Post by Danjon no Unmei on May 1, 2019 15:47:38 GMT -5
Note: Re-posting this role play from another site because of the character development aspects pertaining to the Tiger Mask Undead character featured in GRIM's RPs. Leaving it in its original form, so ignore the actual RP aspects of the post (fyi, I lost the match 
).
"Anything dead coming back to life hurts."
-Toni Morrision
November 9, 2018
Somewhere in Canada...
A lone figure all in black stands watch on a night void of starlight. The hooting of an owl startles him and he jumps. Pulling his gun from his pocket, he spins all around, his breath heavy revealing the sense of dreading building inside of him. Near by a second figures stands waist deep in a hole which he has been digging for the past half hour. He puts the shovel down and tosses a rock at his companion.
"What the hell is rock with you, eh," he hissed, "Put that damn thing away! Stupid hoser, no one's within ten klicks of here."
"Shove off, eh," his companion replies, putting the gun back in his pocket. He looks around and shivers before adding, "This place gives me the creeps. Why would anyone wanna bury something all the way out here, eh?"
The man in the hole shrugs his shoulders. He's too cold to answer, so he goes back to digging. Much like his companion, he too feels nervous about being out here, not that he would dare to let that hoser that. All he wanted to do was finish this job and get back to the truck. The two-four in the back seat should be cold by now and he could really go for a Labatt's Blue right now.
His shovel hit something solid and let out a load "thunk" sound. Both men froze for a moment and looked at one another. Quickly, the man in the hole began to dig faster, tossing soil in all directions. After several more minutes he bent down and with a grunt lifted a small wooden box. He dropped it on the ground beside him and wiped his brow.
The man standing watch walked over and kicked the box with the edge of his toe.
"What do you think is in there, eh," he asked.
The other man climbed out of the hole and shrugged his shoulders.
"No clue, but whatever it is, the boss wants it pretty bad, eh."
He bent down to grabbed his shovel. When he turned around he saw his companion trying to pry the box open. He quickly cuffed him behind the ear and grabbed him by the collar.
"You stupid hoser, the boss said not to open it."
"Get bent, you damn keener," his companion said as he rubbed the side of his head, "I just wanted to take a quick look."
"Well don't even think about it, eh," the man said, tossing the shovel to his companion. He picked the box up and and motioned to the other, "Come on, hoser, lets go."
He hadn't taken three steps before his companion clocked him over the head with his own shovel and he dropped to the ground in a heap.
"Who's the stupid hoser now, eh," the man said throwing the shovel aside.
He tossed the shovel aside and grabbed the box. I his hurry, he didn't realize his gun fell from his pocket. Quickly, he ran back to the truck and put the box down on the tailgate. Reaching into the truck he grabbed one of his buddy's beers and a crowbar lying on the back seat. He took a long drink before setting it down.
"Now to see what all the fuss is about," he muttered, jamming the crowbar under the box's lid and prying it open.
The lid popped off with some effort and landed with a bang in the truck bed. The man frowned as he looked inside the box. He reached in and pulled the contents out. A red tiger mask.
"What the..."
The load bang cut his words short and he fell to the ground, dead. The other man quickly rushed over and tossed the gun into the back of the truck. He saw the mask lying in his former compatriot's hand and cursed.
"Stupid hoser, I told you not to open that box!"
***
A few days later. Somewhere else...
The truck pulled up alongside an abandoned warehouse. The man hoped out, causing beer cans to spill to the ground. He grabbed the box and quickly hurried inside. The place appeared abandoned, but the man wasn't fooled. He knew there were eyes on him the moment he was five klicks from here. Walking quickly through the building, he headed to the basement and down a dark hall. He knocked on the metal door at the end and was ushered in.
A group of masked men swarmed him as he entered, checking him from head to toe for weapons, spy equipment and judging by how one of them frisked him, to see if he had wiped himself correctly. He was quickly relieved of the gun he had taken from his former companion, as well as the box. The latter of which was taken a cross the room and placed in the hands of the individual they all answer, Esior the Necromancer.
"Good to see you, Douglas," Esior said, lifting the box up to take a closer look at it, "Did you have any problems retrieving this item for me?"
"Douglas" shrugged his shoulders and looked around, feeling suddenly very nervous.
"Yeah there was a bit of trouble, but I took care of it, eh?"
