[The scene opens with the ocean, the waxing gibbuous moon, still nearly full, shining down from the cloudless starry sky. The lovely view of the night, enough to make poets and fans of purple prose sploosh in their prissy, pretty, pansy pantaloons, is cut out by a suddenly flash of blue, the camera adjusting from taking in the night sky to focusing on the source of the blue blaze.]
[It's none other than recently ascended (or would that be descended?) Evil Overlord and Bosslady Extraordinaire Kalinda Kriegsdottir. An orb of eldritch flame held in her gauntleted hand.]
[She tosses the ball harmlessly from hand to hand, then grips it like a basketball player about to make a three pointer before she smiles. She tears the orb in half and sends the two smaller orbs into nearby braziers, their prepared oily contents catching fire and illuminating the scene with a brighter light.]
[DTW's resident Necromancer Queen and World Champion is seated upon her throne of skulls and bones, her attire different than usual. Her pauldron has been replaced with something more spiky and sinister. Like if a tribal tattooed buggered one of those oversized World of Warcraft shoulderm pads and out popped a creepy kind skeletal looking black and silver baby that grew up on a diet of horse steroids. Also yes, I said shoulderm. That was totally on purpose. It's cute and I will not hear a mean word against it. Because I'm wearing a voice over headset. These headphones are thick as heck, you realize.]
[Her top is also different. The half 'n half design is gone, replaced by pure black, once again adorned with silver stylings meant to imitate bones. In this care a sternum and ribcage. She's still got the black cargo pants, but her kneepads are now stylized like jawless skulls, and the leg guards are a black matte material adorned with stylized silver ribcages.]
[She's also changed her hairstyle, pulling most of it back into a ponytail and leaving her bangs going to either side of her heart-shaped face. Kalinda Kriegsdottir smiles, showing off her fangs, and tilts her head, her bangs moving aside momentarily to show that she's got the beginnings of tiny horn nubs going on. *sniffle* My dark mistress is growing up and starting to blossom into true dragondom!]
[Next to her throne on a purple velvet pillow is the DTW World Championship, all polished and spiffy. Jokingly dubbed the "killer codpiece" the tribal design resembles a bearded lion's face composed of shapes resembling dragon's wings, a spider, and if you squint really hard a stabby bit that extends down the the groin that looks kind of like a demonic wasp. Kalinda's new attire aesthetic seems to be suited to match the style of the belt almost perfectly.]
[She beckons the camera forward and sits up upon her throne. She steeples her fingers and takes on a serious expression.
"Before we start things off I need to make something perfectly clear, because nobody seemed to get the full picture. When I said I was going to be a villain, y'all jumped to conclusions and immediately decided that I was going to immediately become some sort of puppy-kicking, baby-eating monstrosity that was going to be a dick to everybody for no reason."
[Kalinda extends six inches worth of forked tongue and blows a raspberry.]
"And that's just not true."
"You were thinking of what a villain is in the sense of professional wrestling. Some foul-mouthed, egomaniacal baddie that talks shit about the towns the events take place in, engage in the aforementioned puppy-kicking and baby-eating in order to be generally unlikeable fellows."
"Some arrogant goon who is so lacking in their confidence of their own abilities that they have to rely on their associates in order to win matches, rather than utilize their intellect, experience, and athleticism."
"And that's not me. That is never going to be me. At best I adopt the appearance and aesthetic of stylish sinister sorts, rather than some mustache-twirling Saturday morning cartoon villain douchebag."
[She gestures to herself and her new look.]
"A month ago I decided that I was done with the rest of the pro wrestling world. Everything that does not take place under the DTW can go fuck itself with a chainsaw made out of red hot cactuses for all I care."
"Every time I have attempted to reach out and try to accomplish something outside of DTW something shitty happens. Usually involving racism, speciesism, or people in charge who think that a contract only goes one way."
"It doesn't. A contract binds a federation to the wrestler just as much as it binds a wrestler to the federation. And when wrestling promotions decide that they're going to go and deviate from the contractually obligated terms that they laid down, I'm not going to put up with that bullshit."
