"JOHN
TAYLOR WINS! JOHN TAYLOR IS THE GZW2K1 WORLD HEAVYWEIGHT CHAMPION!!!!!"
"I
don't believe it..."
""The
Lone Gunman"
John Taylor has captured GZW’s highest honour!"
He'd done it. Taylor had achieved something they told him he was never cut out to achieve. He'd cheated fate. He'd sidestepped his supposedly predetermined path. He pondered all of this and more as he secured the comparatively elephantine World Heavyweight Championship belt around his lean, elongated waist. It felt grubby. Wormy. Peering down at it, the words "Tonya Glory" protruded and stared at him. Continuing up the walkway, he tried to rub them off with his sweaty right palm, but the unease remained. Regardless, he knew the title was his. Tonya Glory would have known it by then, too. She'd have seen the match from hospital at least. James Tanner, still licking his wounds in the ring most definitely knew it. Even a petty Pimp Bizkit knew it, although admitting would have to wait until later, as he was busy swallowing copious amounts of his own pride. Taylor smiled as he neared the stage. Then it hit him - some of these people were cheering for him.
Ignorant, obnoxious forms of life, he muttered to himself. They have the nerve to think for a second that they have the slightest idea exactly what I just achieved? Where the fuck were they when I was cheated out of this very belt two months ago? Where were the chants and cheers when I lay in hospital after more than one serious beating by the Heretics? Where were the petitions and campaigns for my return when I retired in 2001? No, these people don't have a clue what they're doing.
He stopped at the stage and turned around. Almost mechanically, he surveyed the entire crowd. Young children held up signs saying "Silencer" and "Come on, Gunman!". Overweight, irresponsible parents clapped and cheered and chanted. A sea of hands tried to escape the crowd, looking for high fives from the new World Heavyweight Champion. Standing firmly in the middle of the stage, Taylor cracked an insincere smile for a moment and began to slowly raise both arms. The roof almost came off the Staples Centre until Taylor extended both middle fingers and flipped off the crowd. Instantly, he was a hated man. Fast food, event programmes and merchandise were thrown sloppily in his general direction. All of a sudden, his smile was no longer insincere. He soaked up the reaction he had longed for for so long, turned and stepped through the curtain.
Once there, he shut the door behind him and took a seat on the steel chair he'd left there earlier. This time, however, he slouched back into it. He unhooked the Championship belt and held it up in front of him. It was quite a sight, but his own reflection visible through it put something of a damper on the whole achievement. He didn't look like a champion. He looked like a thirty-five year old man with ravaged hair a dull shade of blonde or a bland shade of brown and a goatee. He could've passed for a teacher, a solicitor, a petrol pump attendant, a security guard, you, me. Just about anybody, except a GZW2K1 World Heavyweight Champion. He had nothing on the boyish good looks of a Zac Sharp or Billy Bond. He was far too thin to be a monster like Deacon Kane or Nathan Williams. This irritated him, but he let it slide.
"They want a few words?", Taylor asked himself, abruptly and out-of-the-blue.
"No, they don't. They want me to slip up, to make even the most fractional of errors in something I do or say post match, simply to label me unworthy of the belt I now possess. They want to hear me stutter. They want to see a mere inkling that'd suggest I'm not ready to hold the proverbial weight of the company on my very shoulders. Bloodthirsty sharks that they are, they want anything they can get. They want to trick me into making a bold statement akin to a Pimp Bizkit. They'd love to hear me proclaim to be the greatest Champion ever known to man. They'd love to see me piss all over the past greats in an effort to further my fifteen minutes. Fuck them. They get nothing."
"What I will say is this. My name is John Taylor. I'm a thirty-three-year-old man and tonight I won the World Heavyweight Championship by pinning James Tanner, exposing a key weakness, sloth, in former Champion Pimp Bizkit at the same time. I did this without interference on my behalf. Members of the DisOrder took it upon themselves to hit the ring and clear a melee involving several men not involved in the title match whatsoever. That was fine by me, but I had nothing to do with it. It's not up to me how the incompetent GZW administration run their shows. It's got nothing to do with me that during every single World Heavyweight Title match since the restart, there's been some sort of interference. Tonight was different, though. Whereas before, in order for Pimp Bizkit to beat me and for Tonya Glory to beat Pimp Bizkit, they relied on Nathan Williams and Elexia Croix-Fortune, respectively, to actually win the match for them, tonight's interference ultimately became obsolete. Had Electric Sharpe, Brian Sabre and Seven not got involved tonight whatsoever, the outcome would've remained the exact same. I was in control before Sharpe hit the ring, and I was still in control after it was all said and done. I've compared myself before to the constant in a mathematics equation, and that rang true tonight. While Pimp Bizkit had no doubt expected a cakewalk tonight against Tonya Glory and James Tanner clearly folded under the pressure of his premature destiny, I kept my goal clearly in my sight and achieved it. It appears as though it wasn't the young adulterer's time, after all. And if I'm not mistaken, Tanner, that's your get-into-the-main-event-free-card all used up. Your spark has depleted. You can no longer claim to be a hungry youngster just waiting for the opportunity. You had your shot and you blew it. Other than winning a battle royale with help from a retired ex-wrestler, you've done nothing to warrant a place anywhere near the top. You deserve no respect whatsoever. You failed to beat me, in the middle of the ring or otherwise. Tonight, you proved nothing. Good luck trying to rebuild the bridge back to contention for the W.C.E.K. Television Title."
"As for the man that, as of three hours ago, "knew" that he was going to win the World Heavyweight Championship, Pimp Bizkit, on the other hand. Didn't consider the possibility that the clichéd "card subject to change" line might possibly come into fruition? Obviously not if you thought Electric Sharpe, all by his lonesome, would be enough to get my belt back in the Heretics camp? You were all smiles before the show, Pimp. You were happy to go on about nothing in particular, cracking cheesy line after cheesy line about your good looks? Vanity for the sake of it. Just to rub Tonya's nose in what you knew would happen. You were set for a cakewalk, Pimp. We both know that. You knew that Tonya's TV title defence would take something out of her. She'd be softened up at least. Then you had the possibility of Elexia Croix-Fortune. The solution? Keep Electric Sharpe waiting in the wings. That was that sorted, right? Wrong. After sloth and vanity, you showed another key weakness, failure to work well under pressure. Sure, the main event happened a little earlier than you thought, and you weren't exactly facing Tonya Glory, but you could've done something to plan ahead a little better than you did. Electric Sharpe's a phenomenal athlete, but he can only do so much against two super heavyweights in Brian Sabre and Seven. Those three weaknesses are enough to show the world why it is you, Pimp, that aren't ready to carry the company as it's champion."
Content, Taylor rose from his chair. For the first time, he put the title belt over his shoulder. He ran his bony, still gloved right hand over it's shiny, gold plated surface before heading toward the closed door. He opened it to find the same nucleated cloud of interviewers congregated in the corridor outside. Once again they began to speak all at once, but Taylor raised his right hand as if to tell them to be quiet.
"I trust you got all of that, one way or another.", said Taylor, telling them more than asking them. They nodded and agreed in unison.
"Good. Now tell me, did I expose any weaknesses of my own?"
Aside from one or two shaking their heads, they remained quiet.
"Did I do or say anything to suggest that I shouldn't have this?", he added, knocking on his title belt.
More of them shook their heads this time. Taylor smiled his smile from earlier.
"Good. I didn't think so." With that said, he went back into his dressing room and shut the door quietly behind him.