"Where's Robert," the masked wizard asked.
"He was the trouble. Stupid hoser!"
"Yes," Esior replied, further inspecting the box, "stupid indeed. I take it you made sure to end our business arrangement with him?"
Douglas nodded.
"Yeah, had to shoot him. I got his body wrapped up in a blanket in the back of the truck outside."
"Excellent," Esior replied.
He snapped his fingers and pointed at a quartet of his followers.
"Go retrieve the body. Where he failed me in life, he might still serve me in death."
The four masked me scurried off to get the body and Douglas shivered. Robert, or “Bobby” as he called him, might have been a fool but if what he had heard about Esior and his experiments was right, he didn't deserve what was going to happen to his remains. He shivered again and slowly backed his way towards the exit.
“Well if we’re done here,” he said, eyeing the door, “I’ve got a long way to get back to Ball’s Falls and a full Mickey waiting for me in the truck, eh. So if you could just pay me what I’m owed, I’ll…”
Words left him as a stretcher was suddenly rolled in and the corpse lying on it wasn’t Robert’s. Douglas blanched as the body was rolled past him and he gasped in sudden recognition. He knew that poor hoser, it couldn’t possibly him. He had just watched him wrestle a few weeks ago on television.
“Hey, isn’t that E…”
“Douglas, why is the box cracked?”
Douglas swallowed hard. This was the very question he was hoping to avoid. He had tried his best to glue the box back together with the hopes that the wizard wouldn’t notice until he hit the Great Lakes.
“See, ah, Robert hit me with the shovel, eh. The dumb hoser popped the lid off with…”
“Did you see what inside the box, Douglas?”
A lump formed in his throat.
“Well, Bobby pulled it out of the box before I could stop him,eh.”
“So you did see it?”
This question seemed to catch attention of everyone in room. The eyes of every masked person suddenly turned to him and he felt his chance of escape slipping away. He tried to backup a step but felt the cold, unfeeling hands of one of Esior’s followers grab him by the shoulder. He begun looking around, frantic for a way out of this.
“Answer me, Douglas!”
“I had to put it back in the box, eh. It’s not like I had a choice, eh? If Bobby hadn’t been such a stupid hoser…”
Esior lifted a finger in the air, silencing him.
“It would appear you were just as much a ‘hoser’ as Robert was. I’m sorry, Douglas, but I fear this error on your part ends our business relationship. Needn’t you fear though, were you failed me in this life, you too will serve me in death.”
Esior snapped his fingers and all his followers swarmed Douglas within seconds. Douglas tried to scream up but hands came from every direction, cupping his mouth and squeezing his throat. He fought hard to free himself but slowly felt his life being smothered from his body.
***
Esior watched as his followers quickly and quietly brought Douglas’s life to an end. Such a pity, Douglas had been useful but he really couldn’t tolerate such incompetence. If his work didn’t require him that he refrain from bringing more attention upon himself than necessary, he would simply send his minions out to “collect”.
Speaking of which, perhaps it was time to call them off. He snapped his fingers and all eyes turned to him.
“That’s enough, we don’t want him bruised.”
His masked followers stopped their assault. Esior instructed them to take the body they had first brought and put it into a table. Douglas was then loaded up on the same stretcher just in time for Robert’s remains to be carried in.
“Take them both away,” Esior instructed them, “I shall deal them later. For now though, I have other more important tasks to complete.”
He barely noticed as the bodies were rolled away. His attention was turned back to the box. Esior opened it and pulled out the mask, holding it up to the light for closer examination. Satisfied, he turned to the corpse behind him and put the mask on him. He took a step back and admired his handiwork.
“At last, Tiger Mask Red, you are mine!”
***
{Static}
“Greetings, Mr. Saint. Allow me to introduce myself.”
The screen came into focus, and a masked figure’s face filled the screen.
“My name is Esior, but you and everyone else may refer to me as The Necromancer. For more years than you have walked this earth I have been searching for the perfect vessel to focus my power through. A creature of such power and might, that I might show the word what I am truly capable of and I believe I have found just such a vessel right here.”
The camera pulls back. A hooded figure is strapped upright to a table, lifeless, much like Frankenstein’s monster. His chest is covered with stitches, as if it had recently been opened up, only to be sewn shut again. Esior rubs the man’s head as he continues to speak.
