offers another sad chuckle.
“So I have seen. The Champion of Chaos.”
Aveline’s face lights up with a smile.
“And more! La reine mère!”
She turns suddenly to the portraits, her skirts whirling.
“All shall bow before me, as they did my husband, il est ressuscité! All shall love me! All shall THANK ME!”
“Even Angie?”
Aveline’s face falls instantly, and then her brows further into anger.
“Bah! Angelica the Unbeatable!”
“...tell me about it…”
Aveline turns her head and shoots the man a glare over the odd mumble, but he raises his hands in submission.
“Ignore me.”
She glares at him a moment more and then turns back to the the portraits.
“My record will no longer be sullied by that child! Time and again, she and I fought across the year before. Time and again we locked horns. And I was victorious against her. Again. And again. And AGAIN AND AGAIN! Until…”
“Until?”
She doesn’t answer right away, her eyes still moving across the portraits.
“Until the Harvester.”
She turns quickly back to the man and steps close, her brow at his chin, and looks up into his downturned eyes.
“Four times, Writer! FOUR TIMES! Infinity...VICTORY! Synergy on THREE separate occasions...VICTORY! But then WrestleStock and the Harvester. But then I was laid low for a time. And I suffered. I hurt. I was pained. And that led to Day of Reckoning and the Synergies before where the girl somehow ended on top. It lead to losing alongside Deimos against her and that sadness which is Rydell. WrestleStock and the Harvester lead to my battles with Vaughn becoming an unholy balance! BUT NO MORE!”
She sticks a finger in his face, her fingers clenching so hard that the knuckles turned white, her hand even shaking slightly.
“NO MORE! Will I allow the Harvester to influence me and those who fight me. NO MORE! Will I allow such distractions of Satan derail me. Just as I have defeated Cotton twice in a row, a Cotton who no longer has the influence of the Harvester to drive her, I shall defeat the Vaughn girl. The Harvester has no more sway over me. The Harvester has no more influence. And without him, without his distractions, the Vaughn girl WILL lose! Because I not only HAVE the moral high ground...I AM...the moral...high ground!”
She jams her finger into his chest with each word for emphasis. She then spins away and turns her face back to the portraits, her eyes ultimately settling on the trio of the patriarch, and serenity comes over her face once more.
“Moral high ground? Po-tay-to and po-tah-to, I suppose. No denying how successful she is though, Ava. If you underestimate her-”
“Silencieux!”
She spins back around to face the man.
“I know well the Vaughn girl’s capability. I know better than most! No one, literally NO ONE, within the UGWC had more wins than her last year. Not even Wallace himself! She was somehow able to defeat just about everyone within the company, from outsiders in the Trios to the Court to the Harvester to Grey! The amount of times she had her hand raised in victory is second to none, and that includes myself. But, I protest, that this would be different had it not been for the evil influence of the Harvester. Had I won ALL of our matches instead of only half, it would be I who was the undisputed victor of the year! But all of that ends NOW!
“Due to the actions of myself and my dear friends Baal and the departed Morgan, the Harvester is not only gone, but he is vanquished, and NONE of his influence remains. I PROVED that as I took out Cotton in the first salvo of the Round Robin Tournament, and I shall prove it AGAIN in a couple of days. Yes! Vaughn is talented in tournaments. Yes! She has won some before and placed well in others. But this is MY tournament, Writer! This is MY time to prove that I am not only the BEST wrestling has to offer, but it’s very FUTURE!
“I AM, Writer! I...AM!”
She snarls the last few words, her teeth gritted, spital flying out to hit the man in the face. He gives no reaction other than to raise his tired eyes up to the portraits above the mantel.
“Do you think you are God? Like him?”
Aveline turns to face the portraits and her face again finds serenity.
“He did not think, Writer. He WAS. He was the Voice of God. The Hammer of His will. He was everything God wished for the world to be. But now it is MY turn. Now I AM. Now, I am Le Poing de Dieu. His very Fist! Now it is MY turn to change this business! To be what ALL in the world should aspire to! And I will NOT allow the Vaughn girl to usurp me this year! No! Non! This will be a year in which I demolish ALL who stand in my way, and that includes her if I must!”
