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Roman Reigns dreams, and in the dream, he is standing in the center of the ring. Wood and canvas beneath his feet, four posts, three ropes bounding the square. There is nothing else. No crowd, no ramp, no lights. Everything outside the ring is blackness, emptiness. Void.
The ring is the world, and the world is the ring. This is a truth, even in dreams. If he steps outside the ring, he will vanish, and no one will remember him. He knows this, though he cannot tell you how he knows.
Roman turns away from the nothingness, and in front of him is a mirror. It stands as tall as he is, yet it has no frame, no stand or easel. No lights shine down, but he can see himself perfectly all the same.
There he stands, the Tribal Chief: Dark hair, pulled back tight; a perfectly groomed beard dusted with grey at the chin. Black pants, black boots, naked above the waist save for his blood-red ‘ulafala necklace and the ancient patterns inked into his skin. Shoulders squared, chin up, cold-eyed–a man you did not fuck with. Roman smiles–
–and the young man in the mirror smiles back at him, cocky, wild-haired, tattoos fresh and vividly black, flanked by two young men wearing tactical vests and vicious grins. He stretches out his fist in front of him, and Roman’s hand nearly rises to meet it, but he can see the steel chair lifted behind him and he whirls–
–to find himself facing a mirror, tall as he is, without frame or easel.
A glance behind him shows nothing but canvas, ringposts, ropes…void.
He turns back–
Well, it was a good run, wasn’t it? Paul Heyman grins back at him, his voice whispering through the silence. Roman’s belts are on his shoulders, and he grits his teeth at the way his Advocate caresses them. I warned you, I really did.
Roman whirls again, reaches, grabbing–
–there’s nothing but a mirror, as tall as he is, without frame or easel.
A square, bearded face stares back at him, dark eyes cold and merciless, shrouded by heavy brows and lids. Roman swallows a shiver of fear, forces himself to stare into Kevin Owens’ eyes, to answer his smirk with a sneer of his own.
Family man, huh?
Roman lunges, but there’s nothing there. Nothing but canvas, ringposts, ropes…void.
The emptiness is hungry, now. He knows this with the certainty of his own name. He sneers at it, lifts his chin, holds himself aloof.
“Acknowledge me!” he shouts.
The silence is deafening. Crushing. And yet he sets his teeth and bears it. He has borne pain and humiliation, disdain and defeat. He rose above it, and built himself a house of blood and bone to keep it at bay. His family. His Bloodline–
Is this family, uce?
Roman turns, slowly. There is a mirror there, in the center of the ring, as tall as he is, without frame or easel.
Jey stares back at him. His anger pours off of him in waves, a nearly tangible thing, invisible flames that lick at Roman’s boots and press at his naked flesh.
Is this family?
“I am your chief,” Roman says, and his voice sounds hollow to his own ears. As if the black around them steals the sounds almost before he makes them. “You acknowledged me. I take care of you. I love you–”
DON’T YOU DARE USE THAT WORD! The void around him presses in, screaming with a thousand silent voices. He cringes away from it, bending beneath the weight, turning–
–to face nothing. Nothing but canvas, ringposts, ropes…void.
Something warm and wet drips down his chest.
Roman looks down at a rivulet of blood, slowly making its way down his sternum, dripping steadily from his ‘ulafala. As he watches, the necklace softens and melts, each piece turning into blood in turn, slipping through his fingers, spattering softly onto the pure white canvas.
“No, no, no no no…” Roman drops to his knees, frantically scooping with his fingers, trying to gather the blood into his hands–-but it gives him no purchase, evades his every grasp. The canvas soaks it up, staining red, then slowly fading back to white. He kneels there, in the hungry silence, hands bloody, hands empty.
“You can’t stop it, Roman. You really can’t.”
Roman comes to his feet in a rush, spins–
–stops, frozen.
A man stands in front of him. His hands and feet are bound with crimson shackles, linked with a wine-red chain, and hooked to a thick and gleaming collar without lock or opening. Flame-bright hair wreaths his head and face, and his smile shines white in the darkness.
Roman blinks at him. It’s only after a moment he realizes the bonds around the other man’s limbs and throat aren’t rust-red iron.
They’re blood. Living, throbbing, writhing.
“I’d say I’m sorry, but, well. I’m not,” Sami Zayn says. “All stories have an ending, Roman. Even yours. They have to. They have to end, so they can start again.”
“I beat you!”
“Did you?” Sami’s face flashes into a smile, that infuriating, captivating, joyous grin that has haunted Roman’s life for months. “Oh, you won the match, Roman, you sure did that.”
“You’re nothing. You’re nothing without my Bloodline.”
Sami laughs-–and the darkness laughs with him, a hundred thousand silent voices in the nothingness.
“I’m nothing? Is that what you think?”
“It’s what I know. What are you going to do to me, tied up like that?”
“Tied up?” Sami laughs again, another unbearable torrent from the darkness. “Oh. Is that what this looks like, to you? I suppose it would. I am bound, in a way. Yes. Bound by the rules of what we are. Of what we do. Of this place. This world.”
“I make my own rules.”
“Do you?” Sami smiles. “Then step outside the ring.”
Roman turns. There’s nothing behind him, nothing but…
…void.
Terror grips him, steals his voice. If he steps outside the ring, he’ll be forgotten. He’ll become nothing. He knows this with the certainty of his own name.
Nothing, nothing, nothing…
“Ahh, that’s what I thought. You still define yourself by it, don’t you? This place. This world.”
Roman spins.
There’s nothing left. No mirror, no canvas, no ringposts, no ropes.
Just blackness, and himself, and the thing speaking through Sami Zayn’s voice. A terrible avatar of blood and chains and fierce…compassion.
“No. No, I won’t,” Roman whispers–then shouts. “No! I am the Head of the Table! I am the Tribal Chief! What are you, huh? What are you? ”
It smiles with Sami Zayn’s face, as a thousand thousand chains of blood rise up from the darkness, to wrap around Roman’s limbs, his chest, his face.
What am I?
I am this place.
I am this world.
I am this ring, and everything in it.
I am this story.
I am the song. And I am…
...the end.
As Roman is dragged, struggling, into darkness, his mouth and nose filling with the copper reek of blood--he hears it, the sound growing until it overwhelms and deafens.
A bright and terrible song, sung by a million unseen voices.
Finally, in the face of that unending music, Roman screams. First in rage, then in terror, then in sobbing desperation, and after that…
…nothing.
Just an empty ring in the middle of darkness. Wood and canvas. Four posts. Three ropes.
A world.