Post by Travis Pierce on Aug 27, 2022 22:15:05 GMT -5
The screen is dark, and a voiceover by Rob Cartwright is heard.
Cartwright: This is the true story of a group of Entertainment Professionals chosen for superiority who work together and have their lives taped to find out what happens when life gets…pierced…The Piercing Life.
Travis is shown in his confessional.
Pierce: Run of the Mill. It’s a match that is all about brutality. An environment designed to purposefully endanger the participants and see who survives. People might think that Travis Pierce is out of his element in that kind of situation. The piercing truth is that I don’t see how it’s any different than anything else. If you’re wondering why I should be here, why is Travis Pierce in this match in 2022, then maybe you need to take a look behind me and see the road that brought me here.
We see archive footage of Travis sitting in the office of the Director of Human Resources, Robert Ooley.
Ooley: I’ve sat back this past year and watched UGWC be all about people like Donut Hamstrings, Peter Damascus, and Alan Pisseragi. I’ve watched Scared run amuck for about the twentieth fucking year in a row or however long it’s fucking been. The face of this company going into the new year is Astro Bummers. Astro. Bummers. I can’t do it anymore. It’s time to take action. We need a new image, something fresh to put forward in front of everyone, with a strong force behind them. It’s going to be you.
Pierce: Me.
Footage is shown of Travis Pierce standing on the stage alongside Gabrielle Montgomery, Johnny Blake, and Duncan Ryder as the Human Resources Department faction.
Pierce: I knew my time was coming. I was hand-picked to be the new face of the company by one of the people that ran it. It was hard to imagine being in a better position than that. What could possibly go wrong?
Cut to the Director of Human Resources, Robert Ooley.
Ooley: Watching his creative process, how he put together an episode of The Piercing Truth, it was impressive how a cohesive broadcast came out of it. The way he finds the “news” they may as well just type gibberish into Google and click “I’m feeling lucky.” That’s the talent that this man has that I recognized at the time, an ability to turn water into wine and squeeze blood from a stone, powered by a charisma unlike any I’d ever seen. And Old Bob is pretty damn personable himself.
Cut back to Travis.
Pierce: And then it happened. Day of Reckoning, 2011. You look that night up and it says that Travis Pierce defeated Jet Somers to win the UGWC World Heavyweight Title. And it’s certainly something over an oversimplification that glazes over the bitter piercing truth of it all, that the match was a Napoleon’s Revenge Match, meaning that Robert Ooley, the man that had selected me to be the next World Champion, was able to manipulate the rules of the match as it went along and make me the actual World Champion.
Cut to Robert Ooley.
Ooley: Ol’ Bob has no problem giving you the ball. Ol’ Bob gives out lots of balls, he just rams them all over the place. But then it’s on your ass to run, and you’d better run or Louis will be right behind you.
Cut back to Travis.
Pierce: So my first title defense, after being essentially gifted the title, we go straight zero to sixty, and it’s a Maniacal Multiple Massacre Match against the Jackal of Jwar Isle, Tyvola. You remember him. Big beard, had an imaginary friend or something.
Cut to an empty confessional.
It’s empty.
A subtitle pops up that reads “Tyvola’s Imaginary Friend.”
Listen close.
That’s how it happened, alright.
Cut back to Travis.
Pierce: And just like that, I’m a one and done champ. A former World Champion, and there isn’t a moment about it that I can truly cling to and say, that’s mine, right there. I mean, at least I do get to say I’m a former UGWC World Champ. That’s something that people like Dave Rydell and Holden Orson can’t say. Tempest can’t say that. But this is where I’ve been lucky, where I’ve been able to spin and slip by. When people talk about the worst champs of all time, they fire right off with Rogan MacLean. You get them to think a little deeper and they pull out Killian King. Rogan took advantage of mayhem at Outlast. Killian cashed in his High Roller rights. But they both did that themselves, on their own. The real worst champ. It’s me.
Travis lowers his head, and his voice softens.
Pierce: It’s me.
Archive footage of Travis Pierce standing behind a podium at a press conference.
Pierce: Good morning. Today marks a pivotal moment in not only my own life and career, but that of the Piercing Media Network as a whole.
Cut to Travis in the confessional.
Pierce: You know, I’ve always thought of myself as a master strategist. How could I be anything less, right? Developer and creative mind behind a massive media empire. Always a step ahead, always prepared, ready to adapt. At least, I used to think so.
Cut back to the 2014 footage.
