Post by americangrime on Jan 27, 2021 22:35:08 GMT -5
I used to hear the rats chattering, when I was younger. The clicking and snapping of teeth, open-shut, enamel against enamel as they rubbed them together with fury. It was a sound I got used to, in a way-the only companionship I would know in those days.
What I've replaced it with isn't much better.
Men like me, we're born of tougher stuff. We're made of all of the pissed-away hopes of generations, those who've died in gutters and ditches, those who haven't made it home after nights out drinking, those who've been beaten senseless in alleyways after horseplay and romping in various bars, taken one blow too many to the head and called it a day in this wretched fucking world we live in. I was human once-I had a chance like all of you. I had a home, siblings, a family-but that all got taken away, right? Because no matter how many t's you cross and i's you dot-this world will always seek to fuck you.
I spent my teens wandering the streets in search of food and water. By my twenties, I'd given up on those and sought vices. By my thirtieth birthday, I'd turned to harder stuff. When The Father found me, I was what he called a wretch. He thought he could save me, starve me of the light, of water, of sustenance, of air, in order to purge all that I was from this form.
In a way, he may've been right. I'd lost all of those a long time ago, though, so I survived better than he thought I would.
I just don't think he knew what would fill the hole left behind.
-
"Legacy. Honor. Respect. Permeable concepts held close by the general personage-but for what? Why?"
Aurora Ray's familiar voice floats through the air as we enter into another room, this one different from the dark chamber we sat in previously. This seems to be more of a parlor or a living room, furnished not as one would expect the two cohorts of American Grime to furnish, but rather as if it has been removed from someone else’s care. There are markings where pictures usually sat, emptied slots on walls and shelves for trophies, and even though the house is clean and tidy, it appears that it has been so recently disturbed from, perhaps, a different usage. Aurora Ray's general demeanor-and outfit-have changed greatly, as well. She's clad in a new dress, and seems to have done her hair differently. To his credit, Euan Hill is dressed differently as well-the rags he previously wore have been replaced by a standard black button-up shirt, the sleeves rolled up, and a pair of long black jeans tucked into new black boots. The Outcast wears a grimace on his face as he wraps his fists, slowly but surely.
"I mean, even people like us can understand the need for the material-something to impress on the outside. Make the crowds jealous. We've not been so successful here in Project Honor-that much is clear to see, isn't it-but we've still been collecting our pay. Still been pocketing the bits of the purse left over from when the winners have claimed the Lion's Share of the pot. We figured it was time for a change in things-a change in representation, a change in presentaton, and, moreover, a change of our fates here in Project Honor. Lazarus Arjen has given us his blessing as he's gone onto greener pastures, The Father is dead and molding in the ground, which leaves just us. Myself, I'll be taking a backseat to allow my beloved to reap the rewards for his violence...but I will always be at his side."
Aurora smiles, and Euan's eyes are caught on camera. Cold, violent, but ready.
"Nevertheless, let us move into our topic at hand. The Dragon Lady gatekeeps us from a golden opportunity, doesn’t she? Without her in our path, we’d have free entry to the Legacy Gauntlet. Euan would have another path forward to glory, another pathway through which to expand our violence onto this world. The Dragon Lady is an honorable combatant, and I tie this back to my previous question-why honor, of all things, would you carry with you in this world? Honor doesn’t get you anything-the richest and most well off of us don’t have honor as a guiding tenet of their lives-on the contrary, they consider themselves dishonorable.
So why bother weighing yourself down with it?
Let me be honest, “Lady”, if I may call you that-your honor will be the chains that hold you back in this match. I’ll be truthful with you, Euan and I have no intention of being honorable. If there are rules to break, we will break them. If there are opportunities to take advantage of you, be it through injury, distraction, or other means, we will take them. We will maul you down to your barest components, leave you injured and lying, and we will pull you apart. We will pry your teeth from your mouth, your heart from your chest, your life from your body, and you will take it, no matter how hard you try to fight back, how much effort you put forth, you will not escape.
And when you’re reduced down to that, we’ll see how far your honor gets you, hmm?”
Aurora smiles as she runs her fingers through her hair, considering her next words carefully.
“It’s nothing personal against you, Lady. If it was, we wouldn’t even be having this match. Euan and I would have descended upon you like rats in the night. We would have peeled your flesh from your bones while you slept. We would have ended your life before you could even arrive to this arena! But, alas, you’re here, not because you’d love to be, although I’m certain in some world you feel like that’s the truth. No, you’re here because we chose not to take action on you. Nothing personal, no ill will, just the fact that you’re a roadblock, something standing in our way, a proving ground, an opportunity to make an example.
And, through pain and struggle, it’s an example you will be. Proof that honor and respect won’t save you, that the only way to make it in this place, this country, this whole fucking world, is to care about yourself first, and everyone else second, to sink into the grime and sin and take it for what it is. This world is empty of warmth, empty of respect, empty of anything worth valuing. We live, and then we die.
So you might as well be comfortable in the process of living, hmm?”
Aurora chuckles.
“Euan and I, we’re the kind of people who take what we want. And we’ll start taking on Proving Ground, as much as we damn well please. For it’s these little comforts that keep us warm, that let us live, that give us warmth in this…American Grime.”
Aurora laughs, and runs a hand on Euan’s shoulder as she leaves the room. We see Euan surveying the room for a moment, and hear the chattering of rats through the walls.
Cut to black.