Post by Deleted on Aug 29, 2021 4:33:49 GMT -5
- Prologue -
Hello, my name is CJ Wylde...
...and I'm dead.
But that hasn't stopped me from being one of the most influential individuals in a place that didn't exist until after I had left this mortal plane. Anyone who's familiar with Level Up Wrestling at all has at least heard of me; which I think is pretty damned impressive if you ask me.
Equally impressive is how I'm here right now, reasons notwithstanding. Why I'm here is the question and the answer to that is two-fold. The simple answer is, I'm not actually here. Well, not physically anyway. The second, more interesting answer is that you summoned me here. You - a filthy, rotten, cheating, no-good, cheap-shotting scoundrel.
How you did it is, quite frankly, unimportant. Why you did it - Now there's the million-dollar question.
The truth is you simply want to know what I know.
That's what it boils down to, isn't it?
But I digress, and for that, my apologies. Before we continue further, I'd be remiss not to offer a truthfully fair warning: you conjured me for answers, but you might not like what it is that I have to say. With that out of the way, here it is, for all to bear. Let's not waste any more time bothering with the semantics of the séance.
Let's get down to brass tacks.
Devil May Cry is coming, like it or not, and you've got your most important test ahead of you yet in Sin City. So grab your - ahem - two-piece button-down and your dress slacks; your alligator-skin loafers, your dimpled white balls, and your favorite space-age titanium alloy driver and your A-game. Because if you can somehow manage a victory in the biggest match of your career at the TopGolf Las Vegas complex, you may walk out of the MGM Grand Hotel that night as the new Final Boss Champion.
Emmanuel Armitage Blizzard, son of San Diego, California, you've summoned me this evening because you wish to know one thing:
You want to know...
::: 6/10 Studios Presents :::
MML.2021.016/J -
How to Beat Magdalena Lockheart
How to Beat Magdalena Lockheart
Consider me Edward Norton because tonight I'm going to fill the role as the narrator.
So allow me, if you will, to simply guide you along on this journey. Of course, the trek ahead is dangerous because the goal you seek is not easy to achieve. But, then again, the best things in life never are. You look to me like a strong kid - perhaps a genuine contender even - I think you can handle that which lies ahead...
...for the most part.
Now, some things I'll show you and not tell; but don't worry. Nothing and no one I show you will have any knowledge of our presence. Think of this as spectator mode in one of your shitily produced video games.
You could think of us as; you guessed it - ghosts.
To start, I'm going to take you back to the very beginning and tell you something that very few people know about Maggie:
You see, when she had just turned five and was whisked away across the country, bloody stuffed bunny rabbit doll in hand, by that guy Nathan Cristion? Well technically, that was a kidnapping. But it was kidnapping the likes of which few had ever seen before. Why it happened is something that, to those who prosecuted the crime, they still don't fully understand.
Nevertheless, it's not the auspicious start that anyone could have hoped for our future, current champ.
But why, indeed? Why would a relatively unknown burly biker guy snatch Maggie up from the brisk, briny gold sluices of Fairbanks, Alaska and flee with her all the way down to the continental East Coast? And why was the kidnapper, Nathan James "Jimmy" Cristion, chased by hired thugs and bounty hunters, not law enforcement, to his final stop in the Queen City? And why would Cristion go through all that trouble of running with the little girl whom he took, simply to end it by dropping her off with an elderly stranger and hiding?
That, quite frankly, is a story for another time.
The important thing here is how fate would have Magdalena Marie Lockhea- excuse me, I mean, how Lilith Rosemary Parker would grow up to be the calamity that she is today.
Everyone has their secrets, Mr. Blizzard: The secrets that some people would kill to keep hidden. The secrets that others would die to reveal.
Because, as you see, my not-so-gracious host:
If you want to be sure that you can defeat anyone, you simply have to know their secrets.
The devil's always in the details, right?
- Charlotte, NC -
"A'right now girl, dinner's ready!"
Ahh, there are few things better in life than authentic Carolina barbecue. I can almost recall the taste of its rich, succulent flavor.
