(The scene opens up inside of a hotel room. There is a click at the door before it swings open and Drastik steps through it, oddly dressed in very traditional Anglo-Saxon, Elizabethan era clothing, full on with his own ruff worn around his neck. He looks fairly uncomfortable in the clothing as he shuts the door behind him and tosses a copy of “Macbeth” and a pamphlet reading “Shakesperts Club: The #1 Shakespeare Appreciation Club”. He looks at the camera, perplexed and seemingly exhausted before speaking.) What on earth did I just listen to? I mean, listen, I’ve put up with a lot of weird characters and dealt with them throughout my career. In fact, I didn’t even really scoff too much at your weird school shooter gimmick or whatever you think is
#edgy nowadays. I have no problem with your weird cult group that you’re a part of whether you’re making sacrifices to Satan or playing Magic: The Gathering backstage with your friends. But what I do seem to have a problem with is how your little messages to me are pitched like you’re straight out of Beowulf or something. I’m telling you right now that I haven’t been this confused by unnecessarily used syntax since junior year of high school reading Shakespeare in my honors English class. Don’t think I’m an idiot or anything, but I had to replay what you said again and again just to understand what you were even saying, dude. I mean, I know that’s part of the job and all, but cut me some slack by cutting through all the Yoda talk. Anyways, this isn’t my first time around the block and I’ve certainly dealt with my fair share of people like you before that make my job way harder than it needs to be just by deciding to mix up the order of words in any given sentence. I listened to what you had to say—probably at least a dozen times playing the words over and over again to make sure I understood what you were saying—and while I had some sort of optimistic expectation that you’d tell me SOMETHING that I didn’t know—because, believe me, I still don’t know the difference between you or Mike Showman or any of you other new guys whose matches I don’t tune into—you decided to fill all of that space with no sort of response to me. There was no rebuttal, no answers to my questions, no admission to anything that I pointed out that may be true, and not even a coherent message.
There was
nothing.
(Drastik rips off the ruff and cracks his neck, pulling back his hair as he tries to think of where to go from here. He looks down at his bed at the copy of “Macbeth” and the pamphlet. He unbuttons his coat, revealing the Hardcore Championship being worn beneath it. He looks down at it and then back up at the camera as he tries to reason with his opponent.) All right, maybe that’s not completely fair of me to say. You did mention a couple times, vaguely, that some higher power would be coming for me. While that might spook out some of the noobs you faced last Saturday at Shock Value, the only thing that sounds like, to me, is “I really don’t have faith that I can get the job done on my own, but one of these days my crusty swamp-daddy is going to kick your ass! That’ll show you!” Yikes. Are you serious? This big, bad, rugged supposed-veteran of the military with a mean streak is already using his fallback plan to threaten me? This is what bothers me most about guys like you, Solomon. It doesn’t matter how green you are in this business or how many years you’ve lived on this planet; you still find a way to both threaten to “expose” me and make excuses for why you aren’t going to get the job done against me in the same breath. Hell, you even go as far to say that you don’t care about the Hardcore Championship and it’s just some sidepiece to you. Who do you really think you’re going to prove with that? I know you’ve been begging in the back already just asking for a shot against me as soon as I beat Nathan Fiora—something you as well as everyone else fully expected. But suddenly, in order to uphold this reputation of yours as some brooding, mysterious character, you talk about serving your “master” and fighting for his glory. I’m not here to kink-shame or anything, but again, are you serious dude? You’re bringing some daddy kink into your profession? Maybe I was wrong about you being one of those guys that watched Full Metal Jacket once and thought you’d pose as a crazy victim of combat. Maybe, instead, you just really, really liked the Fifty Shades of Grey trilogy and decided to embed that into your character. And actually, that would make a lot of sense in explaining how you’ve acted since I first heard from you. First off, it explains the whole obsession with your “master” and how you somehow think that they’ll end up fighting on your behalf to avenge you after you embarrass yourself this weekend. Second, the quality of your speechwriting is about on par with the fan-fiction-esque writing style of Fifty Shades and equally as incoherent. And third, if how badly you got your ass kicked at Shock Value is any indication, I’m sure that, just like Anastasia, you must be a masochist.