[Kalinda pounds her gauntleted fist upon the arm of her throne, making the DTW World Title jump a little bit. She reaches out to put it back into place, her touch seeming almost like she's trying to calm and soothe the belt.]
"The only promotion that has never tried to fuck me, my friends, or my family over is DTW, and that's where I'm going to stay."
"I'm done playing the adventurer. I'm no longer going off on adventures looking to collect all the myriad wondrous trinkets. I'm not going to travel the world in search of new treasures and new foes to fight. I'm not going to delve into collecting a set of wrestling titles so that I have a dozen straps of leather and gold adorning my person."
"I'm done being the questing hero."
"I've decided to be the villain. The role-playing game style villain. The fantasy trope villain. The end boss. The Evil Overlord. The mastermind that lurks in their lair sending out minions to do their bidding and awaiting a party of heroes to walk through the series of perils, minibosses, and traps that they've set up before they finally face the supreme force of darkness."
[The camera zooms out a bit as Kalinda raises her arms, allowing it to get a good look at her upon her throne. It looks like she's on the roof of some sort of castle somewhere, with crenellations and everything.]
"I'm not going to go out, hat in hand like some Dickensian beggar-child going "Please sir, can I have a spot on your roster?" any longer."
[She even does the little British accent.]
"I can count on one hand the number of times that somebody has asked me to take part in their special wrestling event, and I can count on one extended middle finger the number of wrestling federations that have asked me to be a part of their roster."
[Of course she flips off the camera talking about her middle finger.]
"That federation is DTW, the only place where I've ever had a title match take place without any sort of bullshit shenanigans. It's the only place where I've ever held a title."
"I wasn't saying that I was going to turn into some kind of colossal hooting dickhole. I was saying that I was going to make DTW my Evil Overlord Lair and that all the wandering heroes of the world would go out and gather their trinkets of wonder and renown, only for me to crush them, see them driven before me, hear the lamentations of their women, et cetera, et cetera."
"I'm not going to go out there and win all the championships. Instead I'm staying here in DTW and letting the champions come to me."
[She smiles, all teeth once again, and settles down on her throne.]
"They come here, they challenge me for my title, and when their journey inevitably ends in failure the DTW World Championship is elevated by the prestige that their titles had. I show myself to be the superior wrestler, my championship the superior title, the DTW the superior wrestling federation."
"I'm not going to do that by being a complete and utter wanker and turning my matches into cheatyfaced clusterfucks where my minions run out and do all the work for me."
"I'm the champion. I need to be the one doing all the work to defend my title."
[But we WILL totes surround the ring on occassion if we smell even a whiff of shenanigans. I'm an evil undead eldritch abomination that pretends to be a clown. I know what shenanigans smell like. As well as most internal organs in varying states of decay. Look, the android wanted a body farm and I had an afternoon free to get my bits hacked out. Don't judge.]
"Which is why things HAVE changed a little bit in regards to the way I do things in the ring."
"Back when DTW started we barely had a dozen regular grapplers worth more than the bottle of Mat Acid that'd be needed to spray down the ring after every match to prevent staph infections. So even though this is a deathmatch promotion, I was doing my best to make sure that I was holding back a bit. That I wouldn't be hitting people too hard and damaging the company. That I wouldn't be breaking my toys before I was done playing with them. But now? Shit, I don't even know how many people are on the DTW roster. "
[Kalinda then shrugs going into her next line.]
"We had the Carnage Carnival, which had 24 people in it and that wasn't even the whole roster. People are showing up, wrestling matches, wandering off, being transferred to and from Iron Japan. DTW's in a constant state of flux even with the open door policy being slammed shut."
"If I have a little whoopsie and somebody ends up with a severed buttock that requires 2000 stitches, a blood transfusion, leeches, and rehabilitation to learn how to walk again it's not going to make or break DTW anymore."
[The dragoness pushes herself up off the chair with one arm and makes a slashing motion over one buttock with the taloned fingertip of her left index finger and mimes catching the excised buttock.]
