The Long Way Around - Part 3 - Always Look Closer
Jan 20, 2018 11:54:53 GMT -5
Mongo the Destroyer likes this
Post by Robbie A on Jan 20, 2018 11:54:53 GMT -5
17 January 2018
“The rumours are true, United States officials let me back into the country!” I announce as I stride through the door of Kyle’s bar, I thought about the big surprise shtick, and a number of cliché entrances, but I realised that I really didn’t have the energy for it, given that I had been travelling for most of the day to arrive in New Orleans. So I opted for the simple, effective approach. Effective was in the evidence of Kyle almost dropping a glass in surprise, this could have been because my announcement was pretty loud, I didn’t hang back, but I like to think it was in genuine shock and pleasant surprise.
“You son of a bitch, what the hell are you doing here? You should be in Minneapolis!” He replies, happily, moving around the bar to give me what could only be described as a ‘bro hug’, not my thing, but he’s a good lad, I’ll let him off.
“Well strictly speaking I should be there, you know me I like to get on location as soon as possible, but you can be too early, and I thought it would be good for me to relax with you guys for a few days before heading up. Having the right faces around you gets you into the right focus as well, and you guys are certainly the right faces.” Kyle nods in understanding.
“Whaaaaaaaaaaaaat!” Is the high pitched, excited tone of Tammy, who has appeared in the doorway, dropped her bag and has ran at me and launched herself at me before I’ve even had the chance to turn around. Naturally she takes me out and we hit the floor pretty hard, causing Kyle to burst out laughing and walk away. “Oh my god I’m so sorry! But I’m also not! Oh my god, what are you doing back here so soon? Is everything okay? Oh my gosh I’m rambling, let me get off you and get us up!”
“I...yes, that would be good, don’t worry about it!” Is all I can just about get in edgeways as she scurries off me, allowing me to get to my feet, brushing myself down. Tammy steps away and grabs her back before walking back towards me, a bit calmer.
“Oh, I’m sorry about your suit, it’s got all dirty, although it doesn’t fit you too well...that’s not like you.” Tammy tilts her head to one side, giving me suspicious look.
“Yeah I borrowed this from Alex last night, have barely been out of it. I like it though, thought I would send it to a tailor, although perhaps after a dry cleaner has had their hands on it first!” I tease, which earns me a slap on the arm.
“Jerk.”
“Hey! I’m just telling the truth! No need for the abuse!”
“You can take it.” She says coolly, a small smirk begins to appear on her face. “Anyway, what are you doing here?”
Before I can answer, another voice from the doorway interrupts me. “Oh you have to be fucking kidding me, what the hell are you doing here?” The voice belongs to my associate, Leon Chant. Tammy spins around to see Chant edging slowly into the bar, a mix of angry and worried lines are forming all over his face.
“Ah Leon! I was hoping I’d catch you!”
“Whatever you want from me, I’m not interested!” Is his blunt remark, although again there’s a hint of worry in his voice. “That is, unless what you want is to send me home.”
“Now I told you, if you can find somebody capable and trustworthy enough to come and do your job for you, and I agree with you after vetting them myself, then you can go home to Australia until I need you again.” I shrug.
“No you didn’t, at no point have you told me that.”
“Oh, really?” I look at Tammy and then Kyle, both give me a blank look suggesting Leon may be right. “Well I’m telling you now anyway!”
Leon shakes his head and walks into the back of the bar, mumbling ‘I really fucking hate you Arnold’ as he does. I chuckle at this, Tammy edges up to me as this happens, and checks that Leon is out of earshot.
“I can't believe I've never asked before, but what is the deal with you two?” She whispers.
“Put it this way, without me, he’d be in a Thai prison for the rest of his days, he’s a good guy and I helped him out on the proviso I had him on retainer for any...well, let’s refer to it as heavy lifting. He was fine with that, but nowadays he’d rather live the quiet life. I get that, possibly more than anybody. Truth be told I would love to get to the day where I never have to call him, but it is so hard to find people you can trust.” I whisper back, looking over my shoulder as Chant goes into the back. Tammy smiles and mouths ‘I get it’.
