PROMO: Video Killed The SWF Star

[Toxxic 0]

Those few people who ever get to see Nathaniel Kibagami’s house in Phoenix are usually surprised. These people will normally have a pre-conceived idea of the lifestyle of an SWF wrestler, especially those on a big-money contract like they’d presume Nathaniel to be. What they find is something of a shock - a mid-sized house in the Phoenix suburbs; a decent-sized lawn and a small swimming pool, sure, but none of the flash that might be expected. For far too long, Kibagami spent his money on other things. There are no Rolls or expensive sports cars in the garage or left conspicuously on show on the drive. No infra-red controlled gates or attractive Phillipino maids. Upon entering the most prominent feature is the living room with its comfortable leather sofa, widescreen plasma TV... and a wall of videos.

 

Kibagami sits back on the sofa and closes his eyes. He got used to this place when he was rehabbing, grew accustomed to waking up in the morning with the same room around him, being able to go downstairs and make his breakfast as and when and how he likes it. After so many years on the road, wrestling in front of the fans all over America and indeed the world, it was a luxury. Normally he wouldn’t have bothered coming back here, he would have headed straight over to Edmonton from Vancouver and had done with. But he likes this house. And after his loss to Danny Williams for the World Title he’d gained such a short time previously, he wants to be somewhere he feels comfortable. He’ll head to the airport and catch a flight back to Canada on Thursday, but for now he likes the sun here.

 

A muffled thump tells him that the mailman has called, and he goes to see what has landed on his mat this morning. There was a small pile when he got back that had accumulated rapidly in his absence; he resigns himself to yet more junk mail today, and sure enough the brightly-coloured leaflets are there as usual... but there is also an oblong package wrapped in brown paper and with the address written on in unfamiliar, untidy handwriting. The size and shape is familiar however, and as Nathaniel tears the paper off his suspicions are indeed borne out - it is a video, plain and unmarked. Curiously, the River Dragon takes it to his VCR and seats himself back down. For all his efforts he has been unable to procure some of his most desired matches, and occasionally some well-meaning fan will pass a video on to SWF Head Office to be sent to him; a particularly obscure Japanese show, perhaps; once or twice old camcorder footage of one of his early matches, before he was on TV, taken by someone at the time and rediscovered years later only to realise that the curtain-jerker that day is now one of the most notorious names in North American wrestling. Leaning back, Kibagami presses ‘Play’.

 

It does appear to be a home video of some sort, although the picture is fuzzy. Then suddenly something moves, and what was a shapeless blur of colour changes into the recognisable shape of a face pulling back from the lens... and Nathaniel involuntarily stiffens, because the face is well-known to him.

 

“Hi,” Toxxic says to the camera. The psychotic energy from Smarkdown appears to have gone; instead the straight-edger seems drained and deadened. The cuts across his face from where Nathaniel threw him through the glass doors of the General Motors Place - Nathaniel briefly recalls the screaming fit Zenon had over that, and a small smile quirks his lips - are crusted over. The grey eyes are heavy-lidded and lethargic, although still rimmed with eyeliner. Whatever fire it was that allowed Toxxic to go out and compete after their altercation, then get up from an ADF II off a ladder and come hunting for him has evidently burnt out and taken its toll.

 

“I don’t want you to worry and think that I’m going to come to your house and try and kill you,” Toxxic continues to the lens. “Just consider this direct mail. The internet is a wonderful place, Nathaniel; look hard enough and you can find anyone. Except me, of course. I don’t have a sunny pad in Phoenix; would you like to see my home?” Toxxic reaches towards the camera and apparently picks it up, then scans it around what appears to be a motel room.

 

“I’m still in Vancouver,” the British accent tells him. “I don’t live anywhere, Nathaniel. I’m an Englishman abroad. I don’t have ties to anything here; there is nothing holding me in this country, or on this continent, and sometimes I wonder why I don’t just up and leave. It’s not like the SWF would miss me.”

 

The camera finishes its circuit and is apparently settled back onto the tabletop where it was originally resting. Toxxic withdraws his hand again, and continues.

 

“I knew you’d play this video, Nathaniel, because in some ways we’re very much alike. Videos are useful. They can show you where you’re going wrong, and can help you to find out what your opponent is thinking. Well, this one is going to be a little different. I’m going to tell you where you’re going wrong... and what you’re thinking.” Toxxic rubs his hand over his mouth absent-mindedly, and blinks his eyes a couple of times.

