When Alex decided to take the dog for a walk in the early hours of the morning, he didn’t expect to find himself pressed to the ground. He didn’t expect the barrel of a gun pressed to his temple, and he didn’t expect to meet new people. He just wanted to clear his head, to enjoy a moment of comfort with his talkative beagle. To give Luna a morning to herself.
Leaving the house, he didn’t have an underlying worry for his life. For his safety. For anything to do with himself. He was going to walk the dog, take the scenic route through the park, and leave the dog with Harrison and Saoirse in preparation for the trip. A suggestion from Harrison himself. It was a good idea. Duchess was familiar with James’ place, having spent a long time there with Adrienne, with James. While they were on the road, it was her home away from. While there were not as many people to play with her ears and throw a ball for her as there once was. It was familiar.
Alex wasn’t his usual hyper alert self today, and that was a mistake it seemed. If he had, he would’ve noticed the car that was following him from a distance. The nondescript Chevy that kept just far enough away that it didn’t seem suspect as it happened to reappear every time he crossed from the park and back to a main road. It was a slow walk, Duchess had to inspect every smell like her life depended on it.
He was strong, but moving an anchored beagle was a task even he didn't have the strength to do effectively. If he had noticed the people, he wasn’t really sure what he would have been able to do anyway. Duchess may have been a hunting breed, but she definitely was not a fighter. He wouldn’t have really been able to move her any faster. She was a rock when she was on a walk.
He didn’t notice them, and so it didn’t matter what he would have done. In a moment of almost inevitable death, it was strange that he felt this… calm. That his mind was going over things he could have noticed, rather than trying to think of a way out of this situation. Instead he was remembering his walk. Maybe that was his own defense mechanism. To think of the peace of it, rather than what would be coming for him.
They had spent a little while sitting in the park, playing with a ball. Throwing it for Duchess, wrestling to get it back from her as she brought it most of the way back but refused to let go. Only throw, no take. It was a fun little game that would have gone far better if she had simply let him take it. That however would not be at all the right way to play, it would seem. Duchess had her own version that took precedence.
She had been good today, stopping to pee on every leaf, rock and tree, but no bowel movements to clean. What should have been a thirty minute walk, ended up being a two hour one. The sun was beginning to creep out and some warmth was beginning to creep in. It was just about to go six, and Alex knew that Harrison was going to be so pleased for the early morning wake-up call. Saoirse didn’t seem the type to get up before noon, so he doubted she’d be the one to greet him. He hoped she liked dogs.
Fumbling for his keys in his pocket, there was that primal sensation finally. The hairs on the back of his neck stood up. Too late. He felt a pair of rough hands, one on the middle of his back, the other on his head. He was slammed into the door. Another set of hands yanked the lead from his hand and threw it to the floor. Duchess, trained well enough, didn’t take off. Instead she started to bark. Loud enough to wake the dead. Hopefully loud enough to wake someone to what was happening.
“I don’t want any trouble. Take what you want, please.” Alex said as firmly as he could. The people however did not seem to care for the placation. They yanked him back aggressively before throwing him to the ground. A knee dropped into his back that knocked the wind from him. The second person straddled his legs. Assumedly the one with their knee in his back, pressed a gun to his temple.
So he remembered the walk, a moment of peace. Tried to relive a happy moment. Tried to be in that moment for as long as he could. Time seemed to be moving incredibly slowly at that moment. He could feel his heart in his throat, but it seemed to be beating far too slow for the terror that was tearing through him right now. He’d been close to death before, but this was a bit beyond even him.
This was true terror.
“Sorry about this, but that fucker took somethin’ from us. So now, we’re gonn’ take somethin’ from ‘im.” One of the men said, his voice muffled, seemingly behind a mask. He noted something of an Irish accent, but he couldn’t be quite sure. Funny how life comes about in roundabouts like that. Everything seemed to slow a bit more. He closed his eyes, and braced for the bullet.
He heard the gunshot.
The strangest thing was how far away it sounded. He expected getting shot at point blank would’ve been deafening in the moment. There was a considerable lack of pain too. Maybe a protection by the brain to stop the moment from being too shocking. Shock was the last thing he was really worried about, but the primal reactions of the body were something else.
