act one: rebirth of a hero
Time has a funny way of coming back around again, even when you thought it'd just keep moving forward as it always has. For so long, I'd believed that the path I was travelling was a straight shot to my future... but only now I'm I realizing that it's all came full-circle and I'm back to where I started all those years ago, except now? Now...
Now I'm the legend about to train the rising star. I'm not as young as I was back then, I don't have a Chris Champion to grow with as a wrestler in this business, I don't have a rival to push me forward and teach me new ways to survive out there in that ring. I'm a student of the business, I'm a veteran who's paid the price for all he's learned in the blood he's shed for the sport. I've already learned everything I thought I could possibly learn and all I'm doing now is fighting for the love of it all, from the fans to the company to the business... that's what I came to fight for in the first place.
But now I see there's more than the love I have for all of that... I have to fight for more than love, I have to fight for respect. Not for my own, mind you... I've plenty respect from all I've done, but rather... I have to fight for the respect of the roster in No Limits. I have to... I have to push them forward, I have to help bring them the respect they deserve.
I have to be the fire that lights up Carmine Vestieri to become the legend he's set himself out to be.
The kid is passionate, he's honest in his desires and he's shown that beyond the prick he wants everyone to see lies a wrestler, a professional, a man who's focused on nothing but his future and the future of what he sees as his company. The company he's been given the opportunity to lead forward.
He's the roaring lion atop the mountain... and he knows he's taken in far too much, far too quickly.
He's a great kid, for all the failings he has and for all his shortcomings, he's a great kid and he's a hell of a wrestler. I cannot praise Carmine Vestieri's potential in the ring enough, just as I cannot shun Carmine Vestieri's attitude in the ring enough, either.
The man is as different as the two sides of a coin: on the one side, he's bound for greatness. He's got an ability in the ring that honestly does remind me of Champion, yet in Carmine's own unique way... and he has potential to push himself into something truly great if he starts pushing himself through the boundaries he's put up.
Yet on the other side... Carmine Vestieri is an arrogant, condescending, over-confident, under-trained, ill-prepared champion and wrestler who still has so much training to do before he'll ever be on the proper level for the title that he holds. Truth be told, were it not for the current condition of the NLCW as it was... Carmine would never have been champion by now.
I hate to say it because in the end, despite all the trash talk between the two of us, I respect the hell out of the kid. He really is talented, but... he's not ready for the title he's wrapped 'round his waist. Not now, perhaps eventually... but certainly not right now.
Yet because of the current state of affairs in the NLCW, because of the fact that so very many people have abandoned the place that made them into who they are? Carmine Vestieri is the world champion, and he's damn proud of that fact. He's damn proud of the fact that, in the face of little to no competition, he was able to capture the title and pull himself forward to represent the company. He truly believe that this, his crowning achievement in the company... is his representation of what it means to have "No Limits".
He is wrong. He is horribly, terribly, undeniably wrong... and the only person left to stand up and show him just how wrong he is is the ghost from NLCW's past. The only person left to stand up to Carmine Vestieri and tell him the truth, show him how unprepared he is for this spotlight... is me.
And I've no qualms doing it, either.
If it has to be me who pushes Carmine Vestieri forward, then I really don't mind. I don't mind dealing with the bastard, I don't mind putting up with how much of an asshole he truly is-- after all, in the end... my best friend turned out to be the biggest asshole of all, didn't he?
At Eternity, if Carmine Vestieri wins... he'll have learned nothing from this venture in the NLCW. He'll never improve, he'll forever think that because he was good enough to keep me down for three, he's good enough for anything else in the big time. He'll be lead down a path to nothing more than a lifetime of disappointment, and as for me? I'll simply have been wrong about a small portion in this long-winded plan of mine, and I've learned more than enough in this life of mine to compensate for small errors along my path.
I'll recover from a Carmine Vestieri victory... but Carmine? Carmine will not.
Yet if he loses... if I can defeat Carmine Vestieri, if I can fulfill this part of my story, and if I can complete this little journey of mine down the path I've chosen to take? Then I know for a fact that Carmine will fight forward. I know for a fact that Carmine will track me down, forever looking to push past the limitations set upon him by that loss at Eternity. Carmine will grow ever more determined, ever more confident, ever more certain that in time, he will show the world his true greatness.
That, in time... even he can topple the Goliath that has become of Dominic Pericolo.
Yet in this tale, the key word is time: time slips past, time slows to a crawl... but ultimately, time is unpredictable. It can return to you in a circle just as it can outrun you on a straight path, and ultimately, there's nothing that you can do to stop it... you are only along for the hectic, wonderful ride that it brings you.
Carmine Vestieri is a long way away from ever achieving the greatness he believes he already has, and at Eternity, I will be certain to reveal this fact to him. I will be certain to bring out his best, and ultimately... I will be certain to do as I have twice before.
I will be certain to bring down Carmine Vestieri.
The dawn of a new chapter in this story of mine has begun, and with the would-be epilogue I'd crafted now past, I see nothing but open pages in the path that awaits me. I see nothing but an ocean of words yet to be written... of stories to be told, and of characters to be developed and built upon.
I have fought 'til the bitter end for this story of mine, and I will never, ever give up on giving it exactly the ending it deserves. A life well lived, dreams fully realized... my story still has so much left to be written, and ultimately, it was wrong of me to try and limit it as I did. It was wrong of me to try and split the chapters, to try and break up the books... for in the end, these stories of mine are nothing more than chapters in the grand book of my life.
Eternity marks the rebirth of the NLCW's greatest hero, and you can be damn certain that this time, just as the times long past... the hero will not fall. It's simply not time for this story to end, and Carmine... there's not a chance in hell that you could ever end it. After all, a roaring lion could never best a raging storm.
So dream all you want... after all, I'm a man of dreams myself; but in the end, that dreaming will get you nowhere, because this is my story, and I'll end it however the hell I want to.
See you Sunday, kid.