“When last this one was seen, he was a broken man. Abandoned by those he called ‘good brothers’. He was cast aside, discarded, nothing more than a joke, while those who benefited from him the most moved along as if he never existed. In fact he was more than merely forgotten, he was left for dead.”
With an air of showmanship, The Necromancer pulled off the hood to reveal the man was in fact Tiger Mask Red. His flesh was a sickly color and and his beard tattered and mangy. As Esior held his head up it was clear there was no life in those dead eyes of his, leaving the viewers to wonder how long had he been dead and what had been the cause.
The Necromancer laughed as he let TMR’s head drop and patted him in an almost condescending fashion.
“Pathetic, isn’t he, Mr. Saint. To think that he was once a former World Champion, both feared and respected throughout the world. He was even named the first ever Hall of Fame inductee for Guerreros of Lucha despite accomplishing anything of any merit there whatsoever. Now he’s little more than a piece of meat, bound to a slab, pulled from the cold embrace of the earth and at my mercy.”
The Necromancer lifts TMR’s head once more and turns it to the camera.
“This is who you were scheduled to face in comedically inspired ‘Orange Soda Deathmatch’. I’m not sure about you, but I don’t like his chances of success right now. Well, not in this state anyway.”
He snaps his fingers and two masked men, dressed all in black, come in. They assist Esior to remove his cape and one produces a bowl of black liquid. The Necromancer dips his finger into the bowl and starts writing with it on a long piece of paper. While he does, he begins to chant in some ancient, forgotten language. Once he’s done writing, he picks up the paper and places it on TMR’s chest, stabbing him with a pin to secure the paper in place. Esior turns to the camera and cocks his head to the side.
“Now observe.”
He places both hands upon TMR’s head and begins to chant once more in the ancient language. Nothing appears to happen at first, but then the body begins to convulse and rithe. TMR begins to thrash against the bond that hold him. His mouth opens and smoke seeps from his lips. His head rises and the viewers see his eyes have turned pitch black. If this all didn’t seem weird enough, he begins to scream out yelling nonsense.
“WsjsHekheAknkdneTashdosIafhaskhShsaofhakTsjajHosihoishcIhalckslS?ToshflHjaksjEssfaljPshdakAshckshIdhdN!”
Tiger Mask Red begins to thrash ever harder against the restraints and you can hear the wooden slab his bound to begin to crack from his monstrous effort.
“RosakfEsakshLsakfEdlskAszdkhzSshflaksEishaohfaMlfasflakE!sdkahTaskhfalkshHalskhfaenEvzdnvPasnvalkslkAsnvalkIalksfnalnN!”
The Necromancer’s masked assistants rush forward to subdue him, but TMR’s right hand breaks free from the restraint and he grabs one of them by the throat. When the other tries to interviene, Tiger manages to break his other hand free and grabs him by the throat as well. From off camera several more masked men rush and we hear TMR roaring as they try to prevent his escape.
Esior the Necromancer’s hand reaches out and he pulls the view of the camera away from the scene and back upon himself.
“You see what I’ve done, Mr. Saint. I have brought that pathetic creature back. No longer will be be called Tiger Mask Red. That was the name of a mortal man, who outlived his purpose and was put down like all wounded animals must be. No, what you saw there is something different, something more powerful. You cannot be brought back from the otherside and returned the same. He is filled with dark magic and an insatiable desire for pain and destruction. I…”
“IjfheowkfhoWhsoaklhsIsakshLhsakhsLskalfhkYknlasncaOjkajsbakjU!”
Esior is suddenly knocked out of view of the camera by the flying body of one of his followers. Tiger limps into view, covered in blood. He’s about to go after the man who revived him but once more is set upon by what can be safely assumed, the few remaining surviving assistants. They manage to hold him long enough for Esior to get back to his feet. He touches Tiger on the forehead and he suddenly goes still.
“Did you see that, Mr.Saint,” Esior asks, “Did you see the power of my monster? Did you see the savagery with which he attacks? Now imagine when I point him in your direction. Imagine when all the animalistic rage that his boiling up inside him in centered on you. All that anger, all that confusion, all that pain he feels, it will bubble up inside him and I will paint a bullseye target on you in his mind.”
Even the mask he wears cannot hide the surprise he felt from the attack, but he’s recovered quickly and brushes himself off as if nothing happened.