 

“After you cost me my title against Janus - and you did, Nathaniel, make no mistake, not only by injuring me but also through the fact that you are responsible for Janus in the first place-” Toxxic waves the digression away, and carries on. “After that, I came looking for you. I wanted to hurt you, to cripple you, I admit that. But then I reconsidered. I thought long and hard, and I realised that what I wanted to do to you was to make you suffer what I’d suffered - the loss of a title, of something that you’d fought for and prized over anything else. And I realised that I wasn’t needed for that.”

 

Kibagami realises that he’s leaning forward, as if poised for flight or to leap up and rip the Striaght-Edge Sensation’s throat out. Toxxic is of course unaware of Nathaniel’s reaction and continues on, tired grey eyes staring out from underneath a forehead crusted with red scabs.

 

“Why did you come back, Nathaniel?” he asks, seeming to look out of the plasma screen directly at the message’s intended recipient. “Do you even know? I think I do, now. You came back to win the World Title, but you don’t know why you came to win it. I do. It all comes back to Edwin MacPhisto, the man who I saw on my TV screen and who made me realise that yes, it IS possible for American fans to love someone from a different country. I used to watch the SWF before I joined, Nathaniel. I know that you wanted to bring Edwin down. Eventually you had to trap him in a Last Man Standing Cage match to do it. You came back simply to do that - and you did it.”

 

Toxxic isn’t shouting; he isn’t swearing; he isn’t deliberately mispronouncing people’s names or threatening nearby SWF officials or staff. He is simply talking to a camera, speaking what he believes to be the truth.

 

“But that wasn’t enough, was it?” he continues. “Because Edwin had managed something you never did; he managed to become World Champion. That’s why you came back and went for the World Title, Nathaniel; you wanted to prove to yourself and everyone else that you could do what Edwin did. But what I don’t think you considered was what was going to happen next.”

 

A grim smile briefly flashes across the straight-edger’s face. Not the trademark lopsided grin, but a small, involuntary gesture. Toxxic is saying this to himself as much as to Kibagami; this is a cautionary tale as much as it is a judgement.

 

“Winning the title is one thing. Defending it is another, as I’m sure you’ve now realised. Danny Williams, for all his faults, still wants that title for what it is - you just wanted it for what having it signified, and now you’ve managed that you no longer have the same desire.” Toxxic raises his hand and idly scratches a scab with his thumbnail, but his eyes don’t leave the camera. “Your time in the Federation is done. You don’t belong here any more. And I will not tolerate your presence, getting in my way when I have my own business to attend to.”

 

Toxxic’s voice hasn’t changed; it is still the calm, factual delivery that it was at the start. But it is clear now that there is an option of something else - the fires that fuel this man may be burning low at the moment, but soon enough Toxxic will be back to his normal self, using his anger as a shield and a weapon against the world.

 

“Don’t let Smarkdown fool you, Nathaniel. Danny Williams made my point for me - that little bash on the head I gave you afterwards was the exclamation mark. But things have changed now. I will not make your mistake - I will not carry your memory with me and constantly measure myself against you. If I see you I will do what I originally set out to do last Monday - and that is to cripple you in any way I can, in the ring or out of it. And Nathaniel, if you think that I can’t carry out my threat... if you think that I will put up with your broken-down carcass mocking me with its presence for one moment longer than I have to... if, above all, you think that I will rest until I have totally removed you from my life...”

 

Ever so slightly, the right-hand side of Toxxic’s mouth creeps upwards into what just might be a humourless grin.

 

“...well... I think you can guess the rest.”

 

One hand reaches out towards the camera, and the screen goes black. But Nathaniel Kibagami stares at it for a long time afterwards anyway.

[Toxxic 0]

This promo has not (as yet) been approved by Kibs, but it might take me a while to get hold of him and I want to get the ball rolling.

 

So if it suddenly disappears, you'll know it's because Silent actually has a multi-million dollar mansion or something, and I just didn't know.

[Dace59 0]

Well, it may not be canon, but it's very cool man. Really nice work, and if you can keep Kibs around and showing to carry things thing off it should be great.