What is your heart made of?
Is it a heart of gold?
Has it been refined in the fires of perseverance, tested by trial and tribulation?
Those who have endured such sorrow know what pure, unadulterated compassion looks like.
Their word is their bond, an oath that their allies can swear by.
Their resolve is unshakeable, incorruptible.
Or so it seems.
Gold is hard to corrode, but it is not impossible.
Anything less than pure gold is susceptible to being tarnished by their transgressions.
Blemished by blame.
Stained by imperfection.
And if your heart is anything less than pure, your spirit is vulnerable.
The best of us can fall eventually.
As that gold rusts away, the ugliness beneath is slowly but surely revealed.
Leaving just a hollowed, fractured soul.
And that soul too shall wither, fade into the ether.
Forgotten by those who once showered praise upon the hero.
All the goodwill they’ve built up, tossed in the bin.
And the people who praised you move on to something new.
Something shiny.
Something pleasing to the eye.
And what are you left with?
Resentment.
Envy.
The need to take matters into your own hands.
And that’s when your rusty, broken soul turns you into the thing you hate most.
Your own worst enemy.
The villain.
None of us are safe.
Especially not Cael Gable.
A man whose Olympic medal is outmatched by his heart of gold.
Some would have considered you the best of us, the purest athlete and purest person to walk the halls of this Slaughterhouse.
Your word was your bond, and those who considered you a friend swore by it like an oath.
An oath that you broke.
That heart of gold was less than pure, after all.
And it slowly, but surely, rusted away.
Leaving just a brash, cruel man behind.
Tarnished by his transgressions.
Blemished by blame.
Stained by imperfection.
The kind of man that would abandon his friend in time of need.
The kind who now seeks only his own glory.
His own power, above all else.
It’s almost respectable, Cael.
I could just about applaud the effort.
There’s just one problem.
The corrosion hasn’t finished.
Everything that was ever good about you is being stripped bare.
But the wicked core that remains will soon follow suit, withering away by the second.
And everyone who ever cared about you will soon forget you even existed.
They will move on to something new.
Something shiny.
Something more pleasing to the eye.
And ol’ Simon is ready to take that challenge.
To be the gold standard that you could never live up to.
To achieve something beyond your wildest dreams.
And you will be left to rot in your resentment.
To wallow in the pit of your envy, as I take my rightful place.
A smile on my face, as I watch you fade out entirely.
A testament to your own demise.
A cautionary tale.
In the end, even a heart of gold turns to rust.