Post by anthonycaffrey on Jan 27, 2021 23:26:30 GMT -5
“You ever plan a really fun thing, and then you have to cancel it?”
The camera captures one half of the XHF Tag Team Champions standing by himself near the polar bear enclosure. Very notably, there is no Radu Matei anywhere in sight.
“I mean, that’s been pretty much this whole past year, right? We’ve all had that. And now, now I’ve got a lot on my plate. I’m running a company full time and doing everything that comes with that, and still actively competing as champion. Knowing how much Radu loves bugs, I figured he’d just absolutely love the zoo up here, so we picked a day to just fuck around. One of my favorite things about working with him is that there’s so many days where it isn’t work. Just two guys having a good time, you know?”
The 4-degree Fahrenheit weather contributes to the visible breath that comes from Caffrey as he takes a deep exhale. The champion is bundled up to the extremes.
“I don’t know Radu’s health status for Sunday. He’s hurt. That’s why he didn’t accept the award. I had hoped to hear good news after I got off the stage, but well… I didn’t. He’s hurt. He’s hurt real bad. I’ve seen him fucked up multiple times, and as a team that prides itself on our endurance…no, as a someone who has only been back and forth between the arena and the hospital and came here for a break from my worries, well... we might just be me on Sunday.”
Caffrey shakes his head. It is not news he was expecting to report.
“But Caffrey, all those things you said on stage... yeah, that’s what I do for a living, folks. I’m a professional wrestler first and a professional talker second. I’ve bought a house from my ability to talk like I’m the biggest man on the block. The amount of people who put Fuel for the Fire on their calendar just because I laid out a challenge to our X-Crown champion and the king of a dumpster fire is quite a lot. That Jason would go along and add his own challenge off-script is gasoline.”
Caffrey pauses.
“I was expecting ‘I’ll be okay’. I stood up there knowing that Radu and I vs. the world, I take Radu and I every single time. He’s a warrior, I’m a warrior, and I’m not kidding when I say that we love going to war together. It is so nice to have someone in your corner, someone who believes in you in times like these. I’ve got him, and then I have the thousands of fans who have sent messages from all over the world, and the ones who fill up our socially-distanced seats every episode of FIRESIDE."
Caffrey lowers his mask and points directly to the camera. You can tell he means every word he says.
“You all kept me burning bright in what was a year that never stopped spinning, a year of the highest of highs and the lowest of lows. Thank you.”
“As much as I would like the world to pause for a few days, the sun comes up and the world still spins, and I’ve got two teams on the horizon on Sunday: NPW’s Dark Stars and Dark Novas. Four… time travelers? Really? Again?”
Caffrey makes a snide reference to Anna Seldon and Lisa Daniels, the time-traveling tag team the Purple Emperors beat after winning the Tag Team Annihilator at End of Days.
“On one hand, Terminatrix and Commandtrix, and on the other, Kono and Niko. Now pop quiz for those of you at home: one team has two wrestlers that are exactly 150 pounds soaking wet each, and one team has two wrestlers that are exactly 225 pounds each. To make things more confusing, they all wear all-black military-style duds, meaning dear God, fashion must be dead 50,000 years from now.”
You can see it in the change in body language. There is still a worried Caffrey underneath, but what he’s doing right now is what he does best: performing.
“Can you name which team is which without looking it up?”
Caffrey takes a performative lean forwards towards the camera. He pauses for effect, before moving one of his hands towards the camera. He lifts the part of his glove covering his wrist, revealing that he’s written a note to remember.
“If you guessed that Niko and Kono are the Dark Novas, you guessed wrong! Too bad, so sad. I know both of these teams feel like futuristic copy-and-paste jobs of one another, so no worries if you also can’t figure it out. I learned it by studying up and figuring out that Kono is the one that beat Wellington Dunne at All That Glitters… which, let’s be honest, as much as I love Dunne, isn’t much of an accomplishment…”
Caffrey puts his gloved hands up in the shape of a heart for his old AVA partner.
“...and Niko, who got his ass beat so bad by Adam Sanders on the same night, the night that the Purple Emperors first formed, that Sanders now thinks he can come for the XHF Tag Team of the Year. As for Sanders, I have no comment on him filing paperwork at this time, we’ll see what he can do without the fat, bloated self-important gasbags of the AWF machine backing him.”
For some reason, the anti-AWF sentiment comes off more biting than usual. He has made a plenty big comment even by claiming he’s saying nothing.
“Then you have Terminatrix and Commandtrix, the actual Dark Novas, whose accomplishments on a Network level could also be fit in an upside-down teaspoon. I appreciate the courage it takes to step up, ladies, and that triple rainmaker you’ve got looks like it hurts real bad. You did the work, you earned your way here, and as someone with an Open Door Policy who wants this to succeed, I applaud you and the work of your family members---”
Caffrey puts a finger up. It’s not his middle, but he’s clarifying the situation he already knows.
“--yeah, that’s a thing: family members. Terminatrix is married to Niko. And you saw the four of them talking together, as they seem to worship or at least follow some asshole named Shakaar… they’re family. They’re going to be working together to bring home the gold.
Caffrey takes a deep breath.
“It’s four-on-one.”
Usually conscious of where he puts his hands, Caffrey removes his glasses to rub his eyes with his fingers. The situation is stressing him out.