"At the same time I'm also getting sick and fucking tired of being set the fuck on fire every single goddess-damned match because y'all biscuitheads have it stuck in your underfunded public education filled brains that in order to win a match you have to cause as much painful, dire, long term damage as possible. That you have to wound me, mark me, scar me in order to beat me."
"I'm pissed off that Erik Holland of all people is the first person that's decided to bring this up. Because seriously, for a dude that's so well-read he manages to be so fuckin' dim at times. But then again prior to Kawamata giving me the best match of my career, all my defenses were against Riddick, Teiji, and Devereaux. The lot of 'em forgot to get in line when they were handing out brains and instead filled their empty noggins with a crusty sock, some dog shit, and a bunch of sour grapes."
"Running at me like a murderous psychopath isn't a good idea. It's like being told "bring me something to beat you with" by an abusive parent and running outside and ripping off a tree branch and going 'Yeah, go on Mom-Dad, club me to death! Bash my little fucking brains in!'"
"Kawamata learned that the hard way."
[Kalinda smirks and her smile widens as for a few moments she mentally replays highlights of her match with Beloved Junior Mascot-Chan.]
"If people are going to use fire in every match I have, well then so am I. If you're going to set me on fire then I'm going to set me on fire too. And my coldfire heals me more than the normal fire hurts me."
[She calls into her hand a ball of blue flame and begins absently tossing it up in the air and catching it.]
"People are trying to play a game of continuously escalating violence against me, and that's something that is never going to work out in anybody's favor but mine. Because for fuck's sake I've got a limitless portal to a plane of eldritch, physics-defying fire spliced in to my digestive and respiratory systems. Escalating beyond "biological flamethrower that makes thermodynamics go and cry in a corner" starts getting into uncomfortable territory. Territory where the police and military start swatting your hand and going 'no touchy.'"
[She turns the hand holding the flaming orb over and gives herself a swat with the other before flinging the orb back over the back of the throne without looking. There's an explosion of blue flame and of course a proper Wilhelm Scream.]
"What? It's one of Claudia's clowns. They like getting blown up and set on fire."
[Kalinda snorts, chuckles, and shakes her head.]
"I'm not going to go easy on anybody, but I'm only going to go as far as anybody is willing to take it. Well, unless they've decided to be a thoroughly unpleasant sack of the stinkiest batshit, an unrepentant douchebag, or somebody who puts pineapple on pizza. Then they've earned the excess violence."
[From the expressions on her face for some reason the bosslady seems to regard putting pineapple on pizza as the most grievous of those sins.]
"Kawamata threw everything he had at me, and so I threw everything I had back at him. It's not my fault Generic-Ass Fighting Spirit Man #2356 has a smaller sack of things than I do."
[Kalinda facepalms, realizing what she just may have insinuated.]
"Eww. No. Not like that, you weirdos."
"I gave him everything I had, and I got booed for it. Had commentary shitting all over me for it."
"I mean the crowd I can understand. Masatake's their fuckin' homeboy. He's one of them. He was literally a dude in the audience that stepped up and smacked a bitch and got forcibly dragged into pro wrestling."
[Kalinda holds up one hand and backhands it with the other giving a proper form demonstration on just how exactly one smacks a biscuit.]
"He's from their home country, and for a lot of them their own home town. So I totally get them being bummed out when I start pulling out brand new shit that I've never used before."
"But the announce team. Fucking christ, you guys, if you goofs start ragging on me like the UWA used to do, as if I've personally come into your house and pissed in your cereal, you know what I'm going to do?"
[Kalinda leans forward upon the throne and growls.]
"I will come to your house and piss in your motherfucking Sugar Smacks, because if I'm going to have a commentary team talk shit about me, I'm going to earn that ire, goddammit. Then you can have pissy cereal on top of the salmonella you get because the Angry Orange decided to take a chainsaw to food safety regulations."
[Back to normal seating.]
"Yeah, Kawamata's Yo's countryman, yeah, Kawamata lives down the hall from O'Flaherty, but seriously guys. This is your career. Be impartial, you wankers, because I will send Claudia down there to make sure you behave. She's even managed to pick up what I think is a KGB uniform if I ever need her to play Minister of Media Relations again. The medals she's made of clown versions of Lenin, Stalin, and Karl Marx are absolutely horrifying. Please don't make me use them."
