Post by "The Epitome" Mike Angelo on Nov 25, 2022 23:23:38 GMT -5
~ The lights in the sky match the stars in my eyes. The city of sin seems very fitting for my return. It's a place people come in hopes of changing their lives in just one night. They want to sway Lady Luck to make their wildest dreams come true. In a sense, I'm here for similar reasons. But instead of changing my life to something I've never had, I want to recapture a moment in time from long ago. I was something better back then and I will do whatever it takes to be that same person again. I climbed to the very top in this special little stratosphere known as the wrestling world. Soon, I'll be standing tall once more. Vegas is only the beginning, the rest of the world after that, and then the universe. Time is my master no more. ~
Mike Angelo approaches the front desk of one of the most iconic hotels in Vegas, the Luxor Resort & Casino, to check in having just arrived to the city for the first time in nearly 15 years. It would be weeks before we was able to fully settle in the area, but this would work for the time being. Plus it reminded him of the old days of having to rent cars and check in and out of places like this, though most of them weren't pyramid shaped.
Front Desk Lady: “Hello there, sir! And welcome to the Luxor! Checking in?”
Mike takes a look down at her name tag.
Mike Angelo: “Hey, Patty. I am, in fact, checking in, yes.”
Patty: “And what was the name on the reservation?”
Mike Angelo: “It'd be under Angelo. Mike Angelo.”
Patty: “Oh, like the painter, right?! Give me a moment to pull that up, Mr. Angelo.”
Mike Angelo: “Please, call me Mike.”
She clicks and clacks at the keyboard in front of her for a few moments before frowning.
Patty: “Hmmm, I am having a little trouble finding you, Mister...er, Mike. What was the card number you used to book the reservation?”
Mike provides her with his information and she once again looks through the database in an attempt to find him.
Patty: “Oh, well I seem to have found a name under that card, a Michael Arches. Is that you?”
Mike sighs.
Mike Angelo: “Yeah, that's me, I guess.”
Patty: “Great! I'll just need to see that card and your photo ID and I'll get you all set with your room, Mister Mike.”
She does just that, and after another few minutes, hands Angelo his room key. He heads to an elevator in the lobby and takes it up to his room. Upon entering he see that the room with a view that he booked only had the view of another hotel and not much else. He also notices that the room, built with a slanted wall, is smaller than it looked online when he booked it.
Mike Angelo: “Well this trip is off to a wonderful start...”
He spends the next few hours taking a nap without bothering to unpack any of his belongings. It had been awhile since he had to fly 5 hours, and it took more out of him than he was ready to admit in terms of jet lag. He would be making his first appearance for the WGWF the very next night, opening the show with a promo, and knew that he needed to get as much rest as he could before then. If it wasn't for the exhaustion, the nerves of appearing for the first time in over a year and for a new company might have kept him awake.
~ It felt better than I could have imagined it would. Stepping back out through those curtains a new man. No, not new. A reborn man. I hope I made my intentions clear to the rest of the WGWF and the world that I did not come back just to prove that I still have it. I came back to recapture what it is that I took for granted so long ago. I came back to be the very best this business has to offer. ~
Angelo is back in his room a few days later, having just returned from a workout in the hotel gym, when he gets a notification on his phone from the WGWF office. Upon opening and reading the message, the rundown for the next episode of Brawl, he pauses and laughs to himself.
Mike Angelo: “You have got to be kidding me...”
The card for the show has him facing his own niece and former student, the newly debuting Addison Andrews. He takes his shirt off, and paces back and forth in the room before finally turning the phone on to record and propping it up against the lamp on the desk in the room. He sits down in the chair and seems to be contemplating for a few moments before finally speaking.
The Epitome: “Welcome to the wonderful world of professional wrestling history, today I, the Epitome, will be your guide on a little journey in time and space. The year is 2000, the new millennium! A starry eyed young wrestler by the name of Mike Arches and his best friend Riley Andrews are working a dark match for one of the largest companies on the scene at the time, the Revolution Wrestling Federation. The two of them, though still as green as all hell, put on a barn burner of a match. The president of the RWF, Brian Slack, personally offers them both contracts immediately after the match in the guerrilla position. Arches accepts his on the spot, while Andrews decides that he's not yet ready to make that kind of commitment. Slack, unhappy that he felt he only got the lesser of the two, decides to saddle the new wrestler with the dumb ass name of Mike Angelo. And you know what? Angelo got his ass kicked, early and often. He was over matched and under experienced to be going against the kind of talent that the RWF had. But Angelo didn't give up. He kept fighting and crawling his way up the card, even winning some titles along the way, and making some allies too.”