'Auntie' Mary Parker was doing the best she could to raise a youngin' in the quaint shack that she called home. She felt like her (somewhat) adopted daughter was a gift from God, her purpose divine in its nature.
Yet, God wasn't going to let Mary have a free pass because of this. The fact of the matter is that Auntie Mary was already quite elderly when Nathan James Cristion left little Lily on her doorstep all those years ago.
Time waits for no one. Neither does-
A bedroom door pulled open from the inside. A teenage girl with dirty blonde hair slinks out.
Speak of the devil.
She slides her slippered feet across the hardwood floor, barely able to put in the effort to sit down at the dinner table. The kids at school were mean again. They don't like Lily very much. They haven't liked Lily since they found out that the color of her skin and that of her Auntie's didn't match.
(This is the American Southeast, after all.)
Auntie hated seeing Lily depressed like this. But what could she do about it?
Hold that thought.
Let us take a brief pause for a moment, Mr. Blizzard. Follow me over here now. I want show you the inside of teenage Lily's room. There are tens, maybe even hundreds of hand-drawn pictures scotch-taped to the walls and, would you take a look at that? 99% of them are professional wrestling related, of which 99% of those are of one Lucy Wylde.
Interesting... I wonder if that will come into play later, perhaps?
Back at the table, Auntie struggled to carry Lily's plate to the table and maneuver her walker at the same time. Lily didn't quite notice; the thoughts of the nasty things her peers said to her were running through her mind. I'm sure she wishes she helped now, though.
By this point, Auntie had developed a bit of a cough. It wasn't anything much. Certainly not worth worrying about, no matter what the doctor had told her. Even if the worst were to happen, God had a plan, she reasoned. Everything would be just fine.
"Now I'm gon' let you say grace this time," she said, settling in.
Lily sighed and rolled her eyes. She didn't know why she was supposed to be thankful.
Lily begrudgingly folded her hands, lowered her face, and muttered: "Dear God, thank you for this food, amen."
Mary added, "And thank you Lord for all the blessin's you've done given us. Not a day goes by where I ain't grateful for everythin'. Each day is a gift from you, oh heavenly Fatha. We will always be thankful for all our days togetha and with you. As we were for all our yesterdays, and as we are today, so shall we be once again in your presence tomorrow. Amen."
Auntie Mary coughed again, yet it didn't take the sparkle out of her eyes when she peered upon her most favorite blessing of them all.
They sat and ate dinner, quietly, as had become ritual. Lily was getting older and growing apart from her adoptive mother. It didn't feel as wrong to her then as I'm sure it does now.
She was waiting out the days until she could drop out of school, get a job, and hopefully never have to deal with those kids in class ever again. Waiting out the days until she could move away from the shack and go find a life of her own.
Soon, she'd get her wish. But would it be anything like what she had hoped for?
Lily's plate was still half-full by the time that her Auntie had finished her scant portion. Mary peered over to watch her daughter play with the food that she had shown little interest in.
Mary coughed again.
With a frown etched across her wrinkled face, she said, "Jus' leave the plates for me in the zink. I'll clean 'em in the mornin'."
"Huh?"
"I ain't feelin' so good tonight, baby," Auntie said as she pushed herself up from the table, her weary bones cracked, and her joints popped with the effort. "I'mma head in early. You don't worry about none of that now, ya hear?"
"Oh. Alright."
It was all a bit strange. Auntie never left a task unfinished. But by the time the older woman had given her daughter a shaky hug and a wet kiss on the forehead, Lily had forgotten all the oddity of the moment.
"Love ya, baby girl."
"Love you too, Auntie."
She didn't know that watching her walk through that doorway would be the very last time that she'd ever see Auntie Mary alive.
...and she sure as hell couldn't imagine what would happen next.
It seems as though Auntie Mary was all-too-happy to sacrifice the golden years of her life to raise the child that a stranger had left on her doorstep. Let me ask you, E.A., What do you know of sacrifice? Is the concept utterly foreign to you? Of course not. You've sacrificed several others on your quest for the greater good.
