act one: rebirth of a hero
"He wants the best for the NLCW, Dominic... he's just like you. Don't you see? Think back, further than the NLCW... who else was in it for their own good, but still thought for the best of their company? Who else was just like Carmine, not certain which way they were going, just knowing all they wanted was the best in the end?"
The warrior and his angel had moved to their living room, bags carefully placed beside the door, their precious child in his crib, dreaming the night away in peace. The warrior is staring at the ground in silence, hair draped forward and falling past his face. The strands are blurry, unfocused in his vision... his eyes fixed solely on the ground below.
He remembered. He knew who else was just like Carmine, and he knew where his angel was taking him in this path they were on. He knew how the story went, it had all came full circle once again... the difference maker being that, instead of growing together... he had found one who likely needed to grow under him.
Carmine Vestieri was just like Christopher Champion.
"I remember..." the warrior began, a small smirk playing across his lips, "I remember back then. Champion was such an asshole but he had so much potential, so much talent... I just knew he was bound for greatness if he could only get past the man he'd made himself to be back then."
His angel smiles, running her fingers softly through her warrior's hair. He had taken quite some time to bring the story 'round as he had, but in the end... he was worth waiting for. Seeing the realizations, hearing those words, it made her ever prouder of the man he'd become. There was a time when he'd be concerned solely on his own path ahead of him, but now?
Now... he'd proven what all the years of growing within the NLCW had done to him. He knew that there was a young man waiting to be crafted into legend, worried that perhaps he'd risen too quickly, perhaps he'd pushed too hard... a young man thinking he was ready, but questioning it all the same. Carmine Vestieri had remarkable bravado, he was every bit the roaring lion he'd depicted himself to be.
But the lion was afraid... and who could blame it? The storm before it stood tall in the heavens above, its own roar thousands of times greater than the lion's own. It flashed bright lights through a night-darkened sky, and it brought torrents of rain and hail upon the land below, assaulting the lion from a distance with its strength carried on the winds themselves.
"Back then, Champion was just looking to prove himself the better man. He was using you as the measuring stick for his success... you were the man he could never get one over on, the man who always seemed to be one step ahead. He knew that, in time, if he could get past you.... he'd be right where he was always talking about being."
The similarities were astounding... and the truth they brought forward staggered the hard-stanced warrior. He had plans, and he made preparations... but he could never have prepared for... for such a feeling as this. For such a profound sense of... of deja'vu.
History was repeating itself in the strangest of ways, and Dominic could never have seen it coming. Yet all the while, his angel stood carefully observant, ready to catch him when reality crashed upon him, when it all knocked him to the wayside... she was there to bring him back, and to guide him to where she knew he needed to be.
Deja'vu or not, Dominic Pericolo was now facing the prospect of a young man staking his career on the outcome of a match against him. The result of the match would define the future of the young man's career... a win for Carmine spelled the confirmation of a misguided future he'd invisioned for himself. The truth was, Carmine was miles away from being ready for what he'd obtained... and if he found a way to defeat Dominic at Eternity, he'd never realize that.
No matter where he would go, from that day forward... Carmine would never learn anything from their encounter, always feeling that smug sense of self-grandeur. His bravado would be cemented in a way that he could never grow from, and unlike Christopher Champion, who learned and evolved through efforts made time and time again... Carmine would flounder when he faced those Dominic himself had faced in the past, those great warriors he would believe himself to be on-level with.
Carmine Vestieri had all the potential in the world... he was an arrogant prick, an asshole to the core, but he was also a man with a great respect for all that Dominic had done in the business, and a man with nothing more than a sincere desire to face the greatest the business had to offer, hold his own against them... and grow from their encounter.
He wasn't looking for a victory in their match at all, no... Carmine Vestieri was in it for the experience. He was in it for the same reason Dominic was, just with different intentions... and somewhere back there, he was in it to prove to himself that there would still be a mountain worth climbing up to reach that glorious end.
"You beat him at Eternity... that's not going to come close to killing the kid's spirit. You've seen him, Domi... hell, you've fought him. You know that fire burning in him's just like yours and Champion's. He's shooting for the best, and you've got to step in and show him that he still has a lot of training to do to get there."
A loss at Eternity meant nothing more to Carmine Vestieri than a new lease on his career, a new goal to be made, a new path to be taken. Carmine losing would spell the beginning of a long-standing feud between the two men, but it would be a feud the young man could grow from... one where his priority would become focused solely on stopping the fairy tale of Dominic Pericolo.
In time, perhaps, they'd learn to be more than just rivals in the ring. Perhaps... just as Dominic and Champion before, they could learn to be friends. Yet regardless of what happened between the two outside of the ring, the fact would remain that everything that would ever happen between them inside that ring would be determined by the outcome of their match at Eternity... a most appropriately named event that would come to signify the dawn of a new era in the NLCW.
The warrior remained confident... knowing it would be he who led the company forward, but only now did he realize that he'd be doing so not only out of love for the business, but out of obligation to the arrogant young man who looked to him for a challenge he'd never find elsewhere, and a measuring stick to be used for his own future success.
"In the end..."
... Carmine Vestieri was relying on him to bring him forward, just the same as the very company they fought for all the while.