Anna Stone [vs.] Stygian

Roleplay Here

Don’t Stand Too Close to a Naked Man

The black screen gives way to a panoramic shot of an empty arena. Not recognizable from the surroundings. There’s nothing distinctive about it. That is, perhaps, by design. The specific arena isn’t important, just that it’s an IWF arena; that’s all that matters. An IWF ring at the end of the IWF stage, with the IWF logo on the jumbotron.

The lights die down until only a faint, pale white light shines on the stage, which is rolling with smoke as Dragonforce’s “Cry Thunder” blasts over the arena. Slowly a black, high-backed leather chair rises through the stage, within which Stygian sits. Lilith and Lilah are on either side of him in purple and pink (respectively) satin robes with matching halos and angel wings. Stygian holds a glass containing a red, glowing, smoking liquid in his hand. (It's actually just berry-flavored Gatorade Prime 01 and the glass is rigged with a dry-ice layer and an LED, but it still looks cool.) Stygian sits in the chair, swirling the liquid in the glass round with a bored look as the intro winds into the main riff, whereupon he knocks the glass back in one gulp and sets the glass aside. When the main riff kicks in the girls tear off their robes and angel wings to reveal that if they're any kind of angels at all, they're Victoria's Secret Angels. A wall of fire erupts from the front of the stage and burns down either side of the ramp, framing it in flames, and ending in a blast of pyro from the ring posts that may possibly be visible from space. When the blast at the stage is clear, Stygian is standing with the girls at his side and he leads them down to the ring. About halfway down the ramp they tear off their halos and fling them into the empty crowd.

Stygian: Wait, stop.

Suddenly the picture freezes in the middle of everything. Lilith and Lilah are both still extended into their follow-throughs. The pillars of fire are still erupting from the ring posts, floating in midair. Stygian sighs, he is the only body in motion. He turns around and looks at the stage, looks at the scantily-clad women, and then back to the ring.

Stygian: So many people think of this when they think of me. They see only this. They see the production values. They hear the Dragonforce, they see the image, they see the props and the lights, the flash and the fire. So many people see the beautiful women wearing skimpy clothes, the trench coat with the Tron lights. It’s easy to get wrapped up in the spectacle of Stygian. I should know. I designed it. I designed it from top to bottom. There is rarely a moment of my life to which you, the viewing public is privy that isn’t carefully scripted and meticulously planned to present exactly what I want you to see. That’s what it’s like to be Stygian. It’s like being a circus performer. Or perhaps a magician. Maybe it’s like being a superhero. Sometimes I do feel that way; coming down to the ring with an overture provided by Dragonforce. I mean, come on, it’s Dragonforce! If you can’t feel ten feet tall and bullet proof when Dragonforce is playing in the background, you’ll never get that feeling. My point is, that this is a character. A dramatis persona. I mean I might as well wear a Guy Fawkes mask and blow stuff up.

Stygian turns his back to the camera and slouches over. He spins back around with a dramatic flourish of his trench coat and a Guy Fawkes mask in place underneath a black felt pilgrim hat. This is actually made doubly funny when one considers that he’s now in character as V from V for Vendetta, and Stygian’s trench coat is based off the coat worn by the Red Skull in Captain America: The First Avenger. Both characters were played by Hugo Weaving.

Stygian: Voilà! In view, a humble vaudevillian veteran cast vicariously as both victim and villain by the vicissitudes of Fate.' This visage, no mere veneer of vanity, is a vestige of the vox populi, now vacant, vanished. However, this valorous visitation of a bygone vexation stands vivified and has vowed to vanquish these venal and virulent vermin vanguarding vice and vouchsafing the violently vicious and voracious violation of volition! The only verdict is vengeance; a vendetta held as a votive, not in vain, for the value and veracity of such shall one day vindicate the vigilant and the virtuous. Verily, this vichyssoise of verbiage veers most verbose, so let me simply add that it is my very good honor to meet you and you may call me…

Stygian pauses and shakes his head. He whips the hat and mask off in different hands. He tosses one into the crowd on one side, and the other the other way.

Stygian: Well, you get the idea, I hope. What everyone sees is the legend. They see all of this, and they’re either impressed, or they dismiss it out of hand. They feel the effect. They get blinded by bright lights, big boobs and a seven foot man dressed like…what is this even? Darth Vader? A comic book villain? Stygian shrugs. Little bit of both I figure. After all, man is gestalt. We are the sum total of the parts which contribute to the whole. I grew up watching Star Wars and reading comic books. And, well, who doesn’t like big boobs?

Stygian gestures to the frozen-in-time Lilith and Lilah.

Stygian: But in getting caught up in this, people miss elementary truths. They try to tie it all down to one simple place. They try to wrap it up in a bow and tie it all together. They want it all wrapped up so they can begin to deal with it. So they try to ascribe a label to it. They want to say it’s part of an intimidation game. They want to take the first step towards rationalizing the decision to get into the ring with me, because it’s not something for the faint of heart. So to make it an easier undertaking, to quell that feeling they get when “Cry Thunder” plays. The fact that their throat constricts, their heart races and the contents of their bladder and stomach want to run in liquid streams down their legs. They try to combat the inevitable moment when they’re in that squared circle, the bell rings and they’re face to face with a seven foot tall, 315 pound war machine. The man who bled Tim Patrick. The man who went toe-to-toe with James Shark. The man who crippled Tyson Rowle. The man who took the IWF World Title from Brandon Macdonald, one-on-one, man-to-man when they said it couldn’t be done! The man who broke Dan Alexander’s back, twice. The man who defeated Corey Casey in one of the most violent matches ever conceived.