It's only the concept of self-sacrifice that you couldn't possibly understand.
But you'll have to, if you want to gain the edge that you so desperately need.
- Baltimore, MD -
So where do you go when you're not a real person?
You see, Maggie's, or should I say, Lily's next big problem in life is that, technically, Lily Parker didn't exist.
No birth record on file. No social security number. No paperwork in the world seemed to even identify the little girl as Mary Parker's next of kin. It was like this for a reason. Ironically, homelessness for the sake of anonymity was the best she could have hoped for.
It was the only thing still keeping her safe.
But it's hard to tell that to a teenager on the streets of Baltimore. All of her worldly possessions at the time jammed into a makeshift knapsack.
She had come to Charm City at the behest of a man whom she had just learned had been highly influential in her life, and yet, just a few months prior, she never knew he even existed. She didn't know that it was his blood that stained the stuffed rabbit and that it was his fault that she ended up on that doorstep all those years ago.
Now he begged for her to keep running.
But from whom? Like I said: story for another time.
What's important now is that Lily not only could draw and that she had quite the artist's touch with almost any writing tool. It was the only talent Lily knew she had, and she had to do something to survive.
Despite the city's reputation she was asked to take refuge in, she wasn't scared of the desperate sort that she'd come to meet there. Besides - the grief, the doubt, and the overbearing anxieties of uncertainty all consistently felt as though they were a crushing force on her soul - she had little room left to feel anything else, much less fear.
Yet it wouldn't be long until God, or fate, or what-have-you, would step in yet again to shake things up.
Because, as it turned out, not too long after arriving in Baltimore,
Lily Parker had been attacked.
Luckily, the attack didn't go as planned. The good people of Baltimore stepped in to scare off her attackers, and ultimately, Lily was alright.
Not too long after, though, Lily had found herself in the depths of the Baltimore City Police Department, answering questions from one of their Detectives who had become privy to the matter.
"So let me get this straight," The brash young Detective assigned to her case asked from across the interrogation table, "You came here to Bal'mer cause a convicted killer told ya to?" Gosh, these accents are killer.
He was referring to Nathan Cristion, of course. The blood on the rabbit, remember?
Lily was in shock at the crux of her predicament. She didn't take a single sip from the cup of coffee that the detective offered her. Instead, that cup grew cold between her trembling hands. She had the right to remain silent and chose to use that right near exclusively, despite not being in any real trouble herself.
The Detective doubled down: "You do realize that jails keep records of all the conversations that happen between inmates and visitors."
"So?" She muttered back, scratching at the side of the paper cup.
"Why don't ya tell me what Cristion said to ya?"
Her eyes widened. They were a tell in her body language that the Detective picked up on right away.
"I don't know... look... you're not going to believe anything I tell you anyway, so why not just... I dunno, get whatever records you need to get and go find out for yourself?"
"Alright Miss Parker, if that's how ya want to play... two can play that game."
And no, he wasn't referring to Kliks for Kabul, either... that shameless, fetid, shill shit.
The next sound Lily Parker heard was the door of the interrogation room slamming shut behind the detective as he stormed out.
The detective was forced to wait for the audio files to be sent up from his contemporaries in North Carolina. They simply weren't as easy to obtain back then as they are today.
Sitting at their desks, with all of the proper calls made, the Baltimore City detectives could only ruminate about what light the recordings might shed over the extraordinary circumstances of this case.
They couldn't make out why this girl who had no identity to speak of was on the run and was being chased by: A) people she and they didn't know/could not identify in B) connection to a crime that she (most likely) was the victim of but yet C) her fingerprints and DNA did not even remotely match any known database including D) any countrywide missing persons reports.
"So someone's out there looking for her enough that they're willing to pay big bucks to have her found, but in the same breath they're acting like they don't really want to find her at all... why?"
The junior Detective glanced over at the senior detective supervisor and replied:
"Oh, I think someone wants to find her alright, I just think it's more like that someone doesn't want us finding them finding her."