[THEY ARE NOT HORRIFYING! THEY ARE WONDERFUL AND BEAUTIFUL SYMBOLS OF CLOWN COMMUNISM, GOSH DARNIT ALL TO HECK!]
"Because that was the first sign that something was rotten in the state of Denmark in UWA, when the commentary team started talking shit about me for no reason. And some of the things stated are dangerously close to restricting my moveset."
[They ragged on her fire breath, ragged on her tail, ragged on her being a big ol gal, ragged on her healing. Heck, maybe they were just on the rag. Period. Tee hee. Menstruation puns.]
"It's disheartening immediately after you dedicate your life to a company to have the voices of that company running you down."
"My fucking last two opponents have done a better job of talking me up in the last month than the commentary team has, and that's something I find to be sad. That Erik "World's Thirstiest Title Bitch" Holland is doing a better job of promoting me to the fans than two people who are paid to do exactly that."
"That and keep track of which movie references goes with which one of Holland's special moves. Because seriously, Erik, there's no fucking rhyme or reason to why anything is called anything! Take a popular hard hitting move and slap the title of a random B movie on it. Reach into a bag and pull out names!"
[Kalinda has actually prepared two bags, out of which she pulls out small slips of paper. She's got props, y'all, so you know she's taking things seriously. Well, not seriously as it's meant to be humorous. GAH! YOU KNOW WHAT I MEAN!]
"A fisherman buster is now House On Haunted Hill. A spear is From Hell It Came. Remember that time when everybody and their grandmother was doing the Vertebreaker? Well those days are back and now it's Friday the 13th: Jason Goes to Hell; The Final Friday."
[The Evil Overlord rolls her eyes.]
"Come on, Erik! Have some fucking sense of pride and thematics in your naming schemes! Give them a reason to be there! There's a reason why Koko B. Wares' Ghostbuster is one of the most beloved finishing move names of the 80's, because it's a pop culture reference on a kick ass move that just so happens to be a Brainbuster!"
"But then again your finisher is… well… it's silly is what it is. Apparently it works for you somehow, but I don't see any beauty, finesse, or majesty in what is essentially a glorified fireman's carry."
"The motion's probably been enhanced from your misspent youth working in B-movie theaters, hefting trash bags of stale popcorn no longer fit for sale up onto your shoulders and flinging it into the dumpster. Or more likely taking it home and using it to fill your studded leather beanbag couch, which you attempted to convince the neverending string of potential girlfriends was the coolest thing ever and were completely baffled when the reveal of the thing did not immediately acquire you a single sexing, let alone the several sexings you were expecting to get."
[She pauses to let the stomachs of the fans settle after the mental image of Eric Holland having sex on a studded leather beanbag couch stuff with stale popcorn. Mmmm mmm mmm! Doesn't that image just make you thirsty? For a purgative.]
"This is why I'm going to have to beat you, Erik. Not merely because you're another questing hero, a wrestler with a world championship and multiple titles from outside DTW, but because… well… you're a dork."
"You're a dork with no sense of drama, no sense of thematics, no sense of majesty! You are the clumsy, klutzy adorkable main character type. Full of grandiose plans, but always failing in the execution."
"And your inexplicable main character luck is precisely how you ended up here. You didn't win your Carnage Carnival division, old sport. Logically if anybody should've gotten a title shot after Kawamata it should have been Asockinmydesert Zoboomafoo. But no, you just clumsily stumbled blindly into being awarded a title shot."
[Kalinda squinches her eyes shut and begins flailing around like Mr. Magoo.]
"And that's not something I like, Erik. It's nothing against you personally, it just has me worried for DTW. There are commentators trashing me, they closed the open door policy, people are calling for a restriction of my moveset, and now we're handing out title opportunities to dudes who failed to actually win shit."