“Anyway, I believe you asked me what I’m doing here before that interruption.” I return to a normal tone of voice. “The answer, as I said to Kyle, is that I wanted to spend some time with you guys before I head up to Minneapolis, mental balance and all that.”
Tammy looks at me like I'm not telling her the full truth, so turns to Kyle who backs me up with a thumbs up. "What he said."
“Oh! Well what a nice surprise! We honestly didn’t expect to see you for a long time after Christmas.” She is practically beaming at me.
“Well, I know, and that’s what I thought at the time too. However I realised as I prepared for my matches against Synn, Crow and then Bedlam that I was in more of a clear state of mind after seeing you guys, and I don’t think that was a coincidence. So I’m going to try and be here a little more, where schedules and travel allows of course. Besides, if I win the X*Crown, I could end up here a bit more, what with it’s global rules. So what I’m saying is I’m here to stay...well, kinda, but you get it, right?”
She laughs and pats a hand on my arm. “It’s good to have you home.” She walks past and heads towards the bar. “I’ve got to say as well that it’s nice to see this side of you. Watching you lately on the Network....You’ve been borderline scary recently in the ring.”
I smirk and sit at the nearest stool to me, in order to face both her and Kyle.
“Yeah, you’ve seen me do worse to people though.” Is my somewhat flippant reply.
“I guess, but I think we’ve never seen you this ruthless, even here.”
“Yeah she’s right, I mean yeah, you’ve hurt some guys in here, idiots who were too stupid to tap out until their ankle or arm got popped, but that Bedlam dude, that was different, that was nasty.”
“Perhaps.” I concede. “I needed to send a statement though, I need to be in that place at the moment. This match at Supremacy, it’s going to be violent, really violent. If you’re not up to it, you’re going to get badly hurt, and I’m not in any mood to have that happen to me. You have to remember as well, given that I’m a former XHF Champion, that puts a target on my bag, some of those guys are going to want to take me out because that gives them a reputation and something to brag about.”
“What about the girls?” Tammy says flatly and faces me across the bar.
“I’m sorry?” My reply full of confusion.
“You said guys, but by my last count there are two women in there. Are you going to treat them any differently? Part of me wants you to say yes, because the idea of you hurting a woman like you’ve hurt some of those guys is quite distressing for me. Equally, I want you to say no, because I don’t want you to underestimate anybody, or look down at any woman for being simply that.”
I straighten up slightly, I’d known Tammy for long enough to know that she wouldn’t hesitate to hit me across the head if I said something derogatory towards women, she was no feminist, but she knew how to stand up for her gender.
“Well you’ve set me up with that question, haven’t you Tam?” I say carefully. “I’ve fought women before, they can be tougher than the men, I’m not treating them any differently because I want to win, and that means taking them out. You need to appreciate that what happened to Bedlam, that was a statement, a planned, calculated statement, one that I didn’t take lightly. I don’t want you to be distressed about this, I want your support, I want you to support me in getting the job done, and realising that what I do in the ring is not what I do out of the ring.” All of the time I speak to her I ensure that I'm holding eye contact, I speak slowly, carefully.
“I...I know. Sometimes it’s easy to forget because we don’t see enough of you here, you get swept up in the catchphrases, the character-”
“Hashtag true heel!” Kyle pops up. We both glare at him. “Sorry, not helping.” He meekly goes back to filling optics.
“The point is, we all love Rob Arnold, but we are just a little scared of Rob Fucking Arnold.” She sighs.
“There is nothing to be scared of.” I say reassuringly, which very slowly creates a small smile. “Are we all good?” I ask, which gets a bigger smile, and enthusiastic nod from her, sealing the deal, she’s subtly poured a scotch under the bar and placed it in my hand.
“Excellent.” I stand and take a sip, before walking towards the door that connects the fight club and open it. “Now, I’m going net door to watch Leon fight, because I know he’ll appreciate it if I do that and then give him an open and honest critique of his talents.” I shout down the corridor.
“Go fuck yourself Rob.” Is the reply. I look back at Kyle and Tammy and just laugh, as do they.
Welcome to the XHF Network
Your video is loading…
New Orleans Public Library. Daytime. The camera pans in on the side of the building which confirms what it is, before panning further around to reveal Rob Arnold, wearing jeans and a casual hoodie, much more dressed down than in recent videos. He’s sat down, leaning against a street light situated on a patch of public grass. In his hands is a book, though what book this is remains unclear.