Then he noticed the person on his legs slumped away, less pressure on them. Then the person on his back seemingly floated up and away from him. Was this really what death felt like? A fading away from everything. He dared to open his eyes, and suddenly the world rushed back to him.
“Get up you fucking idiot.” Harrison’s rough voice ripped through the early morning air. Alex rolled over and suddenly felt a spurt of wet liquid across his face. Blood by the smell of it. The door to the bar was open, and James was pulling an already limp body inside. Throat cut. Saoirse dragged the body off his legs and in right behind him.
Why the fuck did he make a morning house call?
Coming somewhat to his senses, Alex got himself up and took a look around. An empty, dusky morning street. Duchess had run inside almost immediately after it opened by the looks. Alex saw the gun that had been pressed to his head on the ground and picked it up. Shoving it into the back of his waistband as he followed Harrison in, closing the door behind him.
“First run in with them I take it?” Saoirse said kind of non-chalantly, no longer lugging a dead body but playing with Duchess’ ears. She was a natural it seemed. The adrenaline it seemed was wearing off, and the actual reality of what had just happened was coming to him.
He emptied the contents of his stomach all over the welcome mat.
Classy.
The light patter of rain, the splat of raindrops across a window. A man sitting in a simple wooden rocking chair by the window, his face obscured by a swathe of darkness. A shadow cast by the flickering light of a fireplace. A lingering grasp of a cold winter, refusing to let go. A dreary world, for a dreary story. A large book lay upon the man’s lap, open somewhere in the middle.
“It is funny how life unravels for us all. The days come to pass, and we see all of it fly past us. The villain of yesterday becomes the hero of tomorrow. The actions that lead us to where we stand, they beg for enlightenment. They beg for the light of truth to show them exactly what is necessary to move to the next stage. To overcome our own faults. Winning, and then losing.”
“I won the World Heavyweight Championship, through my own hubris, I lost the World Heavyweight Championship. Eyes on the horizon, looking beyond what lay before me. Twice now, Miles has been the man to upend me. He ended my first reign as Roulette Champion, and though he was unable to stop the stampede of my Internet Championship reign, he got his revenge for that.”
The man turns his face a little, Alexander Raven’s visage revealed. Half swathed still in the flickering shadows. His eyes drawn and tired, his expression softer than usual. A sorrow to the man.
“In what should have been the most important match of the night, the only thing I was meant to be focusing on and my mind was somewhere else. My mind was on the future, my mind was on the ache. My mind was on fucking Brandon Hendrix. A mistake on my half, I won’t contest that. No matter the opinion of those around me, I’ve never had an issue telling the truth. When I make a mistake, and when I am beat. Miles Kasey beat me that night, and I made the mistake of thinking he couldn’t even come close.”
“I’ve been making a lot of mistakes. I nearly lost the championship to LJ. It was only in focus that I was able to win the World Heavyweight Championship. Dubious as the final outcome was, we’ll never know if Carter truly would have escaped the cage. Before that, I was obsessed with the concept. The idea of taking it all away, more than the truth of doing it. It was my mistakes that took me to where I found my struggles.”
“The hardest part of realising you’re wrong, is knowing what steps are next. I don’t really know what is next for Alexander Raven. That is the simple truth. A swansong was the idea planted, but I wonder if I truly deserve that. I built my career on hurting people. Not simply hurting, but ruining them. I have taken every step of the way in blood, fire and pain. Every single action has led to a selfish decision. A narcissist who beggars belief beyond belief. A story told a thousand times, and maybe one that needs an appropriate ending.”
He flicks through a few of the pages, getting closer to the ending of the book. The turns are slow and deliberate. His eyes scanned the tiny print on each page, like he was searching for something. He lowered his head a little, bathing his face in shadow once more, coming to a slow stop.
“I look back on that scared boy who didn’t know what awaited him. The scared boy that had no idea what awaited him. That scared boy who was quickly lured to the quick path. The painful path. The abusive and damning path. The path I knew from my own past. Violence puts the fear into everyone, and in that fear, control. Control and power. That scared boy would be scared no longer. I wasn’t even twenty and I had become World Champion.”
“By twenty-four, I was a two time World Champion. By twenty-four, I thought my career was over. Laid on the ground, and my skull bashed in. A borderline acquired brain injury scenario. I paid for my hubris, tenfold. It was years before I was lured back. A marriage, the self-inflicted death of a friend, the death of said wife. I realised in my time away, that life outside the ring? It hurt just as much as being inside it. Painful, truly.”