He'd never know just how right he was.
* * *
Weeks went by, and the recordings (and all files related to the case) were pulled from several precincts in and around the greater Charlotte metropolitan area and sent up North. The files finally brought everything about the Cristion manslaughter trial to light; which ironically, was hardly worth the wait. There wasn't much to go off of. It was a case that provided more questions than it ever did answers.
They had gathered that Cristion had murdered a professional bounty hunter in plain view of several eye-witnesses. However, there was never any motive established as to why Cristion killed the man, or to the reason as to why the bounty hunter was pursuing Jimmy in the first place.
Well, not until now anyway.
"Hey, what did you say this Cristion did before the murder?" The senior detective asked.
"He was uhh, I guess ya could say he did freelance work in Anchorage, some in Fairbanks as well... He popped up sporadically for a time, but, it was in Alaska, so, poppin' on and off the grid is pretty typical up."
"Yeah. Hmph. Not much to go off of, huh - what else is new?"
"Whatever he was doing up there was under the table, for what I think was for some kind of mining operation."
"Mining?"
"Yeah. Gold panners. Some of the places he would pop up in had a few goin' at the time, nothin' big or out of place though." The detective sighed. "No one's been able to get a word out of him as to who he worked for or why he suddenly fled to Charlotte, though. Now that we know this girl is involved... I figure I'll head down in a bit and pay Mr. Cristion a little face-to-face myself. Maybe now he'll-"
The chief was all set to respond when he was interrupted by his desk phone ringing off the hook.
A big break, perhaps? One in his line of work always hopes so.
The look on his face as he hung up said otherwise, though.
"Well, that was Lanesboro County."
"Yeah?"
"You can cancel your travel plans," chief said, "I was just informed that a one 'Nathan James Cristion' was involved in a little rec yard scrum two days ago."
"Oh my gosh - Is he alright?" The detective asked.
"Sucker's dead."
Coincidence? Come on now, Mr. Blizzard. Not even Satan himself would believe in such a thing.
It's not often that a murderer dies, and you can feel the air sucked out of a room full of cops. As it turned out, perhaps Cristion wasn't exactly the murderer that people thought he was after all.
What if the reason he killed that bounty hunter was to protect the little girl? What if Nathan Cristion was simply sacrificing his own life for what he knew was the greater good?
It doesn't make sense that someone would willingly choose to suffer for the betterment of somebody else to a guy like you, hmm?
- Baltimore, MD -
Cont'd.
Several more weeks went by while the Baltimore City police department worked tirelessly to keep the girl safe, well, as safe as they could anyway. But unfortunately, every single lead they had as to the young woman's true identity and the motive behind the attacks dried up and fizzled out somewhere precisely wherever and whenever that information tried to cross that cold Alaskan border.
The Police couldn't help. Hell, even the FBI couldn't help. Every avenue they went down was an ultimate dead end. Every lead that they had run dry.
They knew whoever wanted Lily Parker dead knew that she was in Baltimore at the time. So it was deemed that what was best for Lily was to get her out of the city. However, the fine detectives who worked her case weren't about to just send her out into the world with no way to fend for herself.
"Witness protection?" The dirty-blonde-haired girl blinked as she looked across at her new detective friend.
"Yup." He tossed the manila folder containing all of the paperwork she'd need to get started. "It's all in there. All's you got to do is sign."
Her dainty fingers shook as she reached for the envelope. She pulled it across the table towards her and opened the file.
"It's... blank?"
"Well, we figured since we couldn't find your birth name, the best we could do was let you pick out your own."
"Wh-what about Lily?"
"Oh no," the detective shook his head, "Nuh uh. Lily Parker is out. She gone. Ya can't go with something that even remotely sounds like Lily Parker. This is going to be yer new identity, and it's going to be all yer own."
Can you imagine it, E.A.?
Imagine yourself sitting there, handed a fresh start? Especially when that fresh start comes after never having started at all? Could you imagine what it felt like for her to leave what little she had left behind at that moment?
To be gifted the one thing she never had by the genuinely benevolent people of this world - who just wanted for a young woman to have the life someone out there wanted so desperately to deny her?
"But what about my birthday?" Lily asked.
"Pick one." The detective replied. "Any day ya want."
Lily's cheeks burned with embarrassment.
"H-how about... h-how I look?"
"Well, you could always cut ya hair... or dye it," the detective replied with a smile, "Or both. But ya, anythin' you can change is good. Always remember: change is good."
She had a thousand questions, and rightfully so. But the biggest question she had was about the one thing on all of this paperwork that wasn't blank.
"What's... Inwood?"
"Oh, it's a little borough in the Bronx where we'll get ya all set up."
He placed a comforting hand on her shoulder as she jotted down a name.
"Congratulations Miss... uhh.." He peered over her shoulder. "Miss Lockheart, huh? Looks like you're well on your way to your cozy new life up in the Big Apple."
The detective patted her on the back.
"Looks like ya spelled Lockhart wrong though," he chuckled.
- Inwood, NY -
Hide in a sea of people. Hide in plain sight.
To make a long story more palatable, things for Magdalena Marie Lockheart started fantastically in Inwood, to the point where it almost began to feel like fantasy. There were times in the early days that even the newly christened 'Maggie' couldn't believe how well her new life had been treating her.
But you and I both know what happens when things seem too good to be true, though.
The woman now known as Miss Lockheart had taken the money that the Baltimore cops had gifted her and the 2nd-floor apartment they had provided. She invested further in the building by buying out the abandoned barbershop on the floor below. The shop was dirt cheap as it quite literally was rotting beneath her feet.
She polished the old tile floors and had the vintage nickel-plated horse-hide chairs reupholstered. She worked hard to restore the vintage vibe of the shop as close to how it was as she possibly could.
And soon after Magdalena Lockheart had risen from Lily's ashes, the Paper Street Tattoo Parlor was born.
By now, she had her silver hair, and the first of her many tattoos started showing up as she welcomed her new employees to practice their craft on her. By all accounts, every day being Maggie Lockheart made being Maggie Lockheart even easier.
But there was still one thing lingering in the ether that even Magdalena Lockheart heself couldn't escape.
While walking home one night after having a couple of celebratory drinks at a nearby bar, Maggie was jumped from behind in an alleyway behind her parlor.
I'm not going to show you this part Mr. Blizzard, because quite frankly, I can't stand to stomach it. All you have to know is that a knife was involved... a hunting knife. Two men had her pinned down and, in the struggle for her life, inches of that blade had disappeared through the skin below her navel.
If it weren't for one of the girls that worked in her shop hearing all the commotion and running out to save her, by all means, Magdalena Lockheart would have dead. You, I or most anyone would never have gotten the chance to even know her name.
Who attacked her was never proven, though those who are privy to her true identity understood it was most likely the same attackers from Baltimore.
Motive unclear.
It's sad, really.
Maggie Lockheart came to the next day in the intensive care unit of a nearby hospital.
There were NY cops there, ready to take her statement. But she couldn't. With her last hope of getting away from the folks who wanted her 'done in' seemingly dashed, she was simply too broken to talk. Yet that wasn't even the worst part.
The doctors had informed her of what they had to do to save her life on the operating table. Those men might not have found success in taking her life, but what they did take ended up making her sometimes wish that they had.
In the upcoming days when the counselors came and went, when the therapists handed her folded pamphlets and invited her to talk out her feelings in group therapy. Maggie chose not to have any of it.
Instead, she chose to pack up her pain and go home. No, not back to North Carolina, or Baltimore, or even Fairbanks. Maggie knew that whomever it was trying to hurt her would just keep coming back for her regardless.
So she stuck her nose down to the grindstone. Maggie went back to Paper Street. She resumed the life that too many before her had sacrificed all too much for. She was going to figure this out and live life to the absolute fullest, despite anyone's worst intentions to the contrary.