Pierce: The new Chief Executive Officer of the Piercing Media Network, EDEN MORGAN!
Cut back to the confessional, but Travis is again looking down from the camera. A heavy sigh can be heard before we cut back to the conference, with Eden Morgan now at the podium.
Eden: Thank you, Travis, for the heartfelt introduction, and thank you for having such unshakeable faith in me. You have no idea just what it means to me. This is an amazing opportunity for all of us, and I’m looking forward to the days to come and the changes those days will entail. To those already in, and those considering buying in, let this serve as your reminder: PMN owns you. Let that soak in, and understand every bit that that entails.
Cut back to the confessional.
Pierce: Of course, what it really meant was that Eden owned us. Eden owned me. I gave her control and she took everything away from me, my very identity.
Cut to recent footage of Jet Somers arguing with Travis in his office.
Somers: You haven’t been compelling since you couldn’t use your own name!
Cut back to the confessional.
Pierce: People talk about it now like it’s my greatest triumph. After Eden threw me out of my own company and took away my right to even use the name Pierce, I won Battleground and challenged Eden at Horizons to win it all back, and I did. But what people remember as my great victory I recall as my greatest failure. The master strategist was outmaneuvered. Yeah, I won at Horizons, and I reclaimed my identity. But I should never have lost it to begin with. I should have never put myself in that position. You’ll never see Tempest show up at a show and have to call himself “Cyclone” or something like that. There’s a guy that really is a step ahead, that has his fingers fully wrapped around the strings. Identity is such a critical thing. Red Fusion became Dave Rydell, but he chose that. “The Mainstreamer” Martin Graber now goes by Holden Orson, and whether you buy into the whole split personality thing or whatever, nobody pushed that on him. I didn’t decide to be Trevor Sharp. I got stuck with it, and sure, I persevered. I won back my identity, but that identity could never be the same again.
Pierce: For a long time, even if the in-ring stuff was on the downside, I could find solace in the fact that the Piercing Media Network was the premier source of entertainment in the industry. That all changed when Circle Television came on the scene. The WrestleStock Festival, the event that I’m personally invested in and take great pride in, becomes a special broadcast presentation of Circle Television.
Footage is shown of highlights of the 2019 festival, with a focus on the CTN presentation.
Pierce: And I took that personally. It really hurt, it stung. PMN is supposed to be the entertainment vehicle of UGWC. So that year at Horizons, when I faced Kenzi Grey for the Chaos Title, it wasn’t about the championship for me. It was a matter of pride.
Highlights are shown of Kenzi defeating Pierce at Horizons.
Pierce: And that pride just became another thing stripped away from me. You know, I tried telling myself afterwards, the consequence of losing was that I didn’t win the Chaos Title again, and that’s something I should be okay with. That title takes people, took me, to dark places. It is something I’ve taken credit for, time and again. Travis Pierce, the 4-Time Chaos Champion, greatest champion the division has ever seen. And then UGWC holds a match to determine the legacy of that championship, with its three greatest champions, and who are they?
Pierce: I wasn’t in the discussion. No, at Coalescence, the biggest show in UGWC history, my spot on the card was early in the evening, as the partner of Jet Somers for his retirement match. And yeah, the Piercing Weapons are the greatest cooperative team ever, but I can’t help but wonder, is that all I’ll truly be remembered for? The guy that teamed with Jet a lot?
Pierce: We started this walk through memory lane by asking what it means to witness brutality. The piercing truth is that I’ve been witnessing it first hand my entire career. I joined UGWC as the representative Cross-Hemisphere Champion, but lost it in my first defense. I was hand-picked to be the World Champion, had the title practically handed to me, but lost my first defense and have never won it back. I presented myself as the man with a plan that was on top of it all, and had to win back my company and legacy after I let it get ripped out from under me. That media empire was outshone by Circle Television, and you throw on top of that the past year during which I’ve been upstaged by a guy named Danny Danger. What is brutality? Brutality is looking back at it all and realizing I’ve been little more than a fraud. A sham. King of Charisma? Icon of Entertainment? What a joke.
Travis once again lowers his head, but after a few moments he looks up at the camera with a different glint in his eye.