“You know, recently a close friend of mine reminded me of something. It’s a typical cliché, but I found it to be really important at this time, looking ahead to Supremacy in a week’s time. I know what you’re thinking, oh Rob you’re outside a library and talking about that you should never judge a book by its cover how obvious. You would be right, but stick with me, there’s a few lessons to be learned that you won’t have worked out quite yet.”
He smirks and holds up the book.
“To Kill a Mockingbird. I had to study this book when I was in school, without doubt it was one of the most compelling books that I had read at that time, and it still is. The book teaches you the reader through the children protagonists a number of life lessons. It teaches about acceptance of diversity, it talks about the decisions people make and how morally one should come to those decisions. It also talks about how you should look beyond the obvious, that again you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover. I know, cliché-ception.”
He winks as he rests the book down on his legs.
“I’ve spent a lot of time talking about the men who I face at Supremacy, but something I haven’t done is talk about Alexis Grace and Azumi Goto. Don’t be watching this thinking that I’m sexist or that it was deliberate, it wasn’t. They just simply had to wait their turn.
These two high flyers of SSS are going to bring a very different element to the match, one that I’ve not encountered in over ten years. A moron would suggest to you that a woman’s slighter frame would hinder them in a match like this. However they forget that these women have speed, stamina, and a lot of style. They are potentially more dangerous than any of the other men in this match. I’ve fought women before, Celeste LaRue, Joanie and Toni Lee, Gloria Kortial. Four of the toughest women I have ever encountered, they were never say die, hard hitting, and left everything in the ring. I have no doubts in my mind that Alexis and Azumi are going to be any different.
These women are wrongly set aside and not given opportunities, but when they break the door down they do it with some force. Just look at the FWA, there is a queen of the castle in Lethe, and she stands stall looking down on the wannabe princes. I cannot and will not become that. I will deal with both of them in the same mentality as I will deal with Storm, Price, Hyperion, all of them. Anything else would be foolish.”
Arnold tilts his head back to look up at the sky.
“It’s interesting though, so many people are willing to judge on first impressions still. All I keep hearing is that I’m not in the big leagues any more being in AXW, I hear people saying I was never cut out for the top prizes, my XHF World Title win was nothing more than a mistake. These people are so quick to judge, and judge about things they probably don’t know much about.”
He sighs.
“Perhaps though that works in my favour, let them look at me in such low regard, because just like in To Kill a Mockingbird, when the truth is revealed those people feel a great sense of regret, and that could not be more apt in this instance. Let them all overlook me, let them all think that I won’t be able to hack it. Those were the same thoughts that won me my XHF World Title, I have no issue if that wins me the X*Crown as well.
Perhaps though they won’t think that way, perhaps they’ll be in a similar mentality to mine, it won’t matter. As the book also teaches us, perseverance is a great personal asset. When you chase a cause so hard, when you put enough of yourself into a cause you believe in, then there is little that can stop you. Atticus Finch believed that, and was proved right. Similarly, I believe that nobody else in that ring come Supremacy will be able to compete with my level of desire, my level of effort into the cause of me becoming the next X*Crown Champion.”
Rob looks back at the camera with a smirk, picking the book back up as he does.
“Now, I told you at the start there would be a few lessons. The last one is the most important. It’s not from this book, because this isn’t a book at all...”
He runs a fingernail under the corner, which catches and pulls the cover off, revealing the book to in fact be a small box, which Arnold opens to reveal a green apple. He smirks and disregards the fake cover.
“We know to not take things at face value, we learned that lesson, but To Kill a Mockingbird only gives a few reasons as to why that should be. I offer a simple, global reason. The reason? Not everything is what it seems, you may think you have me all figured out, but believe me you don’t, you don’t look hard enough. This will be the downfall of all of those ahead of me at Supremacy, and equally in drive, my desire, that will be my ascension to the throne, the throne of blood.”
Arnold stands up and takes the apple out of the box, biting into it, there is no crunch, and as he swallows the bite he walks closer to the camera and holds the apple up to reveal that is was actually a cake, intricately designed as an apple.
