Black Friday RP: In The End

[Danger10]

Shapiro has always had sympathy for sick and disabled children but has always felt helpless. So he decided that he needed to start volunteering in any way he possibly could. This current evening is a fundraising bowling tournament for special needs children.

Shapiro, standing just next to the concession area drinking a soda, thinking about the poor bowling skills he's been displaying all day. He can't help but notice an 11 year old autistic girl, Katie, on his team has been bowling pretty poorly as well, yet she seems to be having the time of her life. Throughout the entire day and all the games, he's been watching this girl curiously. Knowing that it's a charity event means that winning is no a big deal, but Shapiro still can't seem to understand why she's having so much fun losing.

While Shapiro is watching the numerous disabled children, he is approached by Stephanie, the charity's coordinator.

"You enjoying yourself?" she asks just before taking a drink from her own soda.

"I'm having a blast, just struggling today," Shapiro responds.

"Don't worry, I doubt anyone notices," she responds with a little giggle patting his shoulder for comfort.

"Yeah, I know, but it's still a little embarrassing," Shapiro says with a shrug. "Poor Katie, she's been struggling to."

Stephanie looks over at Katie waiting gleefully for her ball to return, "But she's having a blast isn't she?"

"Yeah, she sure is. As a matter of fact all the kids are," Shapiro says with a somewhat puzzled look on his face.

There's a moment of silence as both Shapiro and Stephanie take it all in.

"You know Shapiro, we have a saying around here: The only disability is a bad attitude." Stephanie says as she takes another sip from her soda.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Shapiro asks, looking at Stephanie.

"Well, no matter what's been thrown at these kids, no matter the ups and downs life takes them through, almost all of them seem unfazed. You will rarely find them without a smile. Through it all they always seem to be happy. It's like they're in tune with something about life that the rest of us aren't," Stephanie says philosophically "It's like they instinctively know that everything's going to be okay in the end."

Shapiro didn't respond, but being around these children put a lot of things in perspective for him and made him appreciate the little things in life. He had a new respect for all the disabled children he met that day. He also realized we could all learn something from them: stay calm, don't panic, everything's going to be okay in the end, if it's not then it must not be the end.

Never in a million years did he think he would walk away from this experience a better man.


The next morning just after dawn and Shapiro is in the gym along with his trainer, Sean, and his trainer's protégé, Scott. These intense, early morning workouts, which have Shapiro pushing himself to his limits, have become more routine as of late as Shapiro recommits himself to the WFWF and to the wrestling business in general.

Both men are lying on their backs having just ran into each other resulting in a double knockout. Sean, acting as the referee, starts his count

1...

2...

3...

4...

5...

6...

Shapiro and Scott slowly start to move.

7...

8...

Shapiro and Scott both reach the bottom rope on opposite sides of the ring and start pulling themselves up simultaneously.

9...

Both men reach their fee just before Sean reaches a 10 count. Shapiro and Scott meet up in the center of the ring. Shapiro strikes first with a hard right hand. Scott responds with a right hand of his own. Shapiro answers back with another right hand of his own. Scott, still not giving in, lands another right hand. Shapiro stretches back and lands one more strong right hand. Scott, still not giving up, throws another right hand back at Shapiro.

Shapiro blocks Scotts punch attempt, picks Scott up and nails him with a backbreaker. Shapiro climbs up to the top rope and waits for Scott to get back up. Scott gets up off the mat, dazed and turns into a flying clothesline off the top rope courtesy of Shapiro. Shapiro then drags Scott off the mat and nails him with a Flatliner. With Scott lying on the mat on his stomach, Shapiro locks in the Shapiro Stretch and Scott almost immediately taps out.

Both men are drenched in sweat and breathing hard due to the morning's long, grueling workout. Shapiro rolls out of the ring and starts drinking from his water bottle as Sean joins him outside the ring.

"Looking great, champ. Why don't you take the rest of the day off?" Sean suggests as he gives Shapiro a friendly slap on the back.

"I can't do that, Sean. I'm facing the real Champ: Drakz. This is my biggest test so far and I'm not going to blow this opportunity." Shapiro responds with a focus stare.

"It's just that you've been pushing yourself really hard lately and you deserve a break." Sean says with a concerned look on his face.

"Sean, it's Drakz. I need this win. I need this win more than any other in my career so far." Shapiro responds with a straight face.

"So then, what do you plan on next? Go another round with Sean or hit the weights?" Sean asks as he looks around at what his gym has to offer.

"Nah, I'm gonna go for a run." Shapiro responds as he stands to leave.

"So then, do you wanna go another round with Scott tomorrow?" Sean asks as Shapiro walks towards the door.

Shapiro stops and turns around facing Sean with a slight smile, "Nah," he responds, "I'll be back for another round in a couple of hours."

Sean smiles as Shapiro exits the gym.

Shapiro steps outside to the brisk, early morning weather. He sticks his headphones in his ears and starts on his way, a million thoughts running through his head...