Pierce: Run of the Mill is a chance to change all that. It’s a chance for me to prove there is more to Travis Pierce after all. The trouble is, I’m not the only person seeking redemption through all this. Dave Rydell and Holden Orson are both career failures who can claim even less success than I can, and while Holden’s appearance might be little more than a stunt, Dave Rydell is a man with everything to prove and nothing left to lose. I can appreciate that. People with nothing left to lose can be extraordinarily dangerous. Just ask Eden Morgan, circa 2014. She faced a man with nothing left to lose at Horizons that year. And here’s the problem for you, Dave. I don’t have anything left to lose now, either.
Travis brings his hands together and rests his chin on them for a moment before continuing.
Pierce: I’m sure a lot of people think this is going to be Tempest’s big moment. Here’s a guy that has been patient and has systematically decimated everyone that stood in his way. He’s got dedicated and fanatical followers, and had what was probably the most dominant run as Cross-Hemisphere Champion in UGWC history, ending with the title stripped away from him. He’s won a Manical Multiple Massacre Match, he’s won a Towering Inferno Match, and most recently he won Battleground. JC returning recently evokes the imagery of the brutal things that he went through at Tempest’s hands, and underlines that we are all likely stepping into his playground on Monday.
Travis runs his fingers through his hair.
Pierce: And then there is our reigning World Champion. Lucy Wylde is at the apex of her own redemption arc, after having fought her way back to the championship for the second time. Yet somehow, for all her talent and accomplishments, Lucy is still fighting for recognition. One of the most effective competitors in Outlast history, yet never won a tournament. No big Horizons moment to hang her hat on. Despite now being a 2-Time World Champion, not even in the discussion among the best ever. If they had a “Legacy of the World Title” match tomorrow, they’d be looking to include Hastings, Vain, and Roberts. Lucy needs this reign to continue, needs it to be epic and historic, because she’s somehow still an afterthought.
Travis leans forward a bit.
Pierce: We’re all desperate in our own ways. It’s going to make this match that much more dangerous. Lucy is going to bring her refusal to die, Tempest will bring his cruelty, Rydell will bring his rage, and Holden will bring, I dunno, maybe a 3D puzzle or something. The point is, they’ll all be looking to do their worst, but as brutal as that match becomes, it pales in comparison to what’s behind me. It’s nothing compared to what I already know, the brutal truth that I have failed in every way imaginable. That changes now. I’m going to take all of that, all of this pain, all of this darkness, and it’s going to come down on all four of you, so just remember that this time it will be entirely my fault when this truth hurts.
Fade out…
Cartwright: This is the true story of a group of Entertainment Professionals chosen for superiority who work together and have their lives taped to find out what happens when life gets…pierced…The Piercing Life.
Travis is shown in his confessional.
Pierce: Run of the Mill. It’s a match that is all about brutality. An environment designed to purposefully endanger the participants and see who survives. People might think that Travis Pierce is out of his element in that kind of situation. The piercing truth is that I don’t see how it’s any different than anything else. If you’re wondering why I should be here, why is Travis Pierce in this match in 2022, then maybe you need to take a look behind me and see the road that brought me here.
2011
We see archive footage of Travis sitting in the office of the Director of Human Resources, Robert Ooley.
Ooley: I’ve sat back this past year and watched UGWC be all about people like Donut Hamstrings, Peter Damascus, and Alan Pisseragi. I’ve watched Scared run amuck for about the twentieth fucking year in a row or however long it’s fucking been. The face of this company going into the new year is Astro Bummers. Astro. Bummers. I can’t do it anymore. It’s time to take action. We need a new image, something fresh to put forward in front of everyone, with a strong force behind them. It’s going to be you.
Pierce: Me.
Footage is shown of Travis Pierce standing on the stage alongside Gabrielle Montgomery, Johnny Blake, and Duncan Ryder as the Human Resources Department faction.
Pierce: I knew my time was coming. I was hand-picked to be the new face of the company by one of the people that ran it. It was hard to imagine being in a better position than that. What could possibly go wrong?
Cut to the Director of Human Resources, Robert Ooley.
Ooley: Watching his creative process, how he put together an episode of The Piercing Truth, it was impressive how a cohesive broadcast came out of it. The way he finds the “news” they may as well just type gibberish into Google and click “I’m feeling lucky.” That’s the talent that this man has that I recognized at the time, an ability to turn water into wine and squeeze blood from a stone, powered by a charisma unlike any I’d ever seen. And Old Bob is pretty damn personable himself.
Cut back to Travis.