He pauses, as if he got caught up in his own story, remembering the people who helped shape him over 20 years ago.
The Epitome: “He began to make a name for himself. He had people he could trust to watch his back. He was earning things the hard way with some like minded young talent. Guys like Shawn King, Tyler Hawk, and even Fred Debonair. Sure, not everyone would always see eye to eye, but they all wanted the same thing...to succeed. And to see each other succeed, as well. And that's what made things so exciting once Riley Andrews finally decided to take the leap and join the RWF about a year later after Angelo went back to Slack to let him know he was ready. Not only had Angelo found success in the one thing he always loved, but now his best friend and future brother in law was going to be right there with him. And at first, things were just as great as he had hoped they'd be. He formed a team, the Canadian Elite, with Riley and the two of them were quick to rise to the top of the tag ranks. Elise, Riley's sister and Mike's fiancée, even got pregnant around this time. Life could literally not be better for Mike Angelo. But then he got hurt and had to leave for a few months. Even that wasn't the worst thing, as he could heal up after going so hard for over a year, and got to spend more time with Elise while she moved along in the pregnancy. Once he came back to the RWF, Riley and Mike picked right back up where they left off, even winning the Tag Team titles. But something had changed, hadn't it Riley?”
His entire train of thought seemed to have shifted from telling a story to an unknown audience to directly to Riley Andrews himself. He stands up quickly enough to push the chair back behind him and points a finger directly into the lens of the camera on the phone.
The Epitome: “You were just too good for...OUR own good, weren't you? You just had to be the big star, the new prodigy, right? You just had to steal the spotlight from me. You had to win all the same titles, have all the same friends, and even steal away my mentor to be your own, right? The biggest damn mistake I have ever made in my entire life was bringing you into the RWF, Riley! And now look at us...twenty years later you're back once more to try and steal my thunder again, aren't you? You just couldn't stay away, could you? I bet Elise put you up to this just to get back at me for the way things have gone this past year, right? There are dozens, hundreds even, of different wrestling companies you could have shown your face back in and yet you chose this one? I find that a little difficult to believe that it was just some big coincidence. And I know for damn sure that Fred didn't put you up to it. I can actually trust him. So what is it? What do you stand to gain from showing up now, huh? Why not last year when I was in the IIW? Would that have been too easy for you, since you knew I wasn't really who I was meant to be back then? Well, guess what Riley, you should have struck when you had the chance to then because whatever game you're playing is not one you're going to win now!”
The anger in his eyes was bordering on psychotic and his breathing matched in intensity. But as if a switch had flipped, something behind his eyes changed and he calmed down in an instant. He sat back down in the chair and took a deep breath before continuing as if nothing was wrong.
The Epitome: “But you know what, it's fine. Everything is fine. Addison is a good kid. My prize pupil, in fact. She takes after you in the ring, a real natural like her dad, and she's got a bright future in front of her. It's just a shame that she's gotten in the way of whatever this is. A real shame that you probably put her up to this, Riley. You know just as well as I do that she isn't ready for it. But here we are. What are we going to do now? I didn't ask for this, Riley. You should have just asked me the kind of trouble you can get into trying to help a daughter out in this business. Moira is sitting at home with no future and bum knee. Addison will be lucky if that's the only thing that happens to her after our match at Brawl. I don't want to hurt her, but if I have to in order to stop whatever it is you've got planned, I will. You know better than anyone the lengths I'll go, the lengths I have gone, in order to secure my place in this business. I just wish it didn't have to be this way...”
He once again stares off almost as he's looking through the camera rather than at it, before reaching out and stopping the recording. He takes a few minutes to look it back over before sending in to the WGWF production team.
~ Things weren't supposed to go this way. I don't know what you want or why you're here, now. But it doesn't matter. Time won't stop me, and neither will an Andrews. ~