Boardwalk Revelation
Nov 10, 2016 20:05:25 GMT -5
Post by Johnny Karma on Nov 10, 2016 20:05:25 GMT -5
29th October 2016, Springfield IL
A locker room door flies open as Johnny Karma once again bursts into a locker room, this time one at the Prairie Capital Convention Center, but rather than trudging through the door looking like a vision of frustration bubbling over into anger that he was after Retribution, instead he’s lighter on his feet and appears to have had a great weight lifted off of his shoulders – and Cherry seems even more cheerful, if anything
…and did you see the look on Rother’s face? He looked like he’d aged ten years in as many seconds!
The pair of them close the locker room door behind them, at which point Cherry flings her arms around Karma’s shoulders and their eyes meet…leading to an awkward moment where the pair are looking into one another’s eyes and suddenly their world becomes very, very quiet
I, uhhh…
Cherry slips her arms off of Karma’s shoulders and backs away a couple of steps
…and what about when I became the first woman to make contact with his bathing suit area? The way he collapsed it was like he needed to be sent back to the factory for a reset!
Turning towards a cooler to garb a bottle of water, either for some refreshment or possibly something to do to try and hide his awkwardness, Karma removes the cap and takes the smallest sip possible
I have to say you were right, that tackling the issue head-on was a much better idea than hoping that it would go away, or that somebody would help sort it out for me. And you can bet your bottom quarter that they didn’t think Dom Harter would be showing up in the first place, let alone coming to feed Chris Tryon some delicious iPad Thai.
Don’t tell me you were thinking of a suitable pun the entire time you were headed back here?
Karma pauses for a second
I’m going to plead the Fifth on that one.
Karma takes another, much longer sip, clearly looking to change the subject slightly
So after months of thinking they were going to get their way by bullying anyone who tried to stand up to them, now the New Kings know that I’ve got numbers on my side – not as many as they do, but enough to make them think twice. In fact, I think that things are going to start getting a little bit better from now on…
9th November 2016, Queens NYC
It’s not quite 8am and Johnny Karma is waking up, having had a refreshing night’s rest, and after yawning and stretching for a moment he reaches over to his bedside table to pick up his phone and switch it on – having switched it off the previous evening due to getting constantly spammed by updates about the Presidential Election
As he waits for his phone to power up, Karma sits up in bed and rubs his eyes, before running his hand down his face to brush his hand against a couple of days’ worth of stubble that he should probably shave once he’s up and out of bed…that it until he receives a barrage of message alerts and, checking the most recent alert he’s received he reads the message – and then his eyes widen for a moment, and the phone slips out of his hand and hits the duvet with a soft thud
At first Karma thousand yard stares at a spot in the wall for a few seconds – that is until he decides the best course of action to take at this exact moment in time is lie down once again, pull the duvet over his head, and a muffled groan of anguish can be heard emanating from beneath his goose down fortress of solitude
29th October 2016, Springfield IL
Karma continues what he was saying just a moment ago, as if that little cutaway did not actually happen
There’s one thing I wish I could see, though, and that’s Rother and his personal security team crawl back to Cannon and carmine and have to break the news to him that they pushed me too far, and I’m doing the one thing they were hoping I wouldn’t: push back.
Having a bunch of people looking to prove they have the biggest shlongs in the locker room by beating on a solitary opponent, that’s the sort of thing that goes with the territory. It’s happened many, many, many times before and will happen many, many, many times in the future so as much as it sucks to be on the receiving end of it, and believe me it sucks, at the end of the day it’s part of what the job.
But when you make things personal, going out of your way to be as much of a hurtful kaker as you can muster…
Taking a deep breath, Karma momentarily clams up, which causes Cherry to step forward once more to place a reassuring hand on his forearm
It’s okay…
It’s not, it’s really not, because their thinking they can get away with that means they think I won’t put an end to it. It means they think I’m weak, a pushover, someone who talks a good game but when it comes to it that’s all I have: talk.
Are they going to think that after what happened tonight?
Karma pauses to think about the answer, trying not to smirk at the thought of his answer
I get the feeling they’ll have second thoughts, that’s for sure.
