Date of RP: 5-11-03
Location:
Pittsburgh
Current Record: 6-2-1
Accomplishments: 2X ASW TV Champion
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- "Obstacles
cannot crush me. Every obstacle yields to stern resolve. He who is fixed
to a star does not change his mind."
- --Leonardo DaVinci, Notebooks
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~~Rain
patters on an empty street, washing the cares and sorrows of the city
down the sewers with the rest of the garbage and refuse that litters the
"hallowed" streets, and we find ourselves outside the light of a
streetlamp, peering out from the darkness of a back-alley safe-haven.
It's a calm night and, like the passerbys on the street, the stars
are non-existant. Just the soft whispers of a city sleeping, the
music of nature barely holding on, and the murmurs of the Gods.
Laughter...the sounds of a gutteral, primal laughter...something out of
the darkest jungles of Africa or the coldest wastes of Anartica.
Beyond a pile of boxes...a heaping mess of rotting cardboard and
broken boards...leaning against a dumpster we find the figure of a man,
haunched over and laughing at the ground. The rain patters the
alley, matting the man's long hair. His sleeveless t-shirt is
soaked clear through, and his pants are wet to mid-thigh. Studded
wristbands glint steel in the glow of the street.
The man pauses, cocks his head at the camera, giving us the glint of a
rabid animal...eyes staring straight forward with hysteria and rage.
The man chuckles to himself, slowly standing to face the camera.
He stops again, grabs the near-by dumpster, and then slams it into the
wall, crumbling stone blocks and denting the rusted and garbage-stained
portly red rubbish bin. He turns back to the camera, looking at it
and pacing around it, slowly, as if he were circling for the kill.
As the figure steps into the light, we see it is the face of Mike
MacDougan, wet and maddened.
He slowly speaks to the camera while squinting at it...and still
circling it.~~
MIKE: It
wasn't enough, was it? It wasn't enough to be "Simply Magic" Mike
Mac-D...it wasn't enough to be someone with flair...with style...with
attitude. With ego. With...with...with.
~~He pauses again, squinting harder
at the camera. Slowly he approaches it, haunched over and looking
into the lens. At about 2 feet from the camera, he holds his
finger up to the lens, glances around, and then looks back to the
camera, whispering.~~
MIKE: With so much more to offer.
~~Mike shakes his head in shame,
dropping it to look at the ground. He quickly and violently swings
around and runs to the dangling end of a fire escape, jumps into the air
and grabs it, and slowly swings down on it, bringing it towards the
ground as rusted metal and stiff joints grind themselves into
functioning again. He speaks over his shoulder as he swings down.~~
MIKE: Mike went on vacation all last
month...a little time to clear his head and get his body in gear...get
his body to work like he wanted it to work. It got rusty. It
got soft without the agony and torture he put it through day to day in
the ring...he failed because he wasn't persistant...he failed because
he's not perfect-
~~The fire escape crunches to a
halt on the pavement. Mike looks to the camera.~~
MIKE: Because he wasn't perfect. Because he
wasn't me.
~~He grins, and then begins to
climb the ladder, rung over rung, slipping a little on the slickness the
rain has provided.~~
MIKE: But he realized something...the
only way he was going to get back to where he was...where he was
accelerated...where he completed the circle and stood as a giant among
men...the only way he was going to get it all back was to change...to
become that which can get it all back. That which can find a way
to fight back. He decided to call in a little friend he met back
at Bellview...I was close personal friends with him in that sterile
white hell. From time to time, I was his only friend. The
only one that would listen.
~~He pauses at the second floor and
looks out over the alley, and then turns back to the camera still on the
ground.~~
MIKE: I was the only one who cared.
Pops? He had his own problems...he didn't have the time or
the patience...but he knew. Oh, he knew.
~~He grits his teeth and begins
climbing the fire escape again, yelling over his shoulder.~~
MIKE: I heard all about it...day in and
day out. That was then...this is now. This is the next
evolution...this is the new and improved Mike MacDougan...this isn't
Mike MacDougan, though...Mike is away for the time being. He's
still here...he's still willing to compete...but it's time to put away
childish things. It's time to get my head in the game and focus on
the prize. I want only one thing...one tiny thing...
~~He reaches the third floor and
looks out over the alley again. He leans over the railing and
yells to the camera. ~~
MIKE: To make the world know I
am the best. I don't want to show the world, I don't want to bring
in all my rage and all my anger to show and tell. No, no, no...I
don't want that. I want to make
the world know. Not see it...but feel it. I want the world
to know that being Mike MacDougan..."Simply Magic"...wasn't simple.
It was downright complicated. I got sick of that shit...I
told Mike to step aside. I told Mike to let me handle things.
I told Mike it was time for Tacit to pay a visit to the ASW.
~~Someone across the street yells
at Mike to shut up. He looks up, grins, and then begins to climb
the fire escape again. He pauses about halfway up to yell back to
the camera.~~
TACIT:
They
always said that his old man was unhinged...that he often had trouble
distinguishing between "KMD" and "The Berserker". Primal...simply
beastly and ghastly in nature...prone to mistakes at the drop of a pin.
Didn't matter much, though, he'd destroy everything in his path
anyway. They said that it was heriditary. Drusilla...Mike's
aunt...Krev's sister...the wife of Bryan Tann...she had it. She
often forget where she was, often fell into a stage of child-like wonder
at the most disturbing of images. That was truly an interesting
pair...the pale as the moon Ophelia with the Ticking Time Bomb.
Throw the snarling missing link into the package and you got
hollidays to remember.
~~He continues to climb up the fire
escape, stopping after only a step or two to turn around to the camera.~~
TACIT:
But don't
worry...I'm stable. I like to think of myself as the better half.
The Evolved half. Mike hesitated too much...Mike never could
just let his body go and do what it wanted to do...he always asked too
much of his body. He always wanted too much control. I say
screw the control...let the body do what it wants to do. I trust
it...I'm a part of it. The body's natural insinct is to survive,
and it won't let my mind wander alone. Zen fighting and all that
crap.
~~Tacit climbs again, coming upon
the 4th floor and looking out again. He grins at the camera, and
then turns around to continue his climb. He yells over his
shoulder as he disappears into the darkness of the higher realms of the
escape.~~
TACIT:
It'll be
OK...I hate everyone equally. You're all going to learn to hate me
too. It'll be fun...it'll be a learning experience to remember.
Just don't forget to mark your calendars...Tacit is coming to a
division near you...
~~And, somewhere off in the
distance...off in the darkness tens of yards into the night sky...we
hear the whistling of a lone man...an evolved man...looking out at the
world finally after being cooped up in a repressed little shell for so
long. We hear the song of a man who is going to do things his way,
all the way. Love him or hate him, we hear the song of a man
fading into the darkness of a blank screen.
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"I'm an evolved being because I'm stronger,
I'm faster, and I'm smarter. I am the ultimate fighting
machine...trained metal on metal, in the streets, and in the gym.
I have prepared since I was 6 to take my father's place, and
finally it is mine. I have not trained this long and this hard to
allow a lesser being to take that away from me. I am evolved, and
I will make all of them learn that fact."
--Mike MacDougan
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