"DTW's getting closer and closer to being one of those shitty scumbag wrestling federations that I swore off of participating in. I don't want this federation to turn into a wretched place to work, lead by an ambulatory pile of pus with the personality of toejam and the moral compass of horse smegma. Mired in shitty matches rife with interference, people getting title shots after losing matches because they're favored by the dickish authority figure. And racism. Racism everywhere."
[Kalinda picks up the DTW title to be in the position of the Woody to her Buzz Lightyear as she makes the memetic pose.]
"And that, Erik is why you have to die. Mwahahaha! Insert clap of thunder."
[And with that the clear sky behind erupts with a bolt of lightning cascading spikily down from the sky. MECHA-Kalinda's evocation training is paying off!]
"Metaphorically of course, but I can't resist hamming it up just a little bit as DTW's Evil Overlord and Necromancer Queen."
[She gets a wide eyed, innocent look on her face and looks around at the throne and the caste rooftop.]
"Just like with Kawamata I cannot let the DTW World Champion go to somebody for whom it will just be another decoration, just another jewel in the crown. Despite her filthy, trashy, violent ways DTW is a classy lady who deserves to be the focus of her champion's life. Not just another momentary fling."
[Kalinda cuddles the DTW World Championship, who definitely does not look like a classy lady. It kind of looks like it wants to plunge its sharp edges into the tender flesh of a wound-be title thief and suck out all their blood and innards.]
"It doesn't matter who you beat somewhere else, Erik. It doesn't matter how big, how bad, how nasty, how skilled, how talented, how durable they were. Because they weren't me. Nothing in this world of professional wrestling can prepare you to face me, and you know it."
"We've faced each other before, Erik, and you lost. You lost bad. Both times. But unless you want to sleep out in the garden shed, you better not say that the Blood Bowl tournament match was because Tiami was there that you lost that one. And even if you did the unthinkable and told the love of your life that you'd do better in the ring without her, I also don't have to deal with Claudia's goofy-ass self pulling shenanigans."
[MY RUMP-PULLING SHENANIGANS ARE WONDERFUL AND WHOLESOME AND A PANACEA TO THE MISERY OF CHILDREN, ADULTS, AND HOUSEPETS THE WORLD OVER!]
"The other time was the Railway Rumble, which you and the whole of Badd Breed managed to lose despite pulling a Dogs of War and having like half the goddamned people in the match being Badd Breed."
"You managed fourth, Eric. In a match where you ought to have had all the cards from sheer numbers advantage. Sure, you didn't want to go about it that way, have Badd Breed be out for their own selves, but that's the kind of dorky, doofy, heroic adventurer bullshit that makes you unfit to be the person that leads DTW into the future."
"I don't see DTW doing well with a hero at the helm. Fair. Trusting. Naive. Setting yourself up to be ripe for the picking for whichever dark and sinister sneak is looking to stab you in the back. Happy to take the title off your hands while you deal with the matter of your lifeblood draining out from the knife slipped between your ribs."
[Despite having no sleeves, Kalinda manages to pluck a knife out of thin air, which she once again tosses behind the throne another one of my clowny compadres uttering a classic stock sound effect scream. You wouldn't believe how long it takes to train them to make those noises instinctively when wounded every time without fail.]
"DTW's World Champion needs to be somebody who can moderate things like this. Somebody who is not an egomaniacal crabass out to elevate themselves above the federation, using DTW as a stepping stone to further glories. Somebody in the shades of grey who isn't a lily white goober unsuspecting of foul play who is going to get their ass handed to them at the first sign of deceit, cheatyhax, and treachery."
"And that somebody is not you, Erik."
[Kalinda rises from her throne, picking up her championship and settling it gently upon her shoulder, as if she were a mother handling her infant child.]
"Eventually somebody will come along that may be worthy of taking the DTW World Championship from my hands and going on to lead this company into a beautiful and glorious future."
"But even then they're going to have to beat me. Which means that I could end up being DTW World Champion for a very, very long time."
"And that's not a problem. I'm biologically immortal. If I have to compete and defend this title until your children's children's children are old and grey, I will. That exactly what I will do. This is the commitment I have when I said that I would dedicate my life to DTW."
[The Titan of Terror's amber eyes begin to glow as she strides forward, accusatorial jabbing a finger at the camera as she moves closer.]
