We're Going Through Changes

I still remember the day well. 

When you’re like me, making plots and plans for your future is something that just comes naturally. Yet, there was a vision that stood in my head more than any other, cutting through the distortion, the fog, the distraction and the bait… I had this idea in my head. So clear, so sparkling. 

I was about to fight Coral Avalon in the Tokyo Dome.

Coral was the wrestler’s wrestler, the one man I felt I could truly test myself again. A man who I knew would allow PRIME to showcase the art of beautiful grappling, rather than the parade of nonsense that came with many of our other compatriots.

February 14th, 2025, all Coral had to do was…

Oh… well, there’s ways to take down giants, and Coral had done it before. Ivan Stanislav may have been cutting through PRIME like he was a knife to spreadable butter. I stress spreadable butter to highlight the ease, sticks of butter are a fucking nightmare to spread about and therefore I would be implying that Mr. Stanislav faced challenges on his route to the Universal Battle on February 14th, but due to the fact he was a fucking giant, spreadable butter it was. 

Yet, Coral Avalon was a conqueror, an era defining run, a man reminding everyone of what he was truly capable of. Some had scoffed at Coral’s PRIME run, dismissing him as nothing more than the manager of the Winds of Change but I saw the hunger in his eyes and the courage that was stored within that fivehead of his. 

This was just another battle to overcome, another notch in the legacy of the most deserving champion of the ReVival era. It was academic to me that he would figure out a way to deal with Ivan. 

So when the bell rang, I saw my dream explode in front of my eyes. Instead of going to the Tokyo Dome with a grappling spectacular in my eyes, now I was tasked with facing a giant who looked down upon me, thought of me as his lesser, as a play thing, as an object to crush to display his strength and his will to the roster. I was now no longer in a battle that I’d known twice before, I was about to be cannon fodder.

That’s exactly how I felt. A lamb to the slaughter. A resurgent monster taking down a legacy, who was I to expect to stand up to that? My dream had become more akin to cheese fueled sweaty mess of random thoughts. I’d only just recovered from a year of Max Kael based hauntings and I barely knew who I was anymore after Colossus. To get that victory had fundamentally changed me. 

Yet, at my lowest ebb, at my biggest moment of concern, for the first time in my life, I could feel the Universe, the Universe was whispering quietly, it wanted me to tune in, it wanted me to pay attention, it wanted to guide me. It wanted a new PRIME, it wanted a new era of what it meant to be the Universal Champion and suddenly I had become its vessel, as if it had escaped from Coral Avalon and went right up my nose.

I still questioned whether I was truly deserving. I wasn’t even sure I deserved an opportunity at the Tokyo Dome, after all me and Coral had just had a slight fucksy wucksy argumental matter in attempting to beat JCH and Ivan. My record was hardly covered in glory at that time period.

Yet, as I stood there backstage questioning myself, as I stood there and wondered if I deserved the opportunity at the Tokyo Dome, fuck, if I deserved any opportunity at all, I was surprised to see a guest stand in front of me.

An old enemy. 

A now neutral acquaintance.

The sadly at that exact moment former Universal Champion.

There he stood, Coral Avalon, and he was looking for me. He was specifically seeking me. He wasn’t doing a farewell tour, we wasn’t going to everyone backstage to say goodbye. He wanted to speak with me. 

It’s a funny thing, doing battle. The more you battle an opponent, I think the more respect you build. There’s honour in battle, there’s a lot of learning too. 

Sure, I’ve been a mouthy prick in my career. Arrogant, annoying, an aggressive risk sometimes. I can see red in that ring, I can snap and arm like a twig. Something in my body just transforms me into a howler monkey, grasped around the smallest or meatiest arms around, seeking to hear the sweet snap, crackle and pop.

Yet I think that still has me sitting in the “Top Ten Sweetest Boys in PRIME” list because… have you seen what the rest of these people get up to?

So yeah, I poked Coral, I prodded him, I’d made a few sparkling remarks about his unborn child at the time, but it was built a fire, and inferno, and raging blame of battle that people would want to remember.