“Like I said...never stop looking closely.”
Fade out.
“The rumours are true, United States officials let me back into the country!” I announce as I stride through the door of Kyle’s bar, I thought about the big surprise shtick, and a number of cliché entrances, but I realised that I really didn’t have the energy for it, given that I had been travelling for most of the day to arrive in New Orleans. So I opted for the simple, effective approach. Effective was in the evidence of Kyle almost dropping a glass in surprise, this could have been because my announcement was pretty loud, I didn’t hang back, but I like to think it was in genuine shock and pleasant surprise.
“You son of a bitch, what the hell are you doing here? You should be in Minneapolis!” He replies, happily, moving around the bar to give me what could only be described as a ‘bro hug’, not my thing, but he’s a good lad, I’ll let him off.
“Well strictly speaking I should be there, you know me I like to get on location as soon as possible, but you can be too early, and I thought it would be good for me to relax with you guys for a few days before heading up. Having the right faces around you gets you into the right focus as well, and you guys are certainly the right faces.” Kyle nods in understanding.
“Whaaaaaaaaaaaaat!” Is the high pitched, excited tone of Tammy, who has appeared in the doorway, dropped her bag and has ran at me and launched herself at me before I’ve even had the chance to turn around. Naturally she takes me out and we hit the floor pretty hard, causing Kyle to burst out laughing and walk away. “Oh my god I’m so sorry! But I’m also not! Oh my god, what are you doing back here so soon? Is everything okay? Oh my gosh I’m rambling, let me get off you and get us up!”
“I...yes, that would be good, don’t worry about it!” Is all I can just about get in edgeways as she scurries off me, allowing me to get to my feet, brushing myself down. Tammy steps away and grabs her back before walking back towards me, a bit calmer.
“Oh, I’m sorry about your suit, it’s got all dirty, although it doesn’t fit you too well...that’s not like you.” Tammy tilts her head to one side, giving me suspicious look.
“Yeah I borrowed this from Alex last night, have barely been out of it. I like it though, thought I would send it to a tailor, although perhaps after a dry cleaner has had their hands on it first!” I tease, which earns me a slap on the arm.
“Jerk.”
“Hey! I’m just telling the truth! No need for the abuse!”
“You can take it.” She says coolly, a small smirk begins to appear on her face. “Anyway, what are you doing here?”
Before I can answer, another voice from the doorway interrupts me. “Oh you have to be fucking kidding me, what the hell are you doing here?” The voice belongs to my associate, Leon Chant. Tammy spins around to see Chant edging slowly into the bar, a mix of angry and worried lines are forming all over his face.
“Ah Leon! I was hoping I’d catch you!”
“Whatever you want from me, I’m not interested!” Is his blunt remark, although again there’s a hint of worry in his voice. “That is, unless what you want is to send me home.”
“Now I told you, if you can find somebody capable and trustworthy enough to come and do your job for you, and I agree with you after vetting them myself, then you can go home to Australia until I need you again.” I shrug.
“No you didn’t, at no point have you told me that.”
“Oh, really?” I look at Tammy and then Kyle, both give me a blank look suggesting Leon may be right. “Well I’m telling you now anyway!”
Leon shakes his head and walks into the back of the bar, mumbling ‘I really fucking hate you Arnold’ as he does. I chuckle at this, Tammy edges up to me as this happens, and checks that Leon is out of earshot.
“I can't believe I've never asked before, but what is the deal with you two?” She whispers.
“Put it this way, without me, he’d be in a Thai prison for the rest of his days, he’s a good guy and I helped him out on the proviso I had him on retainer for any...well, let’s refer to it as heavy lifting. He was fine with that, but nowadays he’d rather live the quiet life. I get that, possibly more than anybody. Truth be told I would love to get to the day where I never have to call him, but it is so hard to find people you can trust.” I whisper back, looking over my shoulder as Chant goes into the back. Tammy smiles and mouths ‘I get it’.
“Anyway, I believe you asked me what I’m doing here before that interruption.” I return to a normal tone of voice. “The answer, as I said to Kyle, is that I wanted to spend some time with you guys before I head up to Minneapolis, mental balance and all that.”