She spins again, her face full of equal parts mania and anger.
“For too long! She has been someone that the world looked upon with such reverence and hope! Hero of the year! The one to watch! Accolade after accolade! Seemingly-dominant cooperative champion! Soon to be the longest-reigning television champion in XWA history! But that ALL turns pale when compared to MY color, Writer! For over two hundred days I have been the MOST important champion within this business, the holder of the Chaos Title! By the time I defend this title again, only a bare handful will have held it longer...and I will surpass them with little effort! And it shall ALL be done during the Round Robin Tournament so that the entire BUSINESS shall see God’s plan made flesh!
“Whereas the so-called ‘main event’ of this company features proxies and stunt doubles, I show the WORLD what TRUE valor is! For nearly twenty minutes, I withstood the assault of Cotton before she felt the Embrace of God, and everyone is BETTER FOR IT! They LEARNED what God wants by watching me last week! The stink of being forced to watch the silliness of the Grey and the Vaughn girl, the silliness of children, was WASHED AWAY by the spectacle that was me, the very blade and edge of God, competing in the Round Robin. And I shall do so again on Monday!
“Indeed! Let his false ‘main event’ be populated by proxies and doubles. Indeed! Let the crowd learn NOTHING as Zane picks apart the likes of the Raabs of the world and those who wear children’s costumes. Indeed! Let the Cooperative division be dirtied and sullied by the embarrassment of old men scratching and clawing for any sort of validation like so many Dynamos, and a woman who has grown so ugly on the inside that her entire FACE and BODY has changed as a result! Indeed! Let the other Round Robin match be between two people who I have defeated again and again AND AGAIN AND AGAIN FOR THE CHAOS CHAMPIONSHIP!”
Her arms wave around as she screams, her volume and energy growing visually in lockstep with her voice.
“Indeed! Let the WORLD see me DEFEAT the Vaughn girl in the Round Robin! Let the WORLD see my TRUE face! Let the WORLD see me WHOLLY unfurled and unhinged! Let them see the LACKLAN NAME UNBRIDLED, O WRITER!”
She breathes hard, her pale face flushed deep red, her bosom heaving with deep breaths. She then lets out a deep breath and a smile spreads across her face.
“Will you be staying long? I imagine your rooms are as they were when you left.”
The man blinks several times at the fast changes in Aveline’s moods. After a shake of his head, he is able to stammer out a response.
“Um...yes...uh. Yes. No. Maybe.”
He gives a shrug of his shoulders.
“It depends. The subject of this book is...complicated.”
“What is it this time? Hopefully something as beautiful as the last! I read it when I...returned home.”
Her slight stutter over the silent “escaped” was covered by another spin and look to the portraits.
“‘Madness Reigns: The Life and Times of Jean-Paul Lacklan was wonderful. Sad. Terrible. Everything my husband, il est ressuscité, is and was. But what of this one?”
He doesn’t answer right away, taking a moment to answer carefully.
“Its a follow-up, actually. Its about...the Lacklan Dynasty. Its bigger than I originally thought.”
Aveline visibly freezes, her lips going dry. The man walks forward and stands at her side, raising an arm to point out the portraits in turn. First the trio of the patriarch-
“Head of the household…”
-the woman with the mouth full of metal-
“...lover…”
-the albino and the dark-skinned girl-
“...only child and daughter-in-law…”
-Aveline-
“...the Wife…”
-but then keeps his hand up in the air, fingers gesturing to nothing.
“...and more. There is so much room for more. Because there IS more, Ava. And that is what the world needs to know. Ol’ Japles, he is risen, was not the end. He was just the beginning.”
Silence settles between the two.
“...what do you know?”
Her voice was a whisper, but seemed loud in the empty hall.
“Too much.”
He lowers his hand and places it on Aveline’s shoulder.
“It’s late and I have traveled far. Sleep well, Queen Mother.”
Without another word, Severen removes his hand from her shoulder and walks out of the room, leaving Aveline to stare at the portraits above the mantel. Green eyes moved along them and found that there was, indeed, room for more.
x2