We did it twice. The Five Star Championship. The Almasy. 

The third time didn’t happen. We’d been Ivan’d.

So as much as I was surprised to see Coral seek me out, I knew the times had changed. We had an uneasy understanding for quite some time. One we actually continue to have, right up until my ReVival match with Jiles and his shocking return.

Despite that mixed understanding though, on this night, he sought me out for one reason and one reason only.

In his own words, he wanted to make it clear to me that the future of PRIME was now in my hands and that I had the power to make the Universe in my image… in the image of the grapplers and battlers. 

I said goodbye to him and the Rumour Mills spun up plenty of speculation on the nature of our conversation. Neither of us have repeated it to this day, and I’m not going to start telling tales out of school now.

Yet, that conversation made my brain do a little cracking, a little pinging, a little anxiety smushing. The reality was, if I didn’t step up, if I didn’t become the vanguard of PRIME against forces like The Red Army, the Universe could look very different now. Probably more sexual assaulty and less wrestlefests if I was to be a prognosticator. 

Or maybe they got over that phase, those guys are hard to keep track of, did you know Max Kael was part of it at one point? Wild and crazy stuff.

I’m getting sidetracked. The point is, Coral believed in me, Coral believed I was the one who could hold PRIME up in his absence and I have fought my heart out for a whole calendar year to try and meet the belief he had in me. People can talk about statistics, they can talk about records, they can compare days and defenses but if Coral Avalon hadn’t spoken to me in that moment, the fork in the road of PRIME would have taken a very different direction.

There is no Cecilworth Farthington: Universal Champion without him.

There is no fighting spirit against the best of the company without him.

One brief chat and my life had changed, my perspective had changed, my understanding of my very purpose in this industry had changed.

Coral Avalon had made me a better man, a better wrestler. 

Squad Goals? It was time to give back. 

—

The Farthington Manor world famous “Drippin’ Room” had been going through a period of renovation, what with the Universal Champion taking a hammer to every pipe he could see in the vicinity, and yelling “IF IT DOESN’T HISS, IT’S PISS”, which was a confusing saying because the room of drip was very much not intended as some sort a piss storage facility. Maybe it was more of an implication that his work would not be completed until the hissing finally erupted out of every corner of the room.

Most had avoided the entire wing of the Manor in which said room existed, due to the sense that the every expanding steam tunnel was ever so slightly warping and damaging the centuries old stately home that had become something of the Kafka-esque nightmare in the years since the Universal Champion had taken control through the simple method of his father dying (due to jizz, it’s important to stress this and yet explain no further than that).

Farthington though? He seemed to love the steam, the pipes, the hissing, the cracking, the occasional yelping of a grounds staff member getting a burn or two.

Since his DIY technique has caused a bit of a kerfuffle, Farthington had taken to sitting in the room which once dropped but now merely hisses. Most days the Glue staff would see on the CCTV feed (because none of them were fucking going in there) and be curious as to why Cecilworth was sitting crossed legged-style in the Hissing Room, his eyes closed and head tilted to the heavens.

The weight of the universe had never felt stronger upon Farthington’s shoulders. He did not quite know what kind of man he would be by the time of squad goals. As he sat, cross legged, steam blowing his face, ignoring degrees of burns that should have probably resulted in a quick trip to the local medical facility, all he could do was try to picture both pathways.

A fork in the road, to use a classic metaphor. A classic metaphor for a classy guy.

One path, he was going to be a day removed from absolute heartbreak. Destroyed, putting his body on the line, desperate to teach FLAMBERGE that Glue was about support, not daggers, fighting until he could fight no more… but failing. A year of Farthington, a year with the Universe, gone in an instant. A legendary run meeting its end. The exact situation Coral Avalon found himself in back during their backstage chat.

He knew in that universe, itchy feet are common. A time to take a step back, perhaps tour the world, find meaning again when for so long meaning was existing. As Universal Champion, you don’t question what’s next, you know what’s next, another monster coming for your tool of communion with galaxies and stars.