Pierce: And then it happened. Day of Reckoning, 2011. You look that night up and it says that Travis Pierce defeated Jet Somers to win the UGWC World Heavyweight Title. And it’s certainly something over an oversimplification that glazes over the bitter piercing truth of it all, that the match was a Napoleon’s Revenge Match, meaning that Robert Ooley, the man that had selected me to be the next World Champion, was able to manipulate the rules of the match as it went along and make me the actual World Champion.
Cut to Robert Ooley.
Ooley: Ol’ Bob has no problem giving you the ball. Ol’ Bob gives out lots of balls, he just rams them all over the place. But then it’s on your ass to run, and you’d better run or Louis will be right behind you.
Cut back to Travis.
Pierce: So my first title defense, after being essentially gifted the title, we go straight zero to sixty, and it’s a Maniacal Multiple Massacre Match against the Jackal of Jwar Isle, Tyvola. You remember him. Big beard, had an imaginary friend or something.
Cut to an empty confessional.
It’s empty.
A subtitle pops up that reads “Tyvola’s Imaginary Friend.”
Listen close.
That’s how it happened, alright.
Cut back to Travis.
Pierce: And just like that, I’m a one and done champ. A former World Champion, and there isn’t a moment about it that I can truly cling to and say, that’s mine, right there. I mean, at least I do get to say I’m a former UGWC World Champ. That’s something that people like Dave Rydell and Holden Orson can’t say. Tempest can’t say that. But this is where I’ve been lucky, where I’ve been able to spin and slip by. When people talk about the worst champs of all time, they fire right off with Rogan MacLean. You get them to think a little deeper and they pull out Killian King. Rogan took advantage of mayhem at Outlast. Killian cashed in his High Roller rights. But they both did that themselves, on their own. The real worst champ. It’s me.
Travis lowers his head, and his voice softens.
Pierce: It’s me.
2014
Archive footage of Travis Pierce standing behind a podium at a press conference.
Pierce: Good morning. Today marks a pivotal moment in not only my own life and career, but that of the Piercing Media Network as a whole.
Cut to Travis in the confessional.
Pierce: You know, I’ve always thought of myself as a master strategist. How could I be anything less, right? Developer and creative mind behind a massive media empire. Always a step ahead, always prepared, ready to adapt. At least, I used to think so.
Cut back to the 2014 footage.
Pierce: The new Chief Executive Officer of the Piercing Media Network, EDEN MORGAN!
Cut back to the confessional, but Travis is again looking down from the camera. A heavy sigh can be heard before we cut back to the conference, with Eden Morgan now at the podium.
Eden: Thank you, Travis, for the heartfelt introduction, and thank you for having such unshakeable faith in me. You have no idea just what it means to me. This is an amazing opportunity for all of us, and I’m looking forward to the days to come and the changes those days will entail. To those already in, and those considering buying in, let this serve as your reminder: PMN owns you. Let that soak in, and understand every bit that that entails.
Cut back to the confessional.
Pierce: Of course, what it really meant was that Eden owned us. Eden owned me. I gave her control and she took everything away from me, my very identity.
Cut to recent footage of Jet Somers arguing with Travis in his office.
Somers: You haven’t been compelling since you couldn’t use your own name!
Cut back to the confessional.
Pierce: People talk about it now like it’s my greatest triumph. After Eden threw me out of my own company and took away my right to even use the name Pierce, I won Battleground and challenged Eden at Horizons to win it all back, and I did. But what people remember as my great victory I recall as my greatest failure. The master strategist was outmaneuvered. Yeah, I won at Horizons, and I reclaimed my identity. But I should never have lost it to begin with. I should have never put myself in that position. You’ll never see Tempest show up at a show and have to call himself “Cyclone” or something like that. There’s a guy that really is a step ahead, that has his fingers fully wrapped around the strings. Identity is such a critical thing. Red Fusion became Dave Rydell, but he chose that. “The Mainstreamer” Martin Graber now goes by Holden Orson, and whether you buy into the whole split personality thing or whatever, nobody pushed that on him. I didn’t decide to be Trevor Sharp. I got stuck with it, and sure, I persevered. I won back my identity, but that identity could never be the same again.
2019-2020
Pierce: For a long time, even if the in-ring stuff was on the downside, I could find solace in the fact that the Piercing Media Network was the premier source of entertainment in the industry. That all changed when Circle Television came on the scene. The WrestleStock Festival, the event that I’m personally invested in and take great pride in, becomes a special broadcast presentation of Circle Television.
Footage is shown of highlights of the 2019 festival, with a focus on the CTN presentation.