5th November 2016, Atlantic City NJ
In spite of the calendar ticking over to November, it’s a warm day in Atlantic City as Johnny Karma sits on the beach in front of Boardwalk Hall, with the sounds of the sea as well as the people shopping on Playground Pier creating a rich cacophony of sound – meanwhile, on the boardwalk behind him, a couple of rubberneckers are trying to make a nuisance of themselves by waving to the camera, drawing some less-than-polite words from the camera operator, namely Cherry Baum
There’s a few things I’ve been asked ahead of the Fifth Anniversary Show, ranging from questions about how it feels to work for the company for three of those five years, making me one of the longest-tenured members of the roster, to whether I will ever get the name of Frontier Wrestling Arts correct, to whether I’ll stop ragging on Jersey. For future reference, my answers are “I guess I must be doing something right”, “I have, haven’t I?” and…
Karma looks over his shoulder to see another rubbernecker trying to make a name for themselves, this one giving the camera the middle finger and snickering about it – until Karma looks at him, at which point they make a quick exit
…no further comment necessary.
But, yeah, being in the same place for so long certainly makes you think that either you’re doing something right and you’re getting rewarded for it by having another contract drawn up to say “Thanks for what you’ve been doing, keep it up” just as much as it means the company’s doing well enough that you aren’t looking for work elsewhere because your cheques keep bouncing, if they arrive at all.
That’s the thing I’ve wanted to do from the first day I walked into the company, be it when I signed my first contract, or when I appeared at my first show in Elizabeth PA, or made my full debut just an hour’s walk from Madison Square Garden – and, yes, I did look this up at the time, because at the time I was thinking that if it took half an hour to walk from where I was to the Garden, things would be looking up. Of course, since then things have changed so much that I can walk to the Garden in just two minutes – in fact, one time I bet someone five bucks that I could be sat in my locker room, get up and jog to the Garden and get back to my locker room within five minutes, and I did…just.
Yet from those meagre beginnings, where my matches were taking place closer to the Barclays Center than the Garden, I always knew that I wanted to do things the right way.
Yet in the three years that I’ve spent in the ring for this company, I’ve seen so many people thinking that the right way is something that losers tell themselves to make an excuse for only getting so far before they run out of talent. I’ve seen The Murder, Chris Q, Jimmy Page, Zero McHannon, The New Kings – and both Cannon and Carmine were just as bad before they formed their alliance – all of this telling me that trying to do things the right way just gets you beaten down and then worn down until you either give up or give in.
Picking up a handful of sand, Karma lets the slightly soggy sand run through the fingers of one hand into the palm of the other, before tipping it onto the beach once more
That’s a lot of time for people to not realise there’s a third way: do something about it.
Since last year’s anniversary show, I’d like to think I’ve tried to do just that. I’ve called out Johnny Cannon for his desire to injure opponents to make himself feel like the big man, and I proved that he really isn’t. I was told I didn’t have a chance against Tony Carmine when I challenged him for the Pride Championship, and then I beat him to prove otherwise. There’s no dismissing what I’ve done, but the problem is that for a long time I was desperate to do things on my own, to be the lone wolf, even though anyone with a basic understanding of mathematics would know one person going against three is not going to work out for you, let alone going against five.
What’s more, my judgment was clouded by rage, because the things they said when I lost someone close to me that I loved…for a time I threw away any thoughts of doing things the right way, and instead wanted to do things the stupid way, giving them what they wanted while depriving me of what I needed.
And now that’s changed.
Karma holds up a couple of fingers, gauging where the wind is coming from
For too long I thought doing things the right way meant doing things one way, which is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different outcome. When I realised that the right way isn’t just a straight line from Point A to Point B, but a series of paths that start at Point A and finish at Point B but the route you take can make the journey very different, that’s where I knew what had to be done, and that’s where I looked for someone who wouldn’t just fight alongside me to put The New Kings in their place, but would fight just as dirty as they would. That’s why Chris Tryon is currently trying to avoid passing an Apple Store because it brings back painful memories for him.
If you watch the last show very carefully, and use the pause button with the speed and precision of a ninja, you’ll be able to pinpoint the exact moment it dawned on Anthony Rother that he’d gone too far and was going to have to accept what was coming to him – and in that moment, it’s worth asking what was going through his mind. Was he trying to work out which comment he made was the one which broke the camel’s back? Was he hoping that Marx or Tryon would rise up like something out of a bad slasher movie to protect him? Maybe he was thinking that he’d need to buy a new suit as the one he was wearing was ruined? What he was thinking isn’t important, the fact that he was thinking it is – because that’s the moment where things start to go against Rother, against The Usual Suspects, and against The New Kings, and all because of one simple thing: I made them doubt themselves.
All of which leads me to the match which will take place at the venue just behind me and…
Karma once again looks over his shoulder
…the guy making the “Call me” gesture in Miss Baum’s direction, somehow believing that she’s psychic and already knows his phone number.
Karma pauses for the briefest moment, giving a sly look to the camera, before continuing
Once again I will find myself at the numbers disadvantage, as myself and Noelle Smith take on Jason Marx and Chris Tryon, with Anthony Rother in their corner…
Probably sitting in their corner, because the last time I saw him he was having trouble standing.
Karma pauses, trying not to lose track of what he’s saying by chuckling at the thought of the grave misfortune that befell Rother’s bathing suit area
…and sitting on their shoulders the whole time will be their new friend, Doubt.
A few weeks ago they’d have swaggered into the ring, looking at me in the same way that someone looks at that toy which a dog has mauled beyond recognition but still sleeps with a paw draped around it, they’d have met with their pals Cannon, Carmine and Diamond backstage and had a laugh at my expense before making their way to the ring and thinking it was a matter of time before I folded.
Now that Marx, Tryon and Rother are realising that I’ve got more of a backbone than the three of them combined, the match won’t be their thinking it’ll be another chance to kick the dog, instead they’ll be afraid that the dog’s going to bite them. Again. Yet the whole time the match is taking place, every single time they find themselves worried that they’re going to have another bad day at the office, they need to remember something: it’s all Anthony Rother’s fault. If only he kept his mouth shut, if only he didn’t throw in with Cannon, Carmine and Diamond. If only…if only…if only.
What they should concern themselves isn’t what Rother should or should not have done, but what all three of them have been doing – because while I have continued to try my hardest to do things the right way, the three of them have made one bad decision after another and they will continue to make bad decisions right up to the moment where they can no longer remember what the right decision even looks like, because they mistook the wrong way for the easy way, and it’s going to cost them. The last time I bumped into them it cost them, even though that wasn’t even in the ring, but this time there’s going to be a referee and a timekeeper replacing somebody holding an iPad, but the results are going to be the same: the realisation that I’m mad as hell and I was done taking it months ago.
A locker room door flies open as Johnny Karma once again bursts into a locker room, this time one at the Prairie Capital Convention Center, but rather than trudging through the door looking like a vision of frustration bubbling over into anger that he was after Retribution, instead he’s lighter on his feet and appears to have had a great weight lifted off of his shoulders – and Cherry seems even more cheerful, if anything
…and did you see the look on Rother’s face? He looked like he’d aged ten years in as many seconds!
The pair of them close the locker room door behind them, at which point Cherry flings her arms around Karma’s shoulders and their eyes meet…leading to an awkward moment where the pair are looking into one another’s eyes and suddenly their world becomes very, very quiet
I, uhhh…
Cherry slips her arms off of Karma’s shoulders and backs away a couple of steps
…and what about when I became the first woman to make contact with his bathing suit area? The way he collapsed it was like he needed to be sent back to the factory for a reset!
Turning towards a cooler to garb a bottle of water, either for some refreshment or possibly something to do to try and hide his awkwardness, Karma removes the cap and takes the smallest sip possible
I have to say you were right, that tackling the issue head-on was a much better idea than hoping that it would go away, or that somebody would help sort it out for me. And you can bet your bottom quarter that they didn’t think Dom Harter would be showing up in the first place, let alone coming to feed Chris Tryon some delicious iPad Thai.
Don’t tell me you were thinking of a suitable pun the entire time you were headed back here?
Karma pauses for a second
I’m going to plead the Fifth on that one.
Karma takes another, much longer sip, clearly looking to change the subject slightly
So after months of thinking they were going to get their way by bullying anyone who tried to stand up to them, now the New Kings know that I’ve got numbers on my side – not as many as they do, but enough to make them think twice. In fact, I think that things are going to start getting a little bit better from now on…
9th November 2016, Queens NYC
It’s not quite 8am and Johnny Karma is waking up, having had a refreshing night’s rest, and after yawning and stretching for a moment he reaches over to his bedside table to pick up his phone and switch it on – having switched it off the previous evening due to getting constantly spammed by updates about the Presidential Election
As he waits for his phone to power up, Karma sits up in bed and rubs his eyes, before running his hand down his face to brush his hand against a couple of days’ worth of stubble that he should probably shave once he’s up and out of bed…that it until he receives a barrage of message alerts and, checking the most recent alert he’s received he reads the message – and then his eyes widen for a moment, and the phone slips out of his hand and hits the duvet with a soft thud
At first Karma thousand yard stares at a spot in the wall for a few seconds – that is until he decides the best course of action to take at this exact moment in time is lie down once again, pull the duvet over his head, and a muffled groan of anguish can be heard emanating from beneath his goose down fortress of solitude
29th October 2016, Springfield IL
Karma continues what he was saying just a moment ago, as if that little cutaway did not actually happen
There’s one thing I wish I could see, though, and that’s Rother and his personal security team crawl back to Cannon and carmine and have to break the news to him that they pushed me too far, and I’m doing the one thing they were hoping I wouldn’t: push back.
Having a bunch of people looking to prove they have the biggest shlongs in the locker room by beating on a solitary opponent, that’s the sort of thing that goes with the territory. It’s happened many, many, many times before and will happen many, many, many times in the future so as much as it sucks to be on the receiving end of it, and believe me it sucks, at the end of the day it’s part of what the job.
But when you make things personal, going out of your way to be as much of a hurtful kaker as you can muster…
Taking a deep breath, Karma momentarily clams up, which causes Cherry to step forward once more to place a reassuring hand on his forearm
It’s okay…
It’s not, it’s really not, because their thinking they can get away with that means they think I won’t put an end to it. It means they think I’m weak, a pushover, someone who talks a good game but when it comes to it that’s all I have: talk.
Are they going to think that after what happened tonight?
Karma pauses to think about the answer, trying not to smirk at the thought of his answer
I get the feeling they’ll have second thoughts, that’s for sure.
5th November 2016, Atlantic City NJ
In spite of the calendar ticking over to November, it’s a warm day in Atlantic City as Johnny Karma sits on the beach in front of Boardwalk Hall, with the sounds of the sea as well as the people shopping on Playground Pier creating a rich cacophony of sound – meanwhile, on the boardwalk behind him, a couple of rubberneckers are trying to make a nuisance of themselves by waving to the camera, drawing some less-than-polite words from the camera operator, namely Cherry Baum
There’s a few things I’ve been asked ahead of the Fifth Anniversary Show, ranging from questions about how it feels to work for the company for three of those five years, making me one of the longest-tenured members of the roster, to whether I will ever get the name of Frontier Wrestling Arts correct, to whether I’ll stop ragging on Jersey. For future reference, my answers are “I guess I must be doing something right”, “I have, haven’t I?” and…
Karma looks over his shoulder to see another rubbernecker trying to make a name for themselves, this one giving the camera the middle finger and snickering about it – until Karma looks at him, at which point they make a quick exit
…no further comment necessary.
But, yeah, being in the same place for so long certainly makes you think that either you’re doing something right and you’re getting rewarded for it by having another contract drawn up to say “Thanks for what you’ve been doing, keep it up” just as much as it means the company’s doing well enough that you aren’t looking for work elsewhere because your cheques keep bouncing, if they arrive at all.
That’s the thing I’ve wanted to do from the first day I walked into the company, be it when I signed my first contract, or when I appeared at my first show in Elizabeth PA, or made my full debut just an hour’s walk from Madison Square Garden – and, yes, I did look this up at the time, because at the time I was thinking that if it took half an hour to walk from where I was to the Garden, things would be looking up. Of course, since then things have changed so much that I can walk to the Garden in just two minutes – in fact, one time I bet someone five bucks that I could be sat in my locker room, get up and jog to the Garden and get back to my locker room within five minutes, and I did…just.
Yet from those meagre beginnings, where my matches were taking place closer to the Barclays Center than the Garden, I always knew that I wanted to do things the right way.
Yet in the three years that I’ve spent in the ring for this company, I’ve seen so many people thinking that the right way is something that losers tell themselves to make an excuse for only getting so far before they run out of talent. I’ve seen The Murder, Chris Q, Jimmy Page, Zero McHannon, The New Kings – and both Cannon and Carmine were just as bad before they formed their alliance – all of this telling me that trying to do things the right way just gets you beaten down and then worn down until you either give up or give in.