What happens when that stops? What happens when your life is no longer determined for you, when you step into the arena awaiting the next person who thinks that they’ve finally cracked all the delicious secrets within your brain soup. Going from life being led around by the nose of the internal PRIME ranking system, to nothing.

As the pipes hit the face of Farthington once more, he tried to imagine how he would feel, how he would feel in the moment standing across the ring from someone he considered to be… well not a brother, that would be a weird age gap… no… like a little cousin? The weird French cousin that creeps out the vibe of the family gathering, which would say a lot because in this context we’d be discussing a Farthington/Glue Family gathering.

If he walked into Squad Goals and FLAMBERGE had L’Uni around his waist, what would his emotional state be? Betrayal? Anger? Acceptance? Hunger?

As he closed his eyes and tried to imagine what we would feel, what he would sense, how his body would react to being a broken man, lost in the world, the loss of a friendship, the loss of an era of Glue Friends sticking together. He tried to let the pipes show him the way, but just as he pictured how he would feel in that very moment, the door of the Hissing Room was battered quite harshly.

“C-Money, it’s Dirk, I am not coming in but there’s this nice paramedic man who is with me and he is very concerned about how much steamed heat you are blasting in your face!”

Farthington moved not an inch, simply bellowing in response to his long term compatriot “QUICK DIRK! THE PIPES ARE ATTUNING ME TO MY FUTURES!”

—

When people have gazed up at the beauty of my Squad Goals team, they have found themselves a bit puzzled. Perplexed. It’s an eclectic mix for sure.

Some Jiles who have Cancer have even been certain that I would have had no choice but to bring my sticky brethren into my bosom of wonders. Yet, there’s a very simple answer. When you’re putting together a team, you want people who believe in you, certainly, that’s the number one thing. Maybe Daniel Christopher doesn’t quite believe in the rest of us, but I believe in him. 

Can I stand, looking at the last few months of my life and claim that FLAMBERGE believes in me? Can I say that as he’s lusted after that which I possess? Does it make sense to draft a man who aims to choke you to death the very night before the battle of Squads? Would any human with a beating heart and passion for what they do just simply shrug that off and say “let’s let bygones be bygones” a mere twenty four hours after they’ve stripped you of everything that gave your entire life meaning. 

See to me, it makes more sense to bring together a team of belief. A team of PRIME. A team not built of alliances or allegiances to others, but men who have only swore to themselves to get the most out of the hand that life has dealt them. 

People who have suffered significantly in their lives but have made the most out of it. Well, maybe not Big John Pepper. Although if you constantly have Fred Dick in your life, no matter how chill a good dude you are, I think it’s fair to assume that you’ve suffered in life somewhat. Actually, then he had to deal with The Masked Guy and now is having a pillow fight, so the more I think of it, John has suffered like the rest of us. 

Yet it’s what you do when times get hard. 

Danny Christie continued to fight, he continued with the only life he has known. There’s so many people in PRIME who could have gotten their claws into him if he was not his own man. Hell, I couldn’t even get my claws to him during a lovely banquet feast for team building and community spirit. He brought a dog, it shat all over my dining room, then he left. That’s the kind of man, no matter what he’s experiencing in his home life, no matter what internal and external politics he faces, that’s a man who knows who he is and stands by it. 

Coral Avalon took his loss to Ivan Stansilav, and his era defining Universal run and instead of seeking a rematch, instead of trying to reclaim past glory… he sought out new experiences. He travelled the world once more, no matter how big or how small the promotion was, for a year there you could buy a ticket to any local wrestling promotion around the world and you may have been treated to wrestling excellence. He has a level of resilience that I’m almost jealous with, although he probably did have a lot of time to build that up during his period as a Bandit, and upon the Octane.

Imagine the smell.

And Big John Pepper…

He’s cool. I like cool people. I think he’d be cool at a loss too. He’s just got this vibe. You know what I mean? A vibe that just makes you feel like everything will be alright. Some people have speculated I brought in John because I wanted to be closer to my Farthington Friends once more, because I wanted to put delicious meats in their belly button holes once I realised that they had belly button holes in their attires and those rumours are mostly true but I resent they got spread to the wider world. 