“Fuck.”
He takes a short walk around the polar bear enclosure. The camera pans away from him to focus on the bear that’s now out, walking around the space. We can see Caffrey looking in, taken aback by the majestic beast. He doesn’t even address the camera as he keeps looking at it.
“I love polar bears, man. They’re beautiful creatures, they can literally swim for days on end with their stamina. Did you know they’re actually black? I was looking forward to this zoo trip because the one in Philadelphia died. Coldilocks was the oldest polar bear in the world. Most of them live to be 23, Coldi lived to be 37. What an animal.”
He points across the way at the electronic gate.
“When I was researching the trip, I couldn’t help but notice all of the security around this exhibit. Now this polar bear here is named Cranbreary… gotta love the puns, man I’m a phuckin’ sucker for a good pun…”
You get the sense Caffrey’s smiling under his mask a bit, with his voice getting brighter as well.
“...but why all the security, right? Philadelphia didn’t have this for Coldilocks. As it turns out, the security is there for a good reason. In the nineties, this zoo had a different polar bear; its name was a little less cute: Binky. Binky was an orphan, which I can appreciate, and every story the locals have told me indicates that Binky took no shit.”
Caffrey sits on a bench to tell the rest of the story.
“A woman looking for a close-up photo of Binky climbed over two different safety rails to get a picture of our boy. As you can imagine, play stupid games, win stupid prizes, like a family of time-traveling space invaders coming to a head with an emperor, and this woman suddenly found out the hard way: Binky stuck his head through the bars and grabbed her in his jaws.”
Caffrey puts two hands up.
“I know what you’re thinking, let me stop you right there: this story doesn’t end like Harambe.”
He continues.
“The woman escapes the encounter with a broken leg and some bite wounds. There are no calls to put down Binky: he’s doing his own thing, she put herself in a dangerous situation, like the Novas and Stars injecting themselves into 2020 and 2021 and trying to take championships that are inspiring thousands of people to keep going through a global pandemic.”
He’s rallying now.
“Less than two months later, two very drunk teenagers strip down in front of Binky’s cage for a little swim. Binky has other fucking plans: he wraps his jaw around one of them, and he won’t let go. One of them pulls his friend away, but Binky has once again broken a potential opponent’s leg. Again, no calls to put down Binky, even the police are on his side, telling reporters that they won’t ask for any jailtime for the kid, because Binky already has his pound of flesh.”
Caffrey laughs.
“And Binky… Binky is treated like a hero in Alaska. Hundreds of letters go to the press, all of them side with the bear. They make stuffed animals, t-shirts, the whole nine yards. Binky is a local hero for defending his turf and standing up for himself. He would later pass on, but all accounts say that Binky lived a good life with many adoring fans.”
He cocks his head.
“So why am I telling you this?”
He stands back up, taking the time to turn and adjust his body and focus on the camera. In the background, Cranbreary walks around their habitat.
“A little birdie told me that Kono enjoys fighting legendary monsters on Earth. He's got one this Sunday. And seeing as how you dumb fucks come into my time, to come into my ring, to come take our championships… I’m standing up and defending my own turf too.”
There’s a double middle finger from Caffrey.
“It’s four-on-one on Sunday but it may as well be four drunken teenagers against one pissed off polar bear. Binky takes legs and so do I. You think I’m gonna back down from a family of four? I’ve been beating the numbers my whole career, from the moment I entered AXW as number seventeen against number one. You want me to be scared of four-on-one?”
Caffrey cranks his neck.
“At Supremacy two years ago, I beat three-on-one against James Raymond, Duke Kosloff, and our X-Crown Champion. At the Anzac Cup last year, I defended that honor four-on-one against Blackstone, Psychotic Goth, Lucifer, and Doomsday. And to win the Crown in the first place, one year ago in April, I won the Rumble FIFTY-NINE-ON-ONE.”
Caffrey’s in the zone now, ready to give it his all.
“So on Sunday, I might not have the greatest tag team partner to walk the Earth in my corner. It might just be me. But Goddamnit, just me as been plenty good for my entire fucking career. Add to that 800 fans who want nothing more than to see me succeed and kick your asses back to the future where you belong and I ask you, what the fuck are you gonna do when I grab your legs in my hands and don’t let go?”
Caffrey’s intensity dissipates just a bit as he takes a deep breath, taking a pause. He turns his front away from the camera, finishing from his side.
“There’s one more thing I didn’t tell you about Binky: I told you he was an Alaskan hero, it stretches beyond that. I mentioned before that Binky takes legs, and as a man who’s made the Process one of the deadliest moves in all of wrestling, I relate to that strongly. But I also mentioned the t-shirts, and I managed to get a hold of one… Niko, Kono, Commandtrix, Termatrix… this Sunday, I’m gonna fire off every elbow I have in my arsenal to keep our championships, and I’ll break every one of your legs if I have to… after it’s all over, you’re gonna hop back in your little time machine and go back where you came from. This Sunday...”
Caffrey lowers his mask to smile his showman smile. He turns his body to face the camera one more time.
“...you’re about to find out what happens to tourists in Alaska.”
The camera captures the t-shirt he’s wearing over the rest of his outfit before fading to black.