"You can't do that, Erik. You can't even promise to be here ten years down the road. In a decade's time you will probably be so broken and worn down you'll likely long since have been forced to retire from professional wrestling. Or perhaps you'll be stinking up the joint in an attempt to recapture the glory of your past that you once had, but no longer can grasp due to your failing body."
"I'm biologically immortal, Erik. Not only am I not going to crumble with age, but I'm only going to get bigger, get stronger. I'm two inches taller now than I was when I started wrestling for DTW. Did you notice that?"
[Kalinda tilts her head, as if listening for a spoken answer from thousands of miles away.]
"Because DTW didn't."
"It wasn't until Tokyo Gore Noir 9 that they remembered to go and change the graphic, even though I've been 7'1" for the better part of a year now. Though by this point I'm probably closer to 7'1.5"."
"This is why each member of the DTW roster that's faced me for the World Championship fights like they're trying to end my career. Because they know this. They know that if they can't beat me now, if they can't keep me down, if they can't weaken me and keep me down on their level that I will ascend."
[The camera begins to move up and back as Kalinda begins to climb a staircase before her and behind the camera.]
"That in time I will become more powerful than they can ever imagine. That I will rise to be something that even with all the world's useless clown brothers, bald beardy fucks, nihilistic shitgibbons, whatever the fuck Ayogabbagabba Zamboni is, nonfunctional punk rocker alcoholics, jewfroed Donald Trump fanboys, and narcisistic edgelords, both those who steal their names from Vin Diesel movies and those who steal their names from pro wrestling legends whose leopard spotted boots they are not fit to lace up will be able to defeat me."
[Kalinda snorts in disgust as she walks to the side, past the camera, which turns to follow her.]
"This is what I am, Erik Holland."
[She spreads her arms wide.]
"This is what I bring to the table."
[The camera begins to pan backwards into thin air. We totally strapped a camera to Spark, Kalinda's little dragon-elemental muse familiar thingy.]
"The potential for an ageless immortal as DTW World Champion."
[Lightning flashes again, the bright light revealing that the stairs, floor, and wall of the castle as oddly textured and a strange off-white in color.]
"What do you have the offer this company and these fans as Champion in comparison to me, with your commitments elsewhere, your frequent inability to plan, and your dorky nature?"
"All you can do is offer the break down and decay of your finite reserves of strength and healing. Your eventual decay into physical degradation and mental senescence. The sacrifice of a human life on an altar of pain."
[An eldritch purple glow surrounds Kalinda, whisps of purest black seeming to float off from the edges and scamper into the deeper darkness.]
"And Erik? I'm the one holding the dagger and the hourglass."
[And from nowhere she's managed to produce a literal dagger and hourglass. She walks up the stairs to where a stuffed dummy with a face made up to look like Holland with her new haircut drawn on in marker and wearing a Badd Breed t-shirt.]
"What do you have to give, Erik?"
[She snarls this at the camera and then turns to the dummy, laying it flat on the runed stone block.]
"Because I can give them eternity."
[She jams the dagger into effigy's gut, sawing it back and forth in jagged motions. The hourglass has run out of sand and she leaves the dagger in the stuffed victim as she throws her arm wide.]
[The camera pulls back as the glow begins to suffuse the castle around her, revealing a literal palace of bone. As the unholy light spreads over the fortress made of once living matter we can see the shape that it's taken. That of a massive horned, fanged skull with A Zeppelin Called Trouble docked between the horns. The camera soars higher and higher, back further and further until Kalinda is a brilliant speck of bright purple amidst a see of lavender glowing bone.]
"I am a dragon."
[With a thunderclap a bolt of lightning reveals the extent of Kalinda's domain. She doesn't merely have a skull-shaped castle, but a whole goddess-darned island chain in the shape of a dragon's skeleton. She raised that shortly after her promo last month, by the way.]
"I am forever."
[She concludes with a whisper as the entire island chain and its structure made from the ancient husks of undersea creatures momentarily burns with blue and lilac fire for a moment before everything vanishes, plunging the feed into black.]
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