Promo....

[Guest vitriol]

Shouting can be heard in the distance, but only from one man. Following each frantic scream there is a loud crack, as if metal striking wood. The light streams in at an angle, illuminating the trees and animals in the distance with golden glows. A squirrel scampers half-way down a tree, looks to one side and darts back upward. To the right, we can faintly see a man draped in green lunging forward, striking an object with what appears to be a sword; the object he strikes at is a tree.

 

“Ah! I will strike you down! Take that!” Dashing backward like a madman, Tristan Whitt spins to face his assailant; the aforementioned tree. His chest heaves rapidly as his lungs struggle to fill as soon as they empty. “Will you not die?!” He strikes forward as forcefully as he can, connecting in the cut already made, slicing the thin tree cleanly through. Salvation shines down on our hero as the top of the tree falls to the ground. Stabbing his sword into the ground, he kneels with his head bowed to say a small prayer for his vanquished foe. “May the light embrace you in your end.” Behind him a good way, a man in a tattered police officer’s uniform closes his eyes and sighs as he shakes his head.

 

“Reliving old battles again, Tristan?” Lifting his head solemnly, Tryst opens his eyes half-heartedly. The fire and the joy that inhabited his eyes…gone.

 

“I…I must do something to pass the time, Stillwell. It has grown much too solemn here. I crave….I crave action. Excitement. I crave adventure. Besides, evil comes in all forms. You should know that by now.” Stillwell, sighing with the composure of one who does it quite often, merely shakes his head.

 

“How could I possibly know that, Tristan? All you ever do is shoot arrows into tires, cut radios in half and scream that Nottingham is coming for you. To be honest, I’m a little concerned.”

 

“It is good,” Tristan replies, getting to his feet and lifting the tip of his sword from the ground, “that you care for my well-being; you needn’t worry, however. I have kept the demons at bay for now.” He flourishes a bit, then replaces the sword in its sheath at his side. “It is you who needs protection, friend.”

 

“Well, if you ask me, you’re just attacking shadows because you don’t have anything to do. There aren’t any demons. Except for boredom, that is.”

 

Tryst, his eyes widening, searches through his surroundings. “Demons?! Where!??”

 

“The ones you were just talking about.”

 

“Yes, where are they?”

 

Stillwell sighs again. He sighs a lot, as of late. Tristan, having left his chosen profession of wrestling, lacks for things to do. As such, he often diverts himself into memories of battles long fought. Whether real or fiction, no one can say, however…they are real enough to him. “There aren’t any, Tristan. That’s the point.”

 

Slowly, he puts down his sword. Not without glaring at Stillwell, of course. “You mustn’t trick me like that. I have to be able to focus when the real danger nears.”

 

“The real-!” Stillwell stifles a laugh as Tryst resumes his perimeter search. He tries failingly to be non-chalant, but then, The Sherwood Fable was never non-chalant. “Tristan, I didn’t think it was possible, but I do believe you’re more insane than when I met you. I mean, aside from what you did to that Brendan kid. I’ll never understand your motivation there.”

 

“He…” Tristan pauses for a moment of careful thought. Something very near amusement crosses his face, if only for an instant, and he quickly regains his perpetual composure. “He had fiendish tendencies, Stillwell. I had to be sure. Besides, I didn’t kill him.”

 

Red-faced and nearly collapsing with the effort of not laughing, mirth gets the better of Stillwell as he barks out a chorus of echoing laughter. In between trying to stop laughing and trying to regain his breath…”Yes….well, you might as well have! I….I’ve never seen a child so scared in my life! His pants were soaked, Tristan! SOAKED!”

 

Smiling wolfishly, Tryst begins his trek back to the main “base” of New Age Sherwood; an abandoned elementary school bus.

 

 

* * *

 

 

As he steps foot inside the bus, dust swirls around him like a radiance of earth. The frayed fragments of wires mark without a doubt the location of what used to be a radio, and papers scattered throughout the vehicle appear to be school papers belonging to children. Not far behind is Stillwell, ragged Police uniform the only semblance of respectability left for the once promising young man. Now the friend and confidant of perhaps a madman, he seems to find solace in the conviction of his companion. “What are you doing?”

 

Turning, surprisingly calm, Tristan looks at Stillwell in a very different way than he has in quite a long time. “Evil comes in many colors, friend, but my dreams are riddled with sameness. Always the same; monotone. That is why I rarely remember them…except…”

 

Intrigued, Stillwell sits. “Except what?”

 

A dangerous light enters Tristan’s eyes, and for the first time in many months they seem to glow with the intensity of a fire. “Except when the evil taunts me…it calls to me. It draws me towards it. Now…Now I dream in Silver…Gold…and Black.”

 

Stillwell, shuddering from the intensity in Tristan’s voice, stands and puts his hand on his friend’s shoulder. “…I’ll drive.”

[Crowe 0]

Ah, fucking excellent. Does this mean that one of my favourite wrestling characters ever will be returning to the fold (and not no showing )? I hope so, as I love this character, he's just so charismatic I find it impossible to not like him! Great work, which is your standard , keep it up.

[Dace59 0]

Ahh, the nutter is back. It's nice to see you havent lost anything either man. I hope you stick around as your character was really fun and some great stuff happend with him.

 

I don't know where you're taking this yet, but I can't wait to find out.

[Guest D. Lucretia]

Well... that was impressive, even if I don't know any of the story behind it. It still reads great.

[Guest Aecas]

I agree with Dace you haven;t lost your touch.

 

It'll be good to see Tryst make a return as he was always very entertaining.

[chirs3 0]

[the.weej 0]

Hmm, interesting. I would like to note that yes, indeed, Tryst is back with us for however long he stays again this time, but I believe Merc wanted it as an every-other show deal for a little while.

 

Tryst is such an odd character, and yet, whatever little background was ever written for him seemed... depressing. Maybe he's truly mad, but maybe he's just loney, or lost out in the middle of no-where for reasons he doesn't want to explain. And Stillwell is fascinating too, because much like Tryst, there isn't a whole lot known about him. There's so many possibilities here... I really hope that with this return, you take the oppertunity to explore as many as you can. I love your prose, btw. It's subtly different from just about anyone else's I've ever read in the SWF.

 

-Z

Edited April 7, 2004 by realitycheck