“So let me ask you something, Mr. Saint. What are you going to do against a man, no, scratch that. What are you going to do when you stand across the ring from a monster, whose only goal is your destruction? What are you going to do against someone who doesn’t feel pain the way a living person feels pain and has absolutely no fear? What are you going to do when you stand across the ring against something that is both so much less and so much more than a human being and you realize that nothing you can do will stop him from coming for you?
“When this match was signed, the matchmakers created it as a joke at his expense because the color of his hair. What will occur will be anything but a joke. My monster will bury you at sea in the very orange pop that this match was designed around and will leave you floating face down on his way to gain the one prize in death he could not obtain in life, the Rey de Reyes Championship. No one will stop this from finally happen and you perhaps take solace in knowing what what my monster does to you will pale in comparison to what’s to come.”
Esior turns and looks on as TMR is strapped into a glass casket by this remaining followers and the lid shut tightly. The camera picks up the mangled remains of the others lying about. The Necromancer looks back at the camera and concludes his speech.
“I hope you enjoy your last few days on Earth, Mr. Saint. If there is anyone whom you love, I suggest you kiss them goodbye, for once you enter that ring, you soul belongs to me and your body will be torn apart by Tiger Mask Undead.”
The camera goes black.
{Static}
***
At home in Guelph, Ontario, a couple sits on their couch watching television. Neither of them say a word as this video ends and their screen goes black. After a few minutes the wife turns to her husband.
“Well that was interesting,” she says.
The husband merely nods his head. He sits back and runs his hands through his hair. Undeterred, the wife continues talking.
“Do you think that was all real? I mean, bringing him back from the dead like that and him butchering everyone.”
“Maybe,” the husband replies.
The wife lets out a long sigh and gets up from the couch.
“Is that all you’ve got to say,” she asks, “‘Maybe.’”
He shrugs his shoulders.
“You and I have seen some pretty weird shit. Six foot tall wooden dolls that can wrestle. Space aliens. A wrestling bear that can use Twitter. I don’t give a damn whether he’s dead or not though.”
“So what do you care about then,” his wife asks.
“Two things, Charlie. Number one, how the fuck did they find my mask? And number two,” Eli Buchanan says, standing up and turning the television off, “how the fuck is there two of me?”
)."Anything dead coming back to life hurts."
-Toni Morrision
November 9, 2018
Somewhere in Canada...
A lone figure all in black stands watch on a night void of starlight. The hooting of an owl startles him and he jumps. Pulling his gun from his pocket, he spins all around, his breath heavy revealing the sense of dreading building inside of him. Near by a second figures stands waist deep in a hole which he has been digging for the past half hour. He puts the shovel down and tosses a rock at his companion.
"What the hell is rock with you, eh," he hissed, "Put that damn thing away! Stupid hoser, no one's within ten klicks of here."
"Shove off, eh," his companion replies, putting the gun back in his pocket. He looks around and shivers before adding, "This place gives me the creeps. Why would anyone wanna bury something all the way out here, eh?"
The man in the hole shrugs his shoulders. He's too cold to answer, so he goes back to digging. Much like his companion, he too feels nervous about being out here, not that he would dare to let that hoser that. All he wanted to do was finish this job and get back to the truck. The two-four in the back seat should be cold by now and he could really go for a Labatt's Blue right now.
His shovel hit something solid and let out a load "thunk" sound. Both men froze for a moment and looked at one another. Quickly, the man in the hole began to dig faster, tossing soil in all directions. After several more minutes he bent down and with a grunt lifted a small wooden box. He dropped it on the ground beside him and wiped his brow.
The man standing watch walked over and kicked the box with the edge of his toe.
"What do you think is in there, eh," he asked.
The other man climbed out of the hole and shrugged his shoulders.
"No clue, but whatever it is, the boss wants it pretty bad, eh."
He bent down to grabbed his shovel. When he turned around he saw his companion trying to pry the box open. He quickly cuffed him behind the ear and grabbed him by the collar.
"You stupid hoser, the boss said not to open it."
"Get bent, you damn keener," his companion said as he rubbed the side of his head, "I just wanted to take a quick look."
"Well don't even think about it, eh," the man said, tossing the shovel to his companion. He picked the box up and and motioned to the other, "Come on, hoser, lets go."