These are men who live life, and after Culture Shock Night 1, I may need to learn how to live again. 

—

“Can the nice paramedic come in, Cecilworth?”

His eyes still closed, another ball of steam to his face, Farthington communes with his internal self and concludes “it’s fine Dirk, my face skin is hardly peeling off at all”

Outside the room, Cecilworth can faintly hear Dirk discussing the situation with whoever he was brought to provide support. “You know, he really doesn’t get like this usually. I don’t think he was even this mad when someone spent an entire year trying to murder him.”

Without moving an inch, Farthington is quick to yelp back “the steam helps, it is my vessel for knowledge, it builds my grand understanding of the alternative universes I find myself in.”

Dirk Dickwood is quick to yell back “fuck it, you can’t say I didn’t try.” as he walks away from his close friend’s heated fate.

With the world of outside distractions gone once more, Farthington returns to his Mind Fortress, the Mind Tank has reversed for the Mind Fork in the middle of the Mind Road and now Farthington projects the tank to instead go down the road that he had yet to travel. The world where he wins on Night 1. The road where he cuts down the dreams of FLAMBERGE. The world where he knows that Glue will be forever different.

For the old man of the group to lose, for Relative Grandpa Farthington to finally drop the curtain on a year long reign, that’s something everyone could come back from. As wounded as he knew he would be, he’d been down this road before.

Colossus 2023, he failed where FLAMBERGE succeeded. He was almost a proud father, the Almasy loss stung, but when FLAMBERGE found a way to conquer the Ivan giant, there was an internal sigh of relief for Cecilworth. There would be no fighting, no internal politics, Glue could throw their support for the very icon of the very message Phil Atken had preached.

He dodged the bullet over two years ago, but he couldn’t dodge it forever.

If he won, could he even claim to uphold the beliefs of Glue that Phil Atken founded the entire group upon? He was getting older, his time in the ring was limited but if he was to crush the youth of PRIME at Culture Shock, was he not a fraud? Yet, if he didn’t give FLAMBERGE the fight of his life, was he not a coward?

In that very moment of internal exploration, as another blast of steam hit his beautiful face like a calming dragon burning healing fire into his face, Farthington had to finally accept the reality he found himself in.

He may commune with the universe, but the universe would never be the same for him, win or lose. The status quo could no longer survive. There would be no further Rockin’ All Over the World.

Change was about to happen and Farthington had no idea how to deal with the hand of fate that awaited him.

—

You know, I can’t even be mad at Rob Williams. 

He may have drafted a perfect team in the department of “people Cecilworth has been rude about online on things like Jabber, or almost broke their arm, or might have broken their arm the day before.”

He’s got people who are hungry. 

I don’t know how hungry he is these days but I know how hungry he was when he took the Five Star Championship from me.

The last of people to truly defeat me in a PRIME ring is shockingly small, the list who done it all by themselves is even smaller.

Just Rob Williams and Clay Byrd now I think about it. 

It’s an impressive team, but it’s a team of individuals. There is no unity. There are just mercenaries hoping to take an ounce of flesh. 

Me? I think I drafted PRIME.

I drafted what PRIME was, I drafted what PRIME is, and I drafted what PRIME will be. The power of a unifying force, the power of a banner, the power of a united cause… that’s when mercenaries start to scarper. 

It’s easy to enter a war zone and take pot shots with snipers when those they battle against are seeking purpose and leadership. You can take control when people have not found what binds them, what brings them together.

A unified force? A sense of purpose? A sense of meaning? 

Each blast of steam against my face, that reminded me, this business is about enduring the pain. It’s about standing up to everything that tries to bring you down. That’s what this team is about. Facing the challenge of change with aplomb. 

I am not your enemy Rob, I am not your team’s enemy. 

But we are yours. 

And we’re ready to usher a new era.