Stygian: Yet still all anyone ever looks at is the image. The image isn’t crafted for intimidation, it never was. The image was to provide style for the substance. To bring something visually exciting. To create talking points. To wow the fans, get them to buy T-Shirts, posters and action figures. It’s something to look cool on the video games. Because as much as we try to stifle that, it’s painfully true that image matters in this business. Some men try to distance themselves from it. They try to brand themselves and style themselves as “pure wrestlers”. They train in gritty little gyms with flickering lights and equipment held together by duct tape like Clubber Lang in Rocky III. They wear plain tights or singlets, go by their real names and have some stupid gimmick like a stamp that says “Armbar 100% Proof”. They wrestle a technical style and use submission holds, and when they come up against someone like me they throw the words “phony” and “sideshow” around. They point at men like me and they say “oh no, I’m a real wrestler, not like those assholes over there”. They usually wash out of pro wrestling the same way they washed out of MMA. They wind up teaching gym in Thousand Oaks, California. Everyone has an image. Even the people who don’t have an image…that is their image. Everyone has an image, they craft it, they cultivate it, they put it out there…they dress in certain clothes, they spout certain phrases, they wear certain colors, they name their moves certain things… I’m not a fake, a phony or a sideshow. I’m just better at playing the image game than most of you are. And for that, you deride me. But what if?

Stygian snaps his fingers and everything comes back to life. Lilith and Lilah throw their halos into the empty crowd and join Stygian where he stands a few feet down the ramp. He pulls the lapel of his coat aside to reveal a Starfleet com badge, which he taps to bring online.

Stygian: Stygian to Enterprise, two to beam directly to Blackrock Spire; energize.

Suddenly Lilith and Lilah are engulfed in columns of light which dissipate, and they’re gone. Stygian undoes the pin and throws the badge away.

Stygian: Star Trek, yuck.

He gets one of those full body shudders as he undoes the belt of his coat and unbuttons it. He retrieves a grisly looking gun from beneath it.

For those of you playing the home game, this is the meltagun from Warhammer 40,000. It’s capable of shooting a thousands of degrees stream of molecularly atomized air into a target. Stygian has built something similar and is currently in the delicate process of selling the patent. This isn’t his prototype. His prototype is considered a national security secret, and he’s not really going to blow up a prop IWF put a lot of time and money into building for his entrance. So this is, the educated mind would surmise, mocked up. Stygian pumps the handle levels the gun at the throne at the top of the stage and pulls the trigger. The blast from the weapon is so bright that it blinds the camera for a second. When the focus comes back, the throne has a large hole in it, and the rest of it is still melting into slag and collapsing underneath its own weight. Stygian turns back towards the ring and tosses the gun away. Once it’s off camera, it is out of sight, out of mind.

Stygian: And what if…

Stygian walks down to ringside with the flaming ring posts. Reaching into the pockets of his coat, he comes out with the Deluminator from the Harry Potter movies. It’s a small device, about the size of an old-fashioned British cigarette lighter. Not the disposable kind favored today. It has a more antique look to it. Silver ends, with a green, marbled handle in between. In the books the Deluminator is used to remove light sources from the Deluminator's immediate surroundings. Stygian slides under the bottom rope into the ring. He flips open the end of the Deluminator and points it at one of the ring posts spewing flame and clicks it. The fire leaps off the ring post and is drawn into a narrow strand, sucked into the end of the Deluminator. He turns and sucks up the fire from the other three ring posts as well. Once that’s done, he drops the Deluminator back into one pocket and pulls the 11th Doctor’s Sonic Screwdriver from the other pocket. He flips open the end of it, and walks over to the side of the ring closest to the entrance where “Cry Thunder” is still blaring. He points the screwdriver up the ramp and clicks it open. It emits a high-pitched vibrating sound until the speakers explode in a shower of sparks and crackling electricity. Stygian twirls the sonic around between his fingers and stuffs it into his pocket.

Stygian: What remains if you take away the throne, the girls, the fireworks, the spectacle, the Dragonforce music? Do I shrink? Do I become less? Am I any different? Without the fire, without the beautiful women, without the show…am I not still the man who out-smarted Chuck Matthews? And the guy who out-brawled James Shark? What did boobs and pyro have to do with any of that? How about me breaking Dan Alexander’s back twice? How about me beating him so severely that he could fake his death and people not only believed it, but arrested me for it? Huh? What did Dragonforce have to do with that? I wasn’t even using Dragonforce at the time, I was using Helloween. What did my ring entrance have to do with me beating Corey Casey so severely that he never wrestled again? I mean, Chad Mason went around here thumping his chest talking about how thanks to him Jason Hawk and Chuck Matthews would never wrestle again…Chuck Matthews is getting back into the ring this week! I said I was going to retire Corey Casey and I did it! I said all along he would never get back into the ring after he fought me and guess what? HE NEVER WILL! And it doesn’t matter how I came out to that ring, who I came out with, or what music I walked out to. I could have driven down to the ring in a pink Mini Cooper, with Pancake Pete, serenaded by Katy Perry’s “Firework” and Corey Casey still would have caught the beating he did from me at Ragnarok. I was the beast of Ragnarok itself that night! Everyone tries to dismiss me because they say that if you can get past the psychological edge I get from intimidation and theatricality, it’s downhill