But fine, go on and on about some irrelevant master and some cheap string of vague threats you have for me. Go on about how the Hardcore Championship means nothing to you even though I’m fully sure that you’d love to have more of an impact on a show then a handful of Rising Star of the Week awards on online blogs. Guys like you can talk all they want and make me lose myself in frustration with how dense you can be, how set on pointing fingers and calling names but nothing else. But at the end of the day, you and I really don’t have any problem with each other that goes beyond this week. Your little Columbine fan club backstage is bound to try to spook out other people if you’re really done with Zack Crash, and this week against me really won’t mean anything to you or the group you’re a part of. And in a similar fashion, in a week’s time, I’ll be looking at my next challenger and probably having a very similar conversation with them as the one I’m having with you. I don’t have a problem with you. The reason we’re facing each other this week for my Hardcore Championship isn’t because you deserve a shot or deserve any real recognition. It’s not because I personally circled your name on a list of guys and said, “Yup, I’d like to face Solomon29 in my first title defense because he’s got a compelling story.” It’s not because you attacked me or I attacked you. It’s because I’m bringing prestige back to this championship by doing exactly what a champion should do: subjecting himself to the rigors of competition each and every week. Literally anyone could be interchangeable with the position you hold right now, Solomon Caine. I don’t care if I’m facing you or Nathan Fiora again or Victor Maero or Ahren Fournier or Y2Impact for that matter. I’m here to prove each and every week what a fighting champion looks like. I’m not going to back down from any fight at any given moment. I have put the ball in every single one of my challengers’ courts and put my hands up to say that it’s your move, not mine. I have relinquished every bit of a champion’s advantage almost immediately after I won the championship at Shock Value. And even in doing so, I’ll remain champion.
(Pleased with what he said and how it came across, Drastik nods at himself for a moment and smirks, then puts up a finger toward the camera and puts the ruff quickly back on. He reaches into his coat pocket and pulls out a plastic skull, holding it out in his hand and works on a quick range of vocal warm-ups to practice his annunciation. The cameraman seems to mumble something along the lines of, “wait, do you want me to stop rolling?” but Drastik puts a finger back up, finishes his warm-up, and then directs his attention back to Solomon Caine for the video package.) Now one thing is clear from your last little message that I didn’t need to bother replaying; you sure like to say “heathens” a lot. And since there seems to be some sort of disconnect between us since apparently I can’t understand a word you’re saying and you just don’t know how to listen to someone who’s got more experience in this business than I think you even realize, I decided to make you feel a little bit more at home by playing on your turf. I’ve adopted your tactics, hit up a Shakespeare reading group all dressed up in one of these snazzy puffy things that they wore around their necks. I downloaded “Heathens” by Twenty-one Pilots and cranked it up, put it on repeat so it gets really stuck in my head, and now I’m going to go ahead and try to communicate to you through your language. Bear with me:
Heathen, thou arst but a lost soul that had not seen the light of victory in your previous endeavor. But ye, in the coming of Voltage, thou will remain in the darkness that thou hast brought upon oneself. I have been granted sacrifice from the gods that hast whispered unto mine ear. As such, thus have damned ye to continued darkness and depression. I say to thee, heathen, that by coming to me with the glimmer of hope captured in thine eyes, reflective of the majesty of my trinket, you have but fooled thine self. Ye heathen, no gold shall exist in thy future, and no glimmer may remain without light. Off, heathen, to eternal darkness! Okay, I think I may have just had an aneurysm. Please, just drop the act. I’m all for committing to these things for comedic effect and all that, but I can’t stand another fishbowl discussion of Macbeth by a group of middle school teachers, and I’m definitely not that into this Twenty-one Pilots song either. But what won’t change, Solomon, is my commitment to proving why I am the most timeless competitor in this industry—how no obstacle, man nor monster, can stop me from taking over this company no matter its state. You’re going to see that commitment this Sunday.
(Drastik stuffs the plastic skull back into his pocket before putting up a hand, middle and index fingers pressed to his thumb before bringing his hand up from his face, down to his chest as if he was jokingly ending a scene. He smirks at the camera again as the scene fades to black. Just before the end of the package, solid white text flashes on the screen for a split second.)SAIL 
by 
Topic: 
Subject: