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Post by Star Stormz on Mar 19, 2022 14:12:27 GMT -5
PWS: APEX Tuesday Night Riot Tuesday, March 29 Climate Pledge Arena - Seattle, WashingtonFatal 4-Way MatchAce Sky vs. Dylan Howell vs. Dawn Warren vs. Devon RyderRoleplay deadline will be Sunday, March 27 at midnight eastern. 1 rp each, 300 word minimum, 5000 word maximum.
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dawn
Full-Time Member
Posts: 16
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Post by dawn on Mar 27, 2022 21:39:44 GMT -5
It has been a long time since I have honestly had the opportunity to stand in front of all of you and share my heart. I have been going through a lot as of lately and I just want to say that it actually feels really good to be able to step into the ring again.
My family has been torn apart since I have been able to speak to you all. I don’t know what to even think anymore. I love my brother Teddy so much but the worst thing to happen was seeing my brother and Kate Steele divorce from one another.
I never wanted things to go down the way they did but I have never seen my brother so depressed and at the same time I really don’t know how I should feel knowing that Kate isn’t in my life anymore. She has helped my life out in so many ways and I feel so lost without her being there for me.
So now the question that is left to be answered is what is going to happen when I go into the wrestling ring and be forced to wrestle with all of this stuff on my mind. I know it’s a lot to think about but I have to be ready. It’s in my blood and I can’t show any sign of weakness. After all Scrappy Doo would have been a badass and he would put his fists up and be ready for a fight, so why can’t I go about and do the exact same thing?!
I am tough and I am in a good place to finally wrestle for the right reasons. It’s not like it matters anyway. I am ready to just do what I do best. To the other three in this match you better bring it because I know I am.
PWS yours truly returns and I am so excited for what’s about to happen.
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Post by Jonathan Sanders on Mar 27, 2022 22:59:31 GMT -5
“I almost asked them to remove me from this match.”
*Fade in. Devon Ryder stands by the doorway to the arena, gazing out into the Seattle night sky.*
“When PWS management texted me and informed me that I was booked, when they showed me the tentative card and I saw I was in ANOTHER four-way match, I nearly backed out. And this is not ordinarily who I am. I’ve never been one to shy away from competition; Devon Ryder does not back down from a fight! …And yet, I found myself…anxious. Unenthused to step back into the ring and potentially suffer another high-profile loss as I did in my previous outing. I was not SCARED, but simply…apathetic. Unmotivated. Like the fire that drives me to perform and to compete had petered out. I felt so GONE, and for a while, I really didn’t know why. I questioned whether it was ME. Had I lost my edge? My drive? Was it finally time to consider…hanging up the boots?"
*He turns, now, to glare into the camera.*
"No."
*Ryder's brow furrows.*
"I will not give in to trepidation. I will not give up, because I have WON this fight before.”
*A pause, and his expression softens. As he speaks, he makes his way towards the merch table, where vendors are getting ready for the show.*
“See, not many of you will know this about me, but I struggle with anxiety. With feeling inadequate. I may not make it a core feature of my personality like Jonathan Sanders, but I know this battle well. All of THIS?”
*Devon motions broadly at his jacket, and the PWS merchandise laid out on the table next to him.*
“The ‘Canadian Hero’? This arrogance I project? This constant air of self-assured superiority? I won’t say that it’s unearned…but it’s a coping mechanism. It’s always been intended to reassure ME of my competence more than anyone else. But it doesn’t always work. We can only play the part so long before the facade starts to fade, and reality gets to us again. And I am not invincible. I got…overwhelmed. I let myself delve too deep, and everything piled up. It started with Cleo Phillips. My fatal mistake, when I had her arrested - an action I have come to regret ever since. I thought I’d moved past it, but…I kept stewing on what I’d done. Turning it over and over in my head, trying to reconcile that horrible act with my self-perception as a hero. It planted the seed of doubt that germinated and took root in the soils of anxiety and grew into a terrible, withering tree of lethargy that sapped my willpower and caused me to lose focus. I stopped believing in myself, and our match did not become all that it deserved to be. But I would have pulled through; I have been through these thoughts before, and I have always prevailed. However, then something entirely DIFFERENT happened…”
*Another pause, and Devon seems wistful, almost sad.*
“I am sure that, by now, most of you will have heard about the so-called ‘Canadian Freedom Convoy’ that rolled through Ottawa - my hometown - in the vain hope of overturning the current Canadian government and bullying our political officers into allowing them to risk their health and the safety of those around them because ‘ooooh, needles are SCAAA-WY!’.”
*The sarcasm DRIPS from Devon’s voice during this line, the Canadian’s tone far more bitter and vindictive than we have ever heard it.
“These separatist, seditionist ASSHOLES - backed by oil billionaires and far-right fringe leaders - DEFILED our nation’s capital, they blockaded city streets, defaced national monuments with actual Nazi iconography, and worse yet, many of our Conservative politicians called them HEROES!”
*Ryder pauses again, his breath ragged after such an impassioned rant, then slowly inhales, shutting his eyes as he allows his posture to relax. When his blue eyes open again they’re thoughtful, introspective, and tinged with a pang of far-off, ephemeral sorrow.*
“It reads like a headline out of the United States. I pray we never suffer anything like the January Sixth capitol riots…but this may well be the closest that we get. It devastated me to watch this happen on our own soil. To watch this country I so dearly love, this beacon of hope and progress in the Western world, AGAINST the tide of fascist isolationism swelling in the United States, come so close to becoming a mirror of the dumpster-fire we are shackled to. It truly broke my heart. I couldn’t grapple with this! How could I cast myself as a Hero - how could I LEAD BY EXAMPLE - when THIS was the example that my homeland set? So I felt…lost. Broken. Disillusioned by my country and bereft of any purpose. But then I started to think.”