Picking up a handful of sand, Karma lets the slightly soggy sand run through the fingers of one hand into the palm of the other, before tipping it onto the beach once more
That’s a lot of time for people to not realise there’s a third way: do something about it.
Since last year’s anniversary show, I’d like to think I’ve tried to do just that. I’ve called out Johnny Cannon for his desire to injure opponents to make himself feel like the big man, and I proved that he really isn’t. I was told I didn’t have a chance against Tony Carmine when I challenged him for the Pride Championship, and then I beat him to prove otherwise. There’s no dismissing what I’ve done, but the problem is that for a long time I was desperate to do things on my own, to be the lone wolf, even though anyone with a basic understanding of mathematics would know one person going against three is not going to work out for you, let alone going against five.
What’s more, my judgment was clouded by rage, because the things they said when I lost someone close to me that I loved…for a time I threw away any thoughts of doing things the right way, and instead wanted to do things the stupid way, giving them what they wanted while depriving me of what I needed.
And now that’s changed.
Karma holds up a couple of fingers, gauging where the wind is coming from
For too long I thought doing things the right way meant doing things one way, which is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different outcome. When I realised that the right way isn’t just a straight line from Point A to Point B, but a series of paths that start at Point A and finish at Point B but the route you take can make the journey very different, that’s where I knew what had to be done, and that’s where I looked for someone who wouldn’t just fight alongside me to put The New Kings in their place, but would fight just as dirty as they would. That’s why Chris Tryon is currently trying to avoid passing an Apple Store because it brings back painful memories for him.
If you watch the last show very carefully, and use the pause button with the speed and precision of a ninja, you’ll be able to pinpoint the exact moment it dawned on Anthony Rother that he’d gone too far and was going to have to accept what was coming to him – and in that moment, it’s worth asking what was going through his mind. Was he trying to work out which comment he made was the one which broke the camel’s back? Was he hoping that Marx or Tryon would rise up like something out of a bad slasher movie to protect him? Maybe he was thinking that he’d need to buy a new suit as the one he was wearing was ruined? What he was thinking isn’t important, the fact that he was thinking it is – because that’s the moment where things start to go against Rother, against The Usual Suspects, and against The New Kings, and all because of one simple thing: I made them doubt themselves.
All of which leads me to the match which will take place at the venue just behind me and…
Karma once again looks over his shoulder
…the guy making the “Call me” gesture in Miss Baum’s direction, somehow believing that she’s psychic and already knows his phone number.
Karma pauses for the briefest moment, giving a sly look to the camera, before continuing
Once again I will find myself at the numbers disadvantage, as myself and Noelle Smith take on Jason Marx and Chris Tryon, with Anthony Rother in their corner…
Probably sitting in their corner, because the last time I saw him he was having trouble standing.
Karma pauses, trying not to lose track of what he’s saying by chuckling at the thought of the grave misfortune that befell Rother’s bathing suit area
…and sitting on their shoulders the whole time will be their new friend, Doubt.
A few weeks ago they’d have swaggered into the ring, looking at me in the same way that someone looks at that toy which a dog has mauled beyond recognition but still sleeps with a paw draped around it, they’d have met with their pals Cannon, Carmine and Diamond backstage and had a laugh at my expense before making their way to the ring and thinking it was a matter of time before I folded.
Now that Marx, Tryon and Rother are realising that I’ve got more of a backbone than the three of them combined, the match won’t be their thinking it’ll be another chance to kick the dog, instead they’ll be afraid that the dog’s going to bite them. Again. Yet the whole time the match is taking place, every single time they find themselves worried that they’re going to have another bad day at the office, they need to remember something: it’s all Anthony Rother’s fault. If only he kept his mouth shut, if only he didn’t throw in with Cannon, Carmine and Diamond. If only…if only…if only.
What they should concern themselves isn’t what Rother should or should not have done, but what all three of them have been doing – because while I have continued to try my hardest to do things the right way, the three of them have made one bad decision after another and they will continue to make bad decisions right up to the moment where they can no longer remember what the right decision even looks like, because they mistook the wrong way for the easy way, and it’s going to cost them. The last time I bumped into them it cost them, even though that wasn’t even in the ring, but this time there’s going to be a referee and a timekeeper replacing somebody holding an iPad, but the results are going to be the same: the realisation that I’m mad as hell and I was done taking it months ago.
