163

M3
Marvolo has been here a long time…

A trembling hand, clutching a ground piece of chalk, stretches towards the dull, concrete wall.

M3
Too long.

Drawing a wobbly vertical line—the latest in a procession of dozens, if not hundreds—the hand collapses, dropping the chalk to the floor.

M3
Days bleed into each other. The walls creep closer. Shadows point and whisper…

Sitting on a stiff yet wafer-thin mattress on a rusted, tetanus-riddled cot, MARVOLO 3 hugs his legs close to his chest.
Wearing tattered, striped, cream-and-black prison overalls, he hangs his masked head low and mumbles into his chest.

M3
No escape… No hope… No—

Click

Creeeaaak

A door opens, and a sliver of pale yellow light cuts Marvolo down the middle.

RAQUEL
Marvolo?

#1 abruptly snaps out of his melancholy state. He hitches up his baggy sleeve and examines his bare wrist.

M3
Blimey, 3 o’clock already!? Thank you, Raquel!

RAQUEL
Numbehr.

M3
Yes, it is very gloomy in here. Be a love and open the curtains, would you?

RAQUEL
Wahn.

Crossing the room, Raquel whisks the drapes back.

Scrape

Marvolo vaults off of the cot, then cups a fist and pushes it firmly into his lumbar.

Crack

M3
Ah, that’s better. We need to get a new one of those—

He points at the cot over his shoulder.

M3
Marvolo can’t show up to wrestle The Great Scotsman with a trick back!

RAQUEL
Great Scott.

M3
You can say that again. Speaking of the Scotsman, let’s see how long Marvolo has been in here…

The pocket-sized luchador kneels beside his chalk tally on the wall, stroking his chin.

M3
Carry the one… Divide by the hypotenuse… 163 minutes.

He stands up straight and shrugs.

M3
Well, that’s close enough.

RAQUEL
Marvolo.

Marvolo chuckles.

M3
You’re quite right, Raquel. Marvolo could have easily gone longer if he’d wanted to. He just didn’t want to.

He walks into the centre of the room and turns to face the window, basking in the wintery daylight which shines through the glass.

M3
163 days. That was the length of your sentence, Scot.

Pheeew

He whistles and mops his brow.

M3
If you’d faced Marvolo sooner, he could’ve gotten you a reduced sentence.

#1 flashes his gold-toothed politician’s smile.

M3
Still, you’ve done your time. You’re free now. Marvolo is happy for you, and you should be happy, too.

RAQUEL
Numbehr.

M3
While you’ve lost ten pounds of gold from around your waist, you’ve shed the one-tonne boulder that you’ve been dragging around everywhere you go.

Marvolo inhales and exhales deeply.

M3
All that pressure and baggage – gone. You must feel almost as good as Marvolo feels every day!

He holds up his index fingers.

M3
Marvolo knows what you’re thinking: but I already felt good! Great, actually. Don’t I look great!?

Marvolo sucks air through his teeth, like a mechanic after kicking someone’s tyre.

M3
You’ve got big muscles, sure, but even they can’t lift you up from the lows to which you’ve sunk.

He flexes his own, considerably less impressive biceps.

M3
For every day that you wore the HOTv Championship around your suspiciously swollen abdomen, you grew increasingly obsessed with getting bigger, faster, and stronger. Protein shakes running through your veins, blood vessels like a roadmap, you pushed your body to breaking point.

#1 snaps his fingers.

M3
Knowing that you had to defend your title week in, week out drove you… Off a cliff.

RAQUEL
Wahn.

M3
All you saw in the mirror was a well-oiled war machine. Unbeknownst to you, though, everyone else was looking at you and licking their lips like hyenas.

Marvolo does just that.

M3
Whilst your muscles bulged and threatened to burst out your singlet, your eyes were dull and sunken. That once majestic, flowing brown mullet of yours got cut short and bleached blonde to hide the field of greys that had since sprouted. Your glistening, elasticised skin turned into patinated leather.

He strokes his baby-butt smooth chin through the opening of his mask.

M3
Every match, every defence, and every victory slowly drained you. Every time the referee held your arm in the air, it was with less and less gusto from you, and perhaps even hesitancy…

A bird soars past the window outside.

M3
They circled you like vultures in the desert, taking turns to swoop down until you were too weak to fight them off. It all paid off for them when, finally, Iceberg became the man to end your 163-day reign.

RAQUEL
Bergman.

M3
Bless you.
Marvolo has arrived fashionably late to the party. Your sentence has already ended, but perhaps he can be the one to help rehabilitate you, and reintegrate you into HOW. By setting you up as a productive member of the roster, we can ensure that you don’t land yourself back in this same situation.

RAQUEL
Marvolo.

M3
That’s right, Raquel. We’ve a new three-step program with a hundred-percent success rate. All you have to do is lie on your back with both shoulders on the mat. One… Two… Three – and we’re done.

#1 dusts his hands.

M3
You served 163 days. Marvolo did 163 minutes for fun. At Chaos 023, however, he’s going to defeat The Once-Great Scotsman in 163 seconds!

He laughs boastfully, tearing off his prison layers to reveal his trademark red wrestling gear underneath.

M3
Marvolo is number one!

RAQUEL
Marvolo es numbehr wahn!