Tammy looks at me like I'm not telling her the full truth, so turns to Kyle who backs me up with a thumbs up. "What he said."
“Oh! Well what a nice surprise! We honestly didn’t expect to see you for a long time after Christmas.” She is practically beaming at me.
“Well, I know, and that’s what I thought at the time too. However I realised as I prepared for my matches against Synn, Crow and then Bedlam that I was in more of a clear state of mind after seeing you guys, and I don’t think that was a coincidence. So I’m going to try and be here a little more, where schedules and travel allows of course. Besides, if I win the X*Crown, I could end up here a bit more, what with it’s global rules. So what I’m saying is I’m here to stay...well, kinda, but you get it, right?”
She laughs and pats a hand on my arm. “It’s good to have you home.” She walks past and heads towards the bar. “I’ve got to say as well that it’s nice to see this side of you. Watching you lately on the Network....You’ve been borderline scary recently in the ring.”
I smirk and sit at the nearest stool to me, in order to face both her and Kyle.
“Yeah, you’ve seen me do worse to people though.” Is my somewhat flippant reply.
“I guess, but I think we’ve never seen you this ruthless, even here.”
“Yeah she’s right, I mean yeah, you’ve hurt some guys in here, idiots who were too stupid to tap out until their ankle or arm got popped, but that Bedlam dude, that was different, that was nasty.”
“Perhaps.” I concede. “I needed to send a statement though, I need to be in that place at the moment. This match at Supremacy, it’s going to be violent, really violent. If you’re not up to it, you’re going to get badly hurt, and I’m not in any mood to have that happen to me. You have to remember as well, given that I’m a former XHF Champion, that puts a target on my bag, some of those guys are going to want to take me out because that gives them a reputation and something to brag about.”
“What about the girls?” Tammy says flatly and faces me across the bar.
“I’m sorry?” My reply full of confusion.
“You said guys, but by my last count there are two women in there. Are you going to treat them any differently? Part of me wants you to say yes, because the idea of you hurting a woman like you’ve hurt some of those guys is quite distressing for me. Equally, I want you to say no, because I don’t want you to underestimate anybody, or look down at any woman for being simply that.”
I straighten up slightly, I’d known Tammy for long enough to know that she wouldn’t hesitate to hit me across the head if I said something derogatory towards women, she was no feminist, but she knew how to stand up for her gender.
“Well you’ve set me up with that question, haven’t you Tam?” I say carefully. “I’ve fought women before, they can be tougher than the men, I’m not treating them any differently because I want to win, and that means taking them out. You need to appreciate that what happened to Bedlam, that was a statement, a planned, calculated statement, one that I didn’t take lightly. I don’t want you to be distressed about this, I want your support, I want you to support me in getting the job done, and realising that what I do in the ring is not what I do out of the ring.” All of the time I speak to her I ensure that I'm holding eye contact, I speak slowly, carefully.
“I...I know. Sometimes it’s easy to forget because we don’t see enough of you here, you get swept up in the catchphrases, the character-”
“Hashtag true heel!” Kyle pops up. We both glare at him. “Sorry, not helping.” He meekly goes back to filling optics.
“The point is, we all love Rob Arnold, but we are just a little scared of Rob Fucking Arnold.” She sighs.
“There is nothing to be scared of.” I say reassuringly, which very slowly creates a small smile. “Are we all good?” I ask, which gets a bigger smile, and enthusiastic nod from her, sealing the deal, she’s subtly poured a scotch under the bar and placed it in my hand.
“Excellent.” I stand and take a sip, before walking towards the door that connects the fight club and open it. “Now, I’m going net door to watch Leon fight, because I know he’ll appreciate it if I do that and then give him an open and honest critique of his talents.” I shout down the corridor.
“Go fuck yourself Rob.” Is the reply. I look back at Kyle and Tammy and just laugh, as do they.
Welcome to the XHF Network
Your video is loading…
New Orleans Public Library. Daytime. The camera pans in on the side of the building which confirms what it is, before panning further around to reveal Rob Arnold, wearing jeans and a casual hoodie, much more dressed down than in recent videos. He’s sat down, leaning against a street light situated on a patch of public grass. In his hands is a book, though what book this is remains unclear.
