(CUE UP: "Hail" by Bongripper. No, I'm not making any of this shit up... welcome to the obscure and mostly unlistenable music genre known as stoner-sludge metal.)
"Okay... I can do better than that."
(We open on the round open top of a simple cylindrical utility bucket. Inside, we can see that the bucket is filled about two-thirds of the way with a black viscous liquid. A shovel with a fresh scoop of foul waste enters the frame, adding to the fill. The camera zooms out slightly, and we can see REZIN holding the shovel, standing up to the ankles in dirt, waste, and other decaying and detestable substances at the bottom of a roadside ditch.)
Rezin
Forgive me if there was much to be desired after that last promo. Truth be told, I haven't really been able to think of much to say lately.
Seems like anything I say just gets turned around on me, or made out to be indisputable proof that I'm everything I'm trying to explain I'm not. I mean, what's the point of talking if people aren't going to listen? Why give them the chance to rape and humiliate the philosophy I've developed and grown accustomed to over the years?
It should be clear to any sane person, looking at me standing here shoveling filth around for reasons that go beyond any rational understanding, that arguing with someone as crazy as me is a rather hopeless effort. What seems logical to anybody else is nothing short of hogwash to a man like me. And yet, they prattle away... perhaps not so much to convince me of my madness, but to convince themselves that their own bullshit is as true as the sky is blue.
(He stops shoveling for a moment to jam the spade into the muck and leans on it for a moment.)
Rezin
"I get results" is the mantra of the elite... guys like Sean Stevens and Randall Knox. It doesn't really matter what the FULL extent of the truth is when you get down to thinks like details and perspective and circumstances. All that matters at the end of the day to guys like that is who got the win, and how they can use that to keep pushing their skewed vision of this sport on the rest of the world.
They get results... they win matches... but it doesn't make them any less of the media whores they know themselves to be. Because at the end of the day... as long as they get the result they want, they have something to validate their own sick and twisted truth.
(He gets back to shoveling.)
Rezin
Anyway, I'm not here to vent my personal bitterness toward those two. Fact is, Teddy, the last time, I just didn't have a chance to touch on something in your promo that particularly caught my ear... and perhaps it should be addressed, before anybody else goes out there thinking they have the wrong idea about me.
I know I give off the stoner image... but the truth is, I don't get really high anymore.
Don't get me wrong... I still smoke ALL the time... but there's nothing even close to the rush or the thrill you're imagining. At this point, I just smoke to maintain a steady and constant level of THC... before the paranoid delusions and schizoid anxiety forces me to cutting up some poor bitch's face. But there's never a high... not any more.
I used to feel that high years ago... in the ring, I mean. You've got a sadistic need for some bone-breaking that quite frankly, I can't help but admire... but mine was different. And difficult to describe. But there used to be something there... every time I'd push myself off of that turnbuckle.
There used to be something that happens in that moment... something that goes beyond anything a bong could give me, Teddy. It looks like a half of a second in real time, but for me... it used to be that every time I simply touched on that feeling of weightlessness, and I heard the whole damb arena all at once gasp into a single moment of beautiful silence... it was beyond euphoric.
It used to be all I ever needed. It was never about money, or winning titles, or selling merchandise... I would wrestle in front of a sold-out football stadium or ten people in a high-school gym; it didn't matter to me... as long as I could get that rush, flying off the top rope.
I dunno if you would understand that, Teddy... which wouldn't surprise me, considering many seem to think I'm a bit crazed. Jack Harmen might know something about it, though. And frankly, I admire the fact that he still lives for that high, even in the face of so much adversity, and gets the respect he's due even if he doesn't "get results" as often as others do.
For many years, I've tried to do everything that Jack Harmen has done and be everything that Jack Harmen is... but unfortunately, nobody's ever been able to look past the bong. Nobody's ever been able to accept the fact that I'm more addicted to the AIR, than to the dank.
(Suddenly, with years of pent of rage, he angrily chucks the shovel as far he can. It lands somewhere in the road, and we can hear a squeal within the passing traffic as vehicles swerve to avoid it. Rezin scowls at the camera.)
Rezin
Nobody
EVER gave me respect in this business, Teddy. After all those years of willingly going into that ring and letting one over-powered and self-flagellating jackass after the next humiliate me -- ALL THOSE YEARS jumping through Dan Ryan's hoops -- those fucking ASSHOLES that have the audacity to call themselves "the Best in the World" and "the Greatest of All-Time" thought I hadn't done enough to EARN that respect.
Fuck that. Respect isn't JUST earned in accomplishments or skill. Respect is also earned in TIME and COMMITMENT. I've put more time into Empire Pro than the both of those cock-rags combined... I've spent more time on that mat, and in those locker rooms. I've dedicated every aspect of my very LIFE to Dan Ryan's federation... even knowing what a tremendous piece of shit my boss is.
And my reward? They walk over me and scrape off their boots, like I'm a fucking doormat... knowing there's next to nothing I can do about it, because I don't "get results" like they do.
They killed my high, Teddy. I can't get my spirit up any more... because it's stuck right here at the bottom of this fucking ditch, and I'll never be able to get out of it.
But if I can't get higher... then the only natural thing for me to do is to make everybody else just a bit LOWER? Why climb my way to the top of the ladder when I can just let the ladder sink to the bottom of this quagmire?
(He picks up a round lid that seals over the top of the bucket and shuts it tight before taking it by the handle and picking it up.)
Rezin
If I can't get my own fix, Teddy, then I'll just have to deny you of yours. I'll have to bring you on down here to my level... a place where the high is nothing but a distant memory, and all that's left is a bitter hatred begging to lash out and destroy the whole fucking world.
What that means is that you won't be breaking my neck... even though, in all honesty, you'd probably be doing me a favor in doing that. A broken neck would mean I could end this misery for once and for all...
(He suddenly smirks... the gleam of the Devil is his eyes.)
Rezin
But why stop it now when we've only just begun?
(With wet, sloshing steps, Rezin slogs his way through the grade leading out of the pit of refuse, and our shot fades to beyond the black and into the void.)