Post by ssri on Sept 10, 2020 17:11:18 GMT -5
The atom-in-ouroboros glows bright against the blackness. Slowly, it fades from view, as video footage takes its place. The footage is grainy, the audio crackling, unclear. A timestamp at the bottom of the screen reads “1973-09-11”. Next to this are the words “Notes from the Founder - 280.”
A man is seated behind a desk. He appears to be in his late 30s or early 40s, black hair flecked with strands of grey. He wears glasses, round-rimmed, perched on the tip of his nose. His eyes are somehow magnetic, drawing the viewer in. Around his neck is a pendant of the atom-in-ouroboros. Behind him are two pillars, one at each side of the screen, topped by an orb - one of silver, one of gold. Between the pillars are a series of bookcases, their shelves filled with books on all subjects - alchemy, physics, astrology, history, occult traditions from across the globe, Crowley and Parsons sitting side by side with Einstein and Jung.
The man stares into the camera, his eyes piercing, unrelenting. His expression is stern, without hint of a smile.
“Good evening. And welcome to another of our weekly lessons.
“The subject for the week, in line with recent developments within and without the Institute - is pro wrestling.
“There are many who would question why we, the Spirit Science Research Institute, would choose to involve ourselves with such a profession - the bloodsoaked entertainment of the unwashed masses.
“Allow me to elucidate.”
He closes his eyes a moment.
"Wrestling, it may be said, allows the observer to be true to themselves in a way few other forms of entertainment have achieved. In other sports - boxing, martial arts - the audience must pretend to be invested in the competition, the athleticism, the elegance of it all, hiding their bloodlust behind a veneer of respectability.
"In theatre, meanwhile, there is the ever-present rationale that what one is watching is simply a performance - that however gruesome and grisly the spectacle may be, it is merely a spectacle, and can be enjoyed as art safe in the knowledge that no true suffering took place.
"In wrestling it is different. In wrestling, the bloodlust is open and unapologetic, stadiums of thousands of people eager for violence. Crowds of men, women, even the youngest of children, watching athletes assault one another with fists and feet, bottles and chairs, hurling one another from unimaginable heights, bombarding one another with attacks that could risk serious injury or even death.
"In that respect, one must conclude that wrestling is in fact far more honest and truthful than both sport and drama. Where the former is shielded by claims of athletic prowess, the latter as art and performance, in wrestling alone the bloodlust is honest and the suffering true. This is its beauty; this is what wrestling gives to the world. For a few precious moments, man is confronted with what he truly desires. Only pain.
He pauses, smirking a moment, allowing himself a brief moment of joy.
“Yet in truth, professional wrestling offers far more than even its greatest practitioners have yet conceived.
“It is a truth, acknowledged since ancient times, that true power - spiritual power, occult power, social and political and economic power - is only exercised through the shedding of blood. Blood is the lifeforce, it is power, it is the boundary between this life and the next. In days past, the idea of sacrifice - plant, animal, or even human - was a fact of everyday life. In our modern times, such blood sacrifices recur under other names.
“The lands of south-east Asia are drenched in the outpourings of the latest blood sacrifice, ordered at the altar of American exceptionalism. A god as powerful as any other, made all the more powerful still by the fact few dare acknowledge his existence.
“In wrestling, while life is not lost, blood is shed by the gallon with every passing week. Shed before a baying crowd at least as bloodthirsty and fanatical as those seen in the Colossei of ancient Rome, shed for the gods of capitalism and the fury of the mob. Meanwhile, the energy of the crowd - the psychic energy of thousands of people gathered together for a single purpose, the deafening roar of the masses calling for blood - holds a power in and of itself, as powerful and overwhelming as that of any fascist rally or religious revival.
“Hitherto, this power has been merely squandered, the rush of bloodshed and the roar of the crowd left to merely dissipate like so much vapour.
“This is about to change. This power is ours. And we shall utilise it as we Will.”
He reaches under the desk and withdraws a photograph. It is a man in his 20s, the atom-in-ouroboros tattooed on the left of his chest, poised, ready to strike an opponent just out of shot.
“Here is one of our newest recruits. He is known as John Riley.
“Riley first set foot in a wrestling ring three years ago. He rapidly rose to fame, travelling across the United States from one region to the next, taking on all comers - Eli Flair, Ray Skelton, Rick Rogers - beating all comers and inviting more. Many had named him the greatest wrestler of the 1970s, perhaps of the entire 20th century. Until a drastic injury laid him low; an injury to the spine and shoulder which many believed meant he would never wrestle again.
“Doctors rejected him, hospitals turned their faces away, friends and colleagues urged him to leave the industry altogether. But then came the Institute.
“Through a uniquely designed regimen, crafted by myself personally - a combination of diet, ritual, exercise, drugs, violence and sacrifice - John Riley has returned to the wrestling profession. Not only able to survive, but to thrive.
“He is only the first. Many more shall follow.
“It is of course incumbent on all members of the Spirit Science Research Institute to support this endeavour to the fullest extent possible. Refusers will be noted, and dealt with with the utmost force.
“So ends the lesson. So says the Founder.
“Go now, and do what you Will.”
He nods. The screen slowly fades out, replaced by further video footage.
We see John Riley - military style crew cut, shirtless, atom-in-ouroboros symbol on his chest, beating his opponents senseless. The decade progresses as we see him casting down one foe after another, sometimes swathed in gold, sometimes drenched in blood.
The video continues, through the 1980s, shifting from armouries and local venues to stadiums and arenas. Different faces start to appear, men and women, each tattooed with the atom-in-ouroboros, their faces a combination of arrogance, contempt and defiance. A woman, her face covered with a mask, pins her opponent, the referee counting at an impossibly fast speed, the woman congratulated with a title belt, her opponent lunging for her mask in obvious fury. A man, an enormous spike in his hand, forcing it into his opponent’s eye with evident glee.
The video speeds up, through the 90s, the 2000s, fashions and styles changing, brutality and bloodshed the only constant. From fisticuffs and tables to barbed wire, fire, nails and glass. A canvas marked with the atom-in-ouroboros drawn in blood, the audience cheering, baying for blood, desperate for more, desperate and hungry as the moment before orgasm.
And onto the 2010s. We see a man, clad all in black, an omega symbol across the right of his chest. A man stands before him on the aisle leading to the ring, smirking a moment before striking him down with terrifying accuracy, an object in his hands which looks like a blade, a redheaded woman rushes to her fallen lover. The redheaded woman and her allies, standing against the man who assailed her lover. A brutal battle in an underground venue, the walls lined with weapons, the floor stained crimson.
A clash in a wrestling ring. 2018. Two women, standing head to head. One is Cassandra, bleeding profusely, her eyes unrelenting, remorseless.
The other is Mia Rayne.
The video freezes, focusing on the two women, the hatred and venom almost palpable through the screen.
The screen fades out, replaced by the face of Cassandra, this time in the modern day. She stares into the camera with an expression of almost comic amusement.
Cassandra: “Good evening, Mia. It’s….been a while.”
She laughs, heartily, again and again, as the video slowly fades to black.