“You know, recently a close friend of mine reminded me of something. It’s a typical cliché, but I found it to be really important at this time, looking ahead to Supremacy in a week’s time. I know what you’re thinking, oh Rob you’re outside a library and talking about that you should never judge a book by its cover how obvious. You would be right, but stick with me, there’s a few lessons to be learned that you won’t have worked out quite yet.”
He smirks and holds up the book.
“To Kill a Mockingbird. I had to study this book when I was in school, without doubt it was one of the most compelling books that I had read at that time, and it still is. The book teaches you the reader through the children protagonists a number of life lessons. It teaches about acceptance of diversity, it talks about the decisions people make and how morally one should come to those decisions. It also talks about how you should look beyond the obvious, that again you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover. I know, cliché-ception.”
He winks as he rests the book down on his legs.
“I’ve spent a lot of time talking about the men who I face at Supremacy, but something I haven’t done is talk about Alexis Grace and Azumi Goto. Don’t be watching this thinking that I’m sexist or that it was deliberate, it wasn’t. They just simply had to wait their turn.
These two high flyers of SSS are going to bring a very different element to the match, one that I’ve not encountered in over ten years. A moron would suggest to you that a woman’s slighter frame would hinder them in a match like this. However they forget that these women have speed, stamina, and a lot of style. They are potentially more dangerous than any of the other men in this match. I’ve fought women before, Celeste LaRue, Joanie and Toni Lee, Gloria Kortial. Four of the toughest women I have ever encountered, they were never say die, hard hitting, and left everything in the ring. I have no doubts in my mind that Alexis and Azumi are going to be any different.
These women are wrongly set aside and not given opportunities, but when they break the door down they do it with some force. Just look at the FWA, there is a queen of the castle in Lethe, and she stands stall looking down on the wannabe princes. I cannot and will not become that. I will deal with both of them in the same mentality as I will deal with Storm, Price, Hyperion, all of them. Anything else would be foolish.”
Arnold tilts his head back to look up at the sky.
“It’s interesting though, so many people are willing to judge on first impressions still. All I keep hearing is that I’m not in the big leagues any more being in AXW, I hear people saying I was never cut out for the top prizes, my XHF World Title win was nothing more than a mistake. These people are so quick to judge, and judge about things they probably don’t know much about.”
He sighs.
“Perhaps though that works in my favour, let them look at me in such low regard, because just like in To Kill a Mockingbird, when the truth is revealed those people feel a great sense of regret, and that could not be more apt in this instance. Let them all overlook me, let them all think that I won’t be able to hack it. Those were the same thoughts that won me my XHF World Title, I have no issue if that wins me the X*Crown as well.
Perhaps though they won’t think that way, perhaps they’ll be in a similar mentality to mine, it won’t matter. As the book also teaches us, perseverance is a great personal asset. When you chase a cause so hard, when you put enough of yourself into a cause you believe in, then there is little that can stop you. Atticus Finch believed that, and was proved right. Similarly, I believe that nobody else in that ring come Supremacy will be able to compete with my level of desire, my level of effort into the cause of me becoming the next X*Crown Champion.”
Rob looks back at the camera with a smirk, picking the book back up as he does.
“Now, I told you at the start there would be a few lessons. The last one is the most important. It’s not from this book, because this isn’t a book at all...”
He runs a fingernail under the corner, which catches and pulls the cover off, revealing the book to in fact be a small box, which Arnold opens to reveal a green apple. He smirks and disregards the fake cover.
“We know to not take things at face value, we learned that lesson, but To Kill a Mockingbird only gives a few reasons as to why that should be. I offer a simple, global reason. The reason? Not everything is what it seems, you may think you have me all figured out, but believe me you don’t, you don’t look hard enough. This will be the downfall of all of those ahead of me at Supremacy, and equally in drive, my desire, that will be my ascension to the throne, the throne of blood.”
Arnold stands up and takes the apple out of the box, biting into it, there is no crunch, and as he swallows the bite he walks closer to the camera and holds the apple up to reveal that is was actually a cake, intricately designed as an apple.
“Like I said...never stop looking closely.”
Fade out.