He hadn't taken three steps before his companion clocked him over the head with his own shovel and he dropped to the ground in a heap.
"Who's the stupid hoser now, eh," the man said throwing the shovel aside.
He tossed the shovel aside and grabbed the box. I his hurry, he didn't realize his gun fell from his pocket. Quickly, he ran back to the truck and put the box down on the tailgate. Reaching into the truck he grabbed one of his buddy's beers and a crowbar lying on the back seat. He took a long drink before setting it down.
"Now to see what all the fuss is about," he muttered, jamming the crowbar under the box's lid and prying it open.
The lid popped off with some effort and landed with a bang in the truck bed. The man frowned as he looked inside the box. He reached in and pulled the contents out. A red tiger mask.
"What the..."
The load bang cut his words short and he fell to the ground, dead. The other man quickly rushed over and tossed the gun into the back of the truck. He saw the mask lying in his former compatriot's hand and cursed.
"Stupid hoser, I told you not to open that box!"
***
A few days later. Somewhere else...
The truck pulled up alongside an abandoned warehouse. The man hoped out, causing beer cans to spill to the ground. He grabbed the box and quickly hurried inside. The place appeared abandoned, but the man wasn't fooled. He knew there were eyes on him the moment he was five klicks from here. Walking quickly through the building, he headed to the basement and down a dark hall. He knocked on the metal door at the end and was ushered in.
A group of masked men swarmed him as he entered, checking him from head to toe for weapons, spy equipment and judging by how one of them frisked him, to see if he had wiped himself correctly. He was quickly relieved of the gun he had taken from his former companion, as well as the box. The latter of which was taken a cross the room and placed in the hands of the individual they all answer, Esior the Necromancer.
"Good to see you, Douglas," Esior said, lifting the box up to take a closer look at it, "Did you have any problems retrieving this item for me?"
"Douglas" shrugged his shoulders and looked around, feeling suddenly very nervous.
"Yeah there was a bit of trouble, but I took care of it, eh?"
"Where's Robert," the masked wizard asked.
"He was the trouble. Stupid hoser!"
"Yes," Esior replied, further inspecting the box, "stupid indeed. I take it you made sure to end our business arrangement with him?"
Douglas nodded.
"Yeah, had to shoot him. I got his body wrapped up in a blanket in the back of the truck outside."
"Excellent," Esior replied.
He snapped his fingers and pointed at a quartet of his followers.
"Go retrieve the body. Where he failed me in life, he might still serve me in death."
The four masked me scurried off to get the body and Douglas shivered. Robert, or “Bobby” as he called him, might have been a fool but if what he had heard about Esior and his experiments was right, he didn't deserve what was going to happen to his remains. He shivered again and slowly backed his way towards the exit.
“Well if we’re done here,” he said, eyeing the door, “I’ve got a long way to get back to Ball’s Falls and a full Mickey waiting for me in the truck, eh. So if you could just pay me what I’m owed, I’ll…”
Words left him as a stretcher was suddenly rolled in and the corpse lying on it wasn’t Robert’s. Douglas blanched as the body was rolled past him and he gasped in sudden recognition. He knew that poor hoser, it couldn’t possibly him. He had just watched him wrestle a few weeks ago on television.
“Hey, isn’t that E…”
“Douglas, why is the box cracked?”
Douglas swallowed hard. This was the very question he was hoping to avoid. He had tried his best to glue the box back together with the hopes that the wizard wouldn’t notice until he hit the Great Lakes.
“See, ah, Robert hit me with the shovel, eh. The dumb hoser popped the lid off with…”
“Did you see what inside the box, Douglas?”
A lump formed in his throat.
“Well, Bobby pulled it out of the box before I could stop him,eh.”
“So you did see it?”
This question seemed to catch attention of everyone in room. The eyes of every masked person suddenly turned to him and he felt his chance of escape slipping away. He tried to backup a step but felt the cold, unfeeling hands of one of Esior’s followers grab him by the shoulder. He begun looking around, frantic for a way out of this.
“Answer me, Douglas!”
“I had to put it back in the box, eh. It’s not like I had a choice, eh? If Bobby hadn’t been such a stupid hoser…”
Esior lifted a finger in the air, silencing him.