Because, as you see, Maggie was tired of running from people like you. Maggie was tired of seeing everyone she ever loved suffer because of people like you. Maggie didn't even know who it was that wanted her dead; but she did know one thing:
If they ever did come around again, she'd make coming after her their biggest regret.
This is what you face.
- Inwood, NY -
Cont'd.
She learned how to be the reason people like you need 911.
I could go on and on about her exploits in training school... and in Future Stars of Wrestling... in Carnage Wrestling... The UGWC... but I don't think you need to know all of that, no. Just understand that along every step of the way, there was always somebody there telling her what she should and should not do with her life. Some of those who were legitimately trying to protect her. Others, well, not so much.
The detractors were always loudest during any setback she ever experienced during her fighting career... and were always eerily silent when she proved them wrong.
And yes, for every point in time that Maggie would rise to meet a new challenge, much like in her life, there was always a bigger setback waiting around the corner to break her... to slam her back down to the ground... to force her to pick herself back up again... to mold her and to change her... to have her coalesce those broken pieces and reemerge as the next greatest force the likes of which this business and the world have never seen.
So, Mr. Blizzard, now I ask you... are you asking me how to defeat Magdalena Lockheart because you think you might have what it takes to break her down like they did? And you want to do it because you think you're what's best for business? You're what's best for everyone?
Hah.
You may think that to be true, Mr. Blizzard, but I'm afraid the only way either of us is going to find out for sure is set to happen real soon. The date's been etched by pure hellfire along an endless façade of soot-covered brimstone-
The Devil, so they say, may cry in Sin City.
But the New Goddess feels no remorse.
- Mojave Desert, NV -
So here she is today. The cursed child. The blessed child.
She's died several times. Always comes back reborn.
Right now, the woman known as Magdalena Lockheart is all alone in a indiscreet motel room. It's a place somewhere out in the middle of nowhere. As you know, Nevada isn't short of those "next gas station in a hundred miles" signs that signal the true scarcity of life in some places. The desert is one such place to get yourself lost in.
She's mulling over the type of person she wants to be right now.
Maggie twirls a bottle of Vicodin pills with her inked and painted fingertips. The sun beaming in from the window beats down on her silvery hair, along with the endless sand and dry brush that surrounds her.
She's in pain again.
No good deed goes unpunished, and after mentioning her displeasure for post-match attacks on social media, it seems as though she's opened up the floodgates for those willing to disagree with her on what constitutes disrespect in our industry. She's chalking off your and Fringe's attacks as the price she paid for being willing to advocate for the greater good.
There are about ten-plus voicemails, and about thirty missed calls on her phone from the people that she loves and cares about. She's trying hard to distance herself, to keep them away from the monster that I put inside her. She knows it's all too easy to slip up and let the Black Legacy slip out.
This hurts in a way that no pill will alleviate and, unfortunately, she's well aware of the lack of cure. There's no easy way to fix that which can only be reconciled through sheer will alone.
Despite her best attempt to ignore these feelings of being lost and alone, she pulls out her phone anyway and dials up the ol' voicemal. There she finds a message from her ex, Amber Caldwell, the one person in her world who wished that she had never heard the name of you-know-who.
In the message, Amber apologizes and goes on about the importance of second chances. She's been watching what Maggie has been doing recently. She's witnessed Maggie in a downward spiral, doing what she thinks is blatant self-harm.
Amber wants Maggie to sit down with her and talk things out... that maybe they could do better... or so she says.
Maggie clutches the orange pill bottle in her hand a bit tighter. The temptation overwhelms her, especially when the excess squeezing causes the white cap to pop loose.
When the message is over, Maggie quickly deletes it. It takes everything she has not to throw her phone out through that lone window outside into the endless sea of dunes, where it can remain buried along with Auntie Mary, Jimmy Cristion, and yes, even me.
The struggle commences. The headache becomes a splitting migraine, and it feels like somebody is trying to jam an icepick into the side of her head. Somewhere deep below the bones and the plate of her skull, Lily Parker and her other, darker persona fight over who it is that is going to get to take control over Magdalena Lockheart.
This is where the Black Dawn starts.
And in the ring is where it always, ultimately ends.
The pain becomes too great. And for the first time in a while, she slips a couple of Vicodin in her mouth. She slams her head back and swallows the pills as dry as the Mojave that engulfs her.
With her back against the wall, she slides down to the floor and clutches her knees tight to her chest. The rest of the pills spill out along the carpet.
When she peers up again, her mako green eyes are shrink-wrapped with tears.
- Promotional -
"My entire life has been influenced by shitbags like you, E.A. You say you want what's best for Level Up but we all know you only want what's best for yourself."
There's no camera crew around. A simple little recording on her cellphone would do.
Don't worry, though. We can watch. She can't see us. She can't see you...
Yet.
"To say being the Final Boss champion has been easy would be a flat out lie. Tomorrow night is a little show called Devil May Cry and between you and I - I've been through hell just to get to it. But I'll tell you right now E.A., I wouldn't trade what I've been through for the world. Maybe it's pride talking when I say how good it feels to truly know just how much harder it is to stay on top once you get there. But if so, it's pride that I've earned."
"Not just pride in being the Final Boss champion but pride in how I got here. Pride in the type of champion I've chosen to be. Pride in the fact that I've done it all by giving my all to our company. Pride that I've never had to hang my head low because I gave anything less to Level Up than my absolute best."
"But these are the types of things that get on my mind when I look down the barrel at someone like you. Since day one you've done nothing but show the people that you think are 'lesser-thans' that you're the key to success. You've tried to convince everyone, even me, that you're our collective bright, shining future. You've asked almost every single one of your opponents to date to help you achieve greater things for Level Up before decimating them and putting a lot of them in their place once they step foot into that ring."
"And for that, you may be a challenger. But I do not grant you the rank of he who is best for our company."
Maggie shakes her head at the camera lens on her phone.
"Not yet."
"You expect more out of the locker room. You expect more out of staff. You expect more out of me, too, and there's nothing wrong with that. Actually, I should be commending you on that part, spouting nonsense trying to light the fire under my ass to simply 'do better' or 'be better' as if there's any other way I could be. There's nothing wrong with a man who understands the true power of words and what they can bring. There's nothing wrong with a man who strives to make everything better for everyone else, even if his life also somehow gets a little bit better in the process as well."
"And it's made me think a lot... yeah... now having all of this being proposed to me... to look in the mirror and ask myself what it is that I've been doing to make Level Up a better place for everyone else besides myself. To be honest with you, like I always have, like I've always tried to be... I see a whole lot of selfishness staring back at me... yeah... I see myself tossing stones from my own glass house sometimes. So I can't chide you for wanting to be the Final Boss champion. I can't put you down for wanting to achieve the same things that I've always wanted to achieve."
"But then it occurred to me that maybe, just maybe, it isn't your goals that aren't the things that are at question here. Perhaps I've been looking at this the wrong way."
"Because, you see, I'd drop this title tomorrow if I knew it would make Level Up a better place. I'd walk out the front doors of the MGM Grand and never once turn back if that scenario would ever... could ever be true. I know that's what I'd want to do... well, maybe not want to. But it's what I'd want to have the strength to do if that's what the people need."
"If I knew in my heart of hearts that my exit would benefit everyone else my inked-up little ass would be out of here in less than a heartbeat. But you see the difference between you and I isn't about what we'd say we'd do when push comes to shove. It's about what we ARE willing to do when push comes to shove... and that's what we each have inside of us has that truly defines us."
"I'm not here to do what's best for business, even if that does make me just as selfish as everyone else. But I am here to do what I said I would do from the first time a Level Up microphone was ever held up to these lips. I said that I was here to prove myself to be the best. And if I found that being the best in Level Up was ever not true, then I was going to work my ass off to become the best. And if I ever worked hard enough to prove that I was the best, I was going to work my ass off to stay... the best."