Pierce: And I took that personally. It really hurt, it stung. PMN is supposed to be the entertainment vehicle of UGWC. So that year at Horizons, when I faced Kenzi Grey for the Chaos Title, it wasn’t about the championship for me. It was a matter of pride.
Highlights are shown of Kenzi defeating Pierce at Horizons.
Pierce: And that pride just became another thing stripped away from me. You know, I tried telling myself afterwards, the consequence of losing was that I didn’t win the Chaos Title again, and that’s something I should be okay with. That title takes people, took me, to dark places. It is something I’ve taken credit for, time and again. Travis Pierce, the 4-Time Chaos Champion, greatest champion the division has ever seen. And then UGWC holds a match to determine the legacy of that championship, with its three greatest champions, and who are they?
Pierce: I wasn’t in the discussion. No, at Coalescence, the biggest show in UGWC history, my spot on the card was early in the evening, as the partner of Jet Somers for his retirement match. And yeah, the Piercing Weapons are the greatest cooperative team ever, but I can’t help but wonder, is that all I’ll truly be remembered for? The guy that teamed with Jet a lot?
Now
Pierce: We started this walk through memory lane by asking what it means to witness brutality. The piercing truth is that I’ve been witnessing it first hand my entire career. I joined UGWC as the representative Cross-Hemisphere Champion, but lost it in my first defense. I was hand-picked to be the World Champion, had the title practically handed to me, but lost my first defense and have never won it back. I presented myself as the man with a plan that was on top of it all, and had to win back my company and legacy after I let it get ripped out from under me. That media empire was outshone by Circle Television, and you throw on top of that the past year during which I’ve been upstaged by a guy named Danny Danger. What is brutality? Brutality is looking back at it all and realizing I’ve been little more than a fraud. A sham. King of Charisma? Icon of Entertainment? What a joke.
Travis once again lowers his head, but after a few moments he looks up at the camera with a different glint in his eye.
Pierce: Run of the Mill is a chance to change all that. It’s a chance for me to prove there is more to Travis Pierce after all. The trouble is, I’m not the only person seeking redemption through all this. Dave Rydell and Holden Orson are both career failures who can claim even less success than I can, and while Holden’s appearance might be little more than a stunt, Dave Rydell is a man with everything to prove and nothing left to lose. I can appreciate that. People with nothing left to lose can be extraordinarily dangerous. Just ask Eden Morgan, circa 2014. She faced a man with nothing left to lose at Horizons that year. And here’s the problem for you, Dave. I don’t have anything left to lose now, either.
Travis brings his hands together and rests his chin on them for a moment before continuing.
Pierce: I’m sure a lot of people think this is going to be Tempest’s big moment. Here’s a guy that has been patient and has systematically decimated everyone that stood in his way. He’s got dedicated and fanatical followers, and had what was probably the most dominant run as Cross-Hemisphere Champion in UGWC history, ending with the title stripped away from him. He’s won a Manical Multiple Massacre Match, he’s won a Towering Inferno Match, and most recently he won Battleground. JC returning recently evokes the imagery of the brutal things that he went through at Tempest’s hands, and underlines that we are all likely stepping into his playground on Monday.
Travis runs his fingers through his hair.
Pierce: And then there is our reigning World Champion. Lucy Wylde is at the apex of her own redemption arc, after having fought her way back to the championship for the second time. Yet somehow, for all her talent and accomplishments, Lucy is still fighting for recognition. One of the most effective competitors in Outlast history, yet never won a tournament. No big Horizons moment to hang her hat on. Despite now being a 2-Time World Champion, not even in the discussion among the best ever. If they had a “Legacy of the World Title” match tomorrow, they’d be looking to include Hastings, Vain, and Roberts. Lucy needs this reign to continue, needs it to be epic and historic, because she’s somehow still an afterthought.
Travis leans forward a bit.
Pierce: We’re all desperate in our own ways. It’s going to make this match that much more dangerous. Lucy is going to bring her refusal to die, Tempest will bring his cruelty, Rydell will bring his rage, and Holden will bring, I dunno, maybe a 3D puzzle or something. The point is, they’ll all be looking to do their worst, but as brutal as that match becomes, it pales in comparison to what’s behind me. It’s nothing compared to what I already know, the brutal truth that I have failed in every way imaginable. That changes now. I’m going to take all of that, all of this pain, all of this darkness, and it’s going to come down on all four of you, so just remember that this time it will be entirely my fault when this truth hurts.
Fade out…