“It would appear you were just as much a ‘hoser’ as Robert was. I’m sorry, Douglas, but I fear this error on your part ends our business relationship. Needn’t you fear though, were you failed me in this life, you too will serve me in death.”
Esior snapped his fingers and all his followers swarmed Douglas within seconds. Douglas tried to scream up but hands came from every direction, cupping his mouth and squeezing his throat. He fought hard to free himself but slowly felt his life being smothered from his body.
***
Esior watched as his followers quickly and quietly brought Douglas’s life to an end. Such a pity, Douglas had been useful but he really couldn’t tolerate such incompetence. If his work didn’t require him that he refrain from bringing more attention upon himself than necessary, he would simply send his minions out to “collect”.
Speaking of which, perhaps it was time to call them off. He snapped his fingers and all eyes turned to him.
“That’s enough, we don’t want him bruised.”
His masked followers stopped their assault. Esior instructed them to take the body they had first brought and put it into a table. Douglas was then loaded up on the same stretcher just in time for Robert’s remains to be carried in.
“Take them both away,” Esior instructed them, “I shall deal them later. For now though, I have other more important tasks to complete.”
He barely noticed as the bodies were rolled away. His attention was turned back to the box. Esior opened it and pulled out the mask, holding it up to the light for closer examination. Satisfied, he turned to the corpse behind him and put the mask on him. He took a step back and admired his handiwork.
“At last, Tiger Mask Red, you are mine!”
***
{Static}
“Greetings, Mr. Saint. Allow me to introduce myself.”
The screen came into focus, and a masked figure’s face filled the screen.
“My name is Esior, but you and everyone else may refer to me as The Necromancer. For more years than you have walked this earth I have been searching for the perfect vessel to focus my power through. A creature of such power and might, that I might show the word what I am truly capable of and I believe I have found just such a vessel right here.”
The camera pulls back. A hooded figure is strapped upright to a table, lifeless, much like Frankenstein’s monster. His chest is covered with stitches, as if it had recently been opened up, only to be sewn shut again. Esior rubs the man’s head as he continues to speak.
“When last this one was seen, he was a broken man. Abandoned by those he called ‘good brothers’. He was cast aside, discarded, nothing more than a joke, while those who benefited from him the most moved along as if he never existed. In fact he was more than merely forgotten, he was left for dead.”
With an air of showmanship, The Necromancer pulled off the hood to reveal the man was in fact Tiger Mask Red. His flesh was a sickly color and and his beard tattered and mangy. As Esior held his head up it was clear there was no life in those dead eyes of his, leaving the viewers to wonder how long had he been dead and what had been the cause.
The Necromancer laughed as he let TMR’s head drop and patted him in an almost condescending fashion.
“Pathetic, isn’t he, Mr. Saint. To think that he was once a former World Champion, both feared and respected throughout the world. He was even named the first ever Hall of Fame inductee for Guerreros of Lucha despite accomplishing anything of any merit there whatsoever. Now he’s little more than a piece of meat, bound to a slab, pulled from the cold embrace of the earth and at my mercy.”
The Necromancer lifts TMR’s head once more and turns it to the camera.
“This is who you were scheduled to face in comedically inspired ‘Orange Soda Deathmatch’. I’m not sure about you, but I don’t like his chances of success right now. Well, not in this state anyway.”
He snaps his fingers and two masked men, dressed all in black, come in. They assist Esior to remove his cape and one produces a bowl of black liquid. The Necromancer dips his finger into the bowl and starts writing with it on a long piece of paper. While he does, he begins to chant in some ancient, forgotten language. Once he’s done writing, he picks up the paper and places it on TMR’s chest, stabbing him with a pin to secure the paper in place. Esior turns to the camera and cocks his head to the side.
“Now observe.”
He places both hands upon TMR’s head and begins to chant once more in the ancient language. Nothing appears to happen at first, but then the body begins to convulse and rithe. TMR begins to thrash against the bond that hold him. His mouth opens and smoke seeps from his lips. His head rises and the viewers see his eyes have turned pitch black. If this all didn’t seem weird enough, he begins to scream out yelling nonsense.
“WsjsHekheAknkdneTashdosIafhaskhShsaofhakTsjajHosihoishcIhalckslS?ToshflHjaksjEssfaljPshdakAshckshIdhdN!”