I never thought success in this business would be easy to attain. But, I didn't think I would struggle this much either.

What am I missing?

What am I not doing right?

Am I not pushing myself hard enough?

What does it take to be successful in the WFWF?

Maybe I need to change my style up.

Should I train in Tae Kwon Do?

Maybe learn some martial arts?

Should I work on more aerial moves?

Should I try and hookup with a veteran and ask them to take me under their wing?

It wouldn't hurt. It would definitely give me some more credibility.

Not just credibility, it wouldn't hurt to have a veteran in my corner watching my back.

Or shouting advice during the match on something I could capitalize on, that I myself can't see or else wouldn't know.

I sure could use that against some of my opponents here in the WFWF.

Lord knows I sure could use that at Black Friday.

Booked vs Drakz the reigning WFWF Heavyweight Champion. The f'n champ, you've got to be kidding me.

Then again, what better way than to make a statement than to beat the Champ.

All it takes is one win.

Everybody's beatable.

Just gotta wait for him to slip up and take advantage.

I can picture it now, Drakz in excruciating pain, tapping to the Shapiro Stretch.

Or Drakz lying on his back unconscious after the Damage Plan.

Man, those are great visions, hopefully I'll make one of them reality at Black Friday. That'll give me all the credibility I need.

[Danger10]

The beginning is based on my disabled daughter, no matter everything she's been through she's still the happy as can be and if you notice, most disabled kids are, and I thought I would kind've bring that to attention.
This was my first time writing a match, because of that I started the segment near the end of the match.
Also I've been narrating through all of Shapiro's RP's and I've been wanting to do one where it transitions to a first person narrative and I finally got to do that as he left the gym.
I had another scene I wanted to add but was having trouble with it and with the deadline coming up I just decided it was best to cut it.
All in all, I'm really happy with this RP, thanks to jdfranchise for the advice on my dialogue, I think it's what's been missing.

[The Gangsta]

This is your strongest piece yet in my opinion. How you make the connection between fighting Drakz and at the disabled children bowling tournament is well done. As you were saying in your monologue, the reference in shifting to a martial arts fighter indicates Shapiro is starting to become a hardened man. You can tell it in the match with Scott as well. But the only advice I would give you is that the dialogue between Shapiro and Stephanie could have been a little bit more smoother. Instead of her saying it in a few sentences, you could have fleshed it out a bit more.

This was a very good piece. I look forward to seeing more pieces from you. If you keep this up, the championship title shots may come to you more often. Good job man.

[CM Poor]

To echo Ante's sentiments, yeah, this is a vast improvement over what you'd out out so far. One thing I can tell that you took to the bank is the fact that you just dropped Shapiro into the scene and let him move throughout it. You didn't go back to kids coming up and fawning over the lower card contender and gushing over how big a fan they are. You put him there with purpose and intent and let him take in the picture. That's good.

I know it's easy to fill a canvas with a training match, but avoid it like the plague. There's never any substance to the story involved and when I see it kick in, it's very off putting as a reader. When you're writing an rp, your real bread and butter is your characters internal and external dialogue - how he interacts with his environment and the people surrounding him, and how he processes it in his mind.

My last bit of advice would be to really study your opponents, and this takes a bit of effort in you may have tyi go back and read months or years worth of material, but where you had launched off of the fact that Shapiro was volunteering his time to brighten the day of disabled children, you could have really meated that out on your match with Drakz. Without going into too much detail, that would have been an incredibly opportune way to emphasize how much better of a person you were that Drakz by chugging into his past a bit.

Keep up the good work though, you're definitely improving.

[bad guy™]

What Brennan said. Especially the last part about studying your opponent. Drakz may be a good ol' guy now but just take a small peek into his history and you find out he was a bit of a scumbag, something that really would have hit this home. Great effort with improvement though.

[Rated R]

Yeah Brennan's advice is pretty spot on, you're coming along strongly but for me you need to work on your descriptions and narrative, your dialogue's decent enough but the description needs fleshing out, there's some really strong ideas that don't really get given enough time to breath and I think for you to take the next step that's what you've got to be working on.

[Drakz]

Not sure why I didn't reply to this as it was the first RP I read. I can only tell you to take heed of what's already been said to be honest, especially about avoiding the mini-match stuff. It just doesn't translate well and because the reader isn't waiting to see who wins (like the actual show matches) they're pretty boring and pointless. I've seen quite a few people do them in the past and they've all fallen flat.

The best thing you can do in the future is do some research on your opponents. If you can find ways to pick them apart and comment on things that they've done or said then you'll have the foundation for some great work. At the end of the day this is competitive so do your best to make them look like an idiot.......at least that's what I've always done.

[Drakz]

Mind you though Shapiro is the good guy's good guy so chances are he wouldn't pick his opponent apart, more likely comment on why he respects them, or how he's going to stop their evil tendencies etc etc etc. It works both ways though, you just have to learn to fit it to your character's thought pattern.