“So I came back. To a world that had forgotten me during my sabbatical. To a world that would remind me quite quickly of why it is unforgiving to those of us who struggle and strive. That insidious desire reared its head and it took but a mere moment for it all to come rushing back. Lesson not learnt it would seem. One thing however that would not be forgotten, was the scars that I already wore. The agony that I was already in.”
He slowly closes the book, shaking his head a little. He takes it in his right hand and slides it down the side of the chair, pushing back a little before using the momentum of the chair to push him up onto his feet. Turning his back as he stares out the window, out into the dark and stormy skies.
“It is a story we’ve all heard before. I apologise for always repeating myself, but. Unless we truly understand history, we cannot hope to change the future. Those who do not learn from the past are doomed to repeat it. It is a truth we see constantly before us. It is something that my very own actions brought to light.”
“Miles, you said something that struck a chord with me. You called this my swansong, and that made me wonder. A swansong is an ending, and I do not know if I am ready for an ending. I do not know if at thirty six, I’m really ready to hang it all up. My choices, my actions. They have led me to a body that just won’t heal. That is the simplest way of looking at this. My mind is at odds with my body. A mind that refuses to quit, a body that is held together by hope and string.”
“Swansong, it is poetic. Ask Jack Washington and he would have told you that, an edgy poet with black and white profile pictures. A man who hides behind big words and lies to protect himself. A poet might be apropos in describing me. I wouldn’t go so far myself. The things I’ve said, the things I say. That aren’t designed to be poetic, they aren’t meant to be elusive. I’d hazard I’ve never really said anything of true substance, but that is all part of the allure. Don’t you think, Miles?”
Alex slowly raises a hand and places it on the window. His other hand was digging into his jacket, searching for something. Not a long search it seems, as his hand evidently curls around something. The bulge of his fist evident through the heavy jacket. He leans forward and places his head against the hand on the window.
“I refuse to let this be my swansong, Miles. I may not have much left, but I’m going to use what I have left to right my wrongs. Right them as best I can. I can’t make up for everything, for every poisoned word. I can’t make up for every egregious action, every drop of blood spilt. I cannot make up for shortening Carter’s career in that Three Stages of Hell. I cannot make up for putting a blemish upon the World Championship the way that I did.”
“What I can do is change how I will be remembered. A man hurt, a man scared. A man who fought tooth and nail to achieve what he needed for his legacy. That is what I will be remembered for. The man who would do anything for them. The people out there, the people who come and bay for it. The roaring fans, the children who will look to be in my shoes one day. For every tortured child who thinks there is no escape from the agony of home.”
“My Swansong will not be a beautiful affair. It will not be a wonderful and applauded thing. I have not and will never earn that. I don’t get to make that choice after what I have done to you, to Carter, to Remington, to Ami and Jamilyn. To my own wife, to my friends. To the world that I pushed aside, abused and used to get to the top. I do not get to have the storybook ending.”
He slowly removes his hand from his pocket. A glinting silver flip lighter, and what appears to be a small fire starter block. He grips them tightly in his hand, as he slowly lifts his head from the window. He turns on his heel slowly, reaching down to grab the book, placing it on the seat of the chair, opening it up once more.
“The Raven is a messenger of the dead, of the sleep, of the other worlds. It travels between realms to deliver messages from the departed to the living. To protect those deemed worthy of a journey beyond that which they currently have. Alexander Raven Black, that’s my full name. Rabenschwarz. A family a little too close to the touch of insanity some would say. My family name will die with me. The last of the Rabenschwarz. The last Raven Black.”
“The more I think about it, the less confident I am in that being the truth of who I am. A phoenix is more appropriate I think. Time and time again, I sizzle down. Ember out and smolder. A pile of ashes waiting for a reignition. Waiting for life to be breathed back into me again. Swansong, Ravens, Phoenixes. I seem to be surrounded by imagery of birds. You know the funniest part of that, Miles? I fucking hate birds.”
He grips the edge of a page in the book and tears it out. Then another, and another. Page after page being torn from the book and thrown to the floor. Ten, twenty, thirty pages torn out. More and more, his eyes rapidly scanning back and forth across the words before tearing another, and another and another.
“Redemption, for me, is human. A man seeking to right his wrongs. Yet I am a victim to my own actions. I am a martyr for my own cause. A heart may be found but the mind is still poisoned. The mind is still deluded. I may not seek to ruin all you have, but I still want what it is you took. I want the World Heavyweight Championship back. I want… I need to be the World Heavyweight Champion. Ego, for all it entails, demands it of me.”
“I hate birds, I hate ships. I hold a lot of hate in my life. Part in parcel for the anger. Ego is what drives me for the most part these days. Ego and anger. Hate and anger. Ego and hate. Some would say I have been projecting my own insecurities for a long time now. They aren’t wrong. I mean, I am but essentially an elder millennial emo at heart. I have to keep up appearances.”
“But I also seek to invite ambition. Desire and drive. To be the man that people want to be, to be better than, or to erase. For those who want to be me, I need to show them how far they can go. For those who want to be better than me, I need to show them how far they must climb. For those who want to erase me, I need to show them what is necessary to make them forget about me. Born in flame, a cleansing.”
He throws the book roughly to the floor. Kicking at the chair and knocking it sideways, tumbling it to the floor too. Aggressively stomping on it, breaking it apart. Breaking it in shards and sticks. He drops the fire starter block onto the pile of tinder and paper. His eyes looked toward the fireplace. The flames threw long shadows over the room.
“I’d like to say this isn’t personal for me, Miles. That I am a better man, a stronger man. A man renewed and with clearer vision. Some of that is right. I am trying to be better, I am trying to be stronger. I am trying to see clearer. To see beyond the illusions that my mind has cast for almost two decades now.”
“This is personal for me, Miles. Not in the same, but personal all the same. This is my story of redemption. This is my main character moment. This is where I must make a choice. Make a decision, make a stand. I am sorry that it must come at the cost of your moment. At the cost of what you have strived for. You took the head of the hydra and held it aloft for the world to see. The snake laid dormant for a moment.”
“On the ship, I will show the world that things aren’t always storybooks. That things aren’t always perfect. I have to show them that Alexander Raven was not a winner by desperation, by fallacy. No, Alexander Raven was and will be, Worlds Champion because I fucking fought for it. By tooth and nail, on my final stretch. With a body broken and beaten down, I am still good enough. I am still strong enough. I am still the man who people quiver at the thought of. No Brandon Hendrix will change that. No moment of clarity will absolve that. Miles, I apologise. But I must take back what is mine.”
Alex walks slowly towards the fire, reaching for a poker that sat nearby. Taking it in hand and shoving it roughly into the fire. A flurry of embers flying off as he does. Notably a few rays of sunshine began to streak through the murky dark storm clouds. The rain begins to lighten as the light begins to pierce through. A few beams of light streaming through the rain splattered window.
“I failed before. I have failed many times. I am a failure in the eyes of many, and that is okay. People underestimate failures. People forget how far a failure climbed before they fell. I wear the ring I made, out of some warped sentimentality to myself. But also because my mind casts my own doubts upon me, it also holds onto hope. Hope that I will defeat myself, and be… reignited.”
“Like the inevitable storm, the sun will always come out. That is a universal truth. No matter how dark the night, dawn will break and hope will come back. The world will be warmed once more. The flowers will bloom, and everything, for a moment. Everything is hopeful once more. If the world won’t produce light, then I will do it myself.”
He yanks back the poker and pulls a few of the burning logs from the flames. They roll onto the paper and the tinder and the fire starter. It takes mere moments, before they ignite. The flames low at first, before screaming to life. The room itself takes mere moments before it ignites. A furious inferno engulfing the room, engulfing Alexander Raven.
“I might not want to hurt you anymore. But I am a sucker for theatrics.”
The flames roar and spin. A furious inferno that engulfs everything. Something sizzles and flies from the flames, landing in the only space that seems phobic to the roaring inferno. An ornate ring. The Sin City Wrestling Worlds Heavyweight Championship Number One Contendership ring, as Alexander Raven so eloquently coined it. Among the burning inferno, one point of peace. That stupid ring.
“I’m coming to take back my World Heavyweight Championship.”
As the fire rages, smoke fills the room. Black smoke that has nowhere to escape to. The room filled with the black smoke, obscuring even the flames in its blanket of darkness.
And then…
Nothing.