Tiger Mask Red begins to thrash ever harder against the restraints and you can hear the wooden slab his bound to begin to crack from his monstrous effort.
“RosakfEsakshLsakfEdlskAszdkhzSshflaksEishaohfaMlfasflakE!sdkahTaskhfalkshHalskhfaenEvzdnvPasnvalkslkAsnvalkIalksfnalnN!”
The Necromancer’s masked assistants rush forward to subdue him, but TMR’s right hand breaks free from the restraint and he grabs one of them by the throat. When the other tries to interviene, Tiger manages to break his other hand free and grabs him by the throat as well. From off camera several more masked men rush and we hear TMR roaring as they try to prevent his escape.
Esior the Necromancer’s hand reaches out and he pulls the view of the camera away from the scene and back upon himself.
“You see what I’ve done, Mr. Saint. I have brought that pathetic creature back. No longer will be be called Tiger Mask Red. That was the name of a mortal man, who outlived his purpose and was put down like all wounded animals must be. No, what you saw there is something different, something more powerful. You cannot be brought back from the otherside and returned the same. He is filled with dark magic and an insatiable desire for pain and destruction. I…”
“IjfheowkfhoWhsoaklhsIsakshLhsakhsLskalfhkYknlasncaOjkajsbakjU!”
Esior is suddenly knocked out of view of the camera by the flying body of one of his followers. Tiger limps into view, covered in blood. He’s about to go after the man who revived him but once more is set upon by what can be safely assumed, the few remaining surviving assistants. They manage to hold him long enough for Esior to get back to his feet. He touches Tiger on the forehead and he suddenly goes still.
“Did you see that, Mr.Saint,” Esior asks, “Did you see the power of my monster? Did you see the savagery with which he attacks? Now imagine when I point him in your direction. Imagine when all the animalistic rage that his boiling up inside him in centered on you. All that anger, all that confusion, all that pain he feels, it will bubble up inside him and I will paint a bullseye target on you in his mind.”
Even the mask he wears cannot hide the surprise he felt from the attack, but he’s recovered quickly and brushes himself off as if nothing happened.
“So let me ask you something, Mr. Saint. What are you going to do against a man, no, scratch that. What are you going to do when you stand across the ring from a monster, whose only goal is your destruction? What are you going to do against someone who doesn’t feel pain the way a living person feels pain and has absolutely no fear? What are you going to do when you stand across the ring against something that is both so much less and so much more than a human being and you realize that nothing you can do will stop him from coming for you?
“When this match was signed, the matchmakers created it as a joke at his expense because the color of his hair. What will occur will be anything but a joke. My monster will bury you at sea in the very orange pop that this match was designed around and will leave you floating face down on his way to gain the one prize in death he could not obtain in life, the Rey de Reyes Championship. No one will stop this from finally happen and you perhaps take solace in knowing what what my monster does to you will pale in comparison to what’s to come.”
Esior turns and looks on as TMR is strapped into a glass casket by this remaining followers and the lid shut tightly. The camera picks up the mangled remains of the others lying about. The Necromancer looks back at the camera and concludes his speech.
“I hope you enjoy your last few days on Earth, Mr. Saint. If there is anyone whom you love, I suggest you kiss them goodbye, for once you enter that ring, you soul belongs to me and your body will be torn apart by Tiger Mask Undead.”
The camera goes black.
{Static}
***
At home in Guelph, Ontario, a couple sits on their couch watching television. Neither of them say a word as this video ends and their screen goes black. After a few minutes the wife turns to her husband.
“Well that was interesting,” she says.
The husband merely nods his head. He sits back and runs his hands through his hair. Undeterred, the wife continues talking.
“Do you think that was all real? I mean, bringing him back from the dead like that and him butchering everyone.”
“Maybe,” the husband replies.
The wife lets out a long sigh and gets up from the couch.
“Is that all you’ve got to say,” she asks, “‘Maybe.’”
He shrugs his shoulders.
“You and I have seen some pretty weird shit. Six foot tall wooden dolls that can wrestle. Space aliens. A wrestling bear that can use Twitter. I don’t give a damn whether he’s dead or not though.”
“So what do you care about then,” his wife asks.
“Two things, Charlie. Number one, how the fuck did they find my mask? And number two,” Eli Buchanan says, standing up and turning the television off, “how the fuck is there two of me?”