"And to me, if I went back on my word now, that'd be a slap in the face to EVERYONE in the back who has ever fought for anything here, and to everything I've worked so hard to achieve since winning this belt six months ago! Because I once stood in that very ring with blood over my battered body with my nose shattered across my face just to prove that I could be strong enough and brave enough to dare call myself the Last of Us. And since then it's been MY JOB to defend what was given to me that night with EVERY fiber of MY BEING- and GODDAMNIT... EVERY DROP OF BLOOD I'VE SPILLED AND EVERY TEAR I'VE SHED ALONG THE WAY ARE ALL THE PROOF THAT ANYONE WILL EVER NEED ABOUT HOW GOOD I'VE BEEN AT STAYING TRUE TO MY WORD-"
"So to be quite honest I'm a little hurt, and I'm DAMN sure offended that you would DARE think I've been doing any less than trying to make Level Up the BEST possible place that I can make it be... and insulted that you insinuate that you could do better. And it's true, I may NOT be the greatest professional wrestling champion to ever walk the face of this Earth, and I might not have fully understood the power that the title can give when I won it. But I'll tell you what, Blizzard, I just keep doing what I've ALWAYS done... I get just a LITTLE BIT BETTER at EVERY SINGLE DAY... to the point now where I'm willing to accept that being the CHAMPION means accepting all of the RESPONSIBILITIES that come along with it- and if that means shoving BRIEFCASES up the ASSES of every stuffed suit that comes around claiming that THEY KNOW WHAT'S BEST FOR OUR BUSINESS!"
"Because it doesn't matter to me how you got the shot... hell, if you are the Developer like Eli thinks that you might be... then the only thing you've developed at Devil May Cry is how to get your own ass whipped at the highest form. It doesn't matter at all how you paved the road to the Final Boss champion, all that matters now is that you did. Regardless of how anyone thinks about it, when that bell rings you're going to get the answers to a lot of questions that have been burning on the back of your mind for some time. Do you have what it takes to prove that you're what's best for business in Level Up? It's about time you put up, and it's long overdue that you shut up and let's both FIND OUT TOGETHER WHAT SACRIFICING FOR THE GREATER GOOD REALLY MEANS-"
"I'll do you the honor of allowing you to tell me if you think I've just been posturing all this time... but after that final bell rings. I'll allow you the privilege of telling the WORLD of WHO YOU THINK I AM, BUT- only after you've got to experience the REAL THING for YOURSELF."
"I'LL LET YOU TELL THE WORLD... if you STILL think that the monsters aren't real and if we're all just a bunch of clowns out here writing checks with our mouths that our asses could never cash. But I'm here to tell you now, E.A. MY name is Magdalena Marie Lockheart, and I AM the Final Boss Champion. I might not be what's best for Level Up Wrestling, but I'm all that they've got right now. And I'm going to keep on fighting to make sure it stays that way... I'll fight with my life to make sure the next person who holds this championship TRULY deserves it... I'll give ANYTHING for the people of this company and ALL they could ever ask me to GIVE... for that, yeah, I'm damn proud."
"Proud enough to meet you in that ring tomorrow night, look a man who is a full foot-and-a-half taller than me up in his eyes and show him just how real the monsters are around here. And when you see that look in my eyes, you'll know exactly what I'll have to say:"
"Look at what you just made me do."
- Epilogue -
So, you wanted to know how to beat Maggie Lockheart, hmm?
Well, sad news friend.
You're not up against her anymore.
It seems that in your quest to do what was best for your business, you've inspired her to rise up against you. You've evoked the Artist to bring out Heaven's Dark Harbinger... The Calamity from the Skies... The Destroyer of Worlds...
You're fucked pal.
Changes come. But may God and all of Heaven have mercy for your soul for what's about to come down on you...
Because I know she won't.
Well, sad news friend.
You're not up against her anymore.
It seems that in your quest to do what was best for your business, you've inspired her to rise up against you. You've evoked the Artist to bring out Heaven's Dark Harbinger... The Calamity from the Skies... The Destroyer of Worlds...
JENOVA
You're fucked pal.
Changes come. But may God and all of Heaven have mercy for your soul for what's about to come down on you...
Because I know she won't.