“Why had Canada gone down this path? HOW did any of this happen? How did this GREAT country - once a bastion of rational thought and progressive, idealistic democracy - fall so far in such a short time?”
*Devon pauses, lips curling into a smirk as he gazes down the camera lens.*
“The answer is simple: the United States of America.”
“See, this convoy may have been ORGANIZED by Canadian right-wing populists and Western separatist grifters, but the truth is, most of its MONEY came from here. Our regressive Southern neighbours. Early in the convoy’s life-cycle, a GoFundMe page was started - ostensibly it was to provide food and shelter for those partaking in this fundamental assault on Canadian democracy, but in truth it was little more than a grift to benefit those at the top. But who were the prominent backers of this project? Who, above all others, donated to this cause in SPADES?”
“I don’t think you need me to tell you that answer, but I will anyway. It was U.S. citizens. Your prominent alt-right talking heads like Ben Shapiro, Dan Bongino, and the same people who donated to the campaign of the modern-day Adolf himself: Donald Trump. In fact, while no data was ever released for the GoFundMe campaign specifically, the website ‘GiveSendGo’, who ALSO had a campaign running to support these protests, was hacked in February and revealed that over 55 percent of their donations came from donors living in the United States. YOU did this to us. The same corrosive influence that has poisoned your political discourse, that causes you to MURDER each other over things like race, gender identity and sexual orientation, the VIRUS that is American Exceptionalism…finally infected us, too.”
*A pause. The smirk is gone.*
“It was YOUR talking heads who spoke so highly of these convoy protests! It was YOUR political leaders who emboldened them to act this way! YOU fomented hatred and division in the right-wing of our society, YOU told racists, homophobes, bigots and actual god damned NAZIS that it was okay to open their awful, hate-filled mouths! You inspired this violent dissent through YOUR example…and by selling us the lie of the ‘American Dream.’ Freedom at all costs, and nothing can be more important.”
“That was undoubtedly the biggest earworm festering in the heads of the disenfranchised but vocal minority who organized and perpetrated these protests. Disillusioned, angry, LOST people who felt powerless in a rapidly-changing world and clung to radicalization because it gave them some sense of power…they chased the American Dream because they thought it would make them happy. They fell for the deception that it was ‘socialism’ who caused all that ails them, that if they could just make everyone live ‘properly’ the world would be a better place; these sad, unfortunate souls miss the bitter reality that the system they think they’re fighting for WANTS them to feel this way. It NEEDS them to be angry, to be unhappy, and those in power do nothing to stop it because people are easier to CONTROL if left untreated. Think about it: a happy and mentally-healthy populace is a populace that's far less susceptible to manipulation; how can you make them buy your miracle cure if there's nothing ailing them? If they're self-actualized and free of anxiety, how can you play on their FOMO to sell them another cell phone they don't need? Or, for that matter, if they are happy as they are and accept themselves and their situation...how can you make them work for you? How can you sell them on a better life if they just try a little harder, if they just put in more hours and sell a little more? How can you convince them things would be better under your unquestioned dictatorship if they’re already happy under their DEMOCRACY? Poor mental health drives the American capitalist system…and that system not only creates misery, but FEEDS on it as well. Fascist corporatism causes human suffering because it requires human suffering to survive! The American Dream isn't just a lie...it's a fucking marketing gimmick. And these idiots bought it wholesale.”
*Devon pauses again, inhaling to calm himself down.*
“But I can’t get my hands on the organizers or perpetrators of the Canadian Freedom Convoy protests. I can’t break the ankles of American influence in our politics. What I CAN do is lead by example…but that’s not what I am going to do tonight. Because I am a Hero…but I am still a human being. I have flaws, I have feelings…and tonight, I am very, VERY angry. So I agreed to this match because I need an outlet for that rage. Somewhere I can PUT all this confusion and frustration that I need to work through to get back to being the Canadian Hero that I was before! I am truly sorry for Dawn Warren and Ace Sky, because you will BE those targets tonight. You will help me work through all this anger, to clear my head in the way that I do best, the ONLY way that I know how; through pure, unabashed professional-wrestling brutality. You do not deserve what I will do to you tonight, and I really hope you know it’s nothing personal. I LIKE you, Dawn Warren; you come from a reasonably-progressive state that I do not loathe to visit, you are a pure and wonderful young woman with a VERY bright future ahead of you…but you’re simply in the wrong place tonight. And I am sorry. If I could give you one piece of unsolicited advice, it would be to stay out of my way as best you can and let Ace Sky take the brunt of this beating; he comes from Houston, Texas, so given the US’s track record so far this year, he should be WELL accustomed to violence by now. Aren’t you, Ace?”
*He pauses again, a serious expression crossing his face.*
“I admit I don’t know much about you. I’ve seen some of your work, you seem to be a perfectly fine professional wrestler…but FINE is insufficient against Devon Fucking Ryder. I am THE Professional Wrestler, Ace - the single greatest thing to happen to this sport since David Shane himself. You cannot hope to stand against me on my WORST night, let ALONE when I have so much rage and doomscrolling-fuelled aggression to work through. You are NOT in for a good show tonight, Ace, so PLEASE - PLEASE heed my words when I ask of you - just tap out.”
*Ryder pauses, flashing his signature arrogant smirk into the camera.*
“The sooner you give in, the sooner it can be over.”
*With that, the Canadian Hero pulls on his jacket and pivots on his heel, The Guess Who’s “American Woman” starting up to play him off as he swaggers off towards gorilla.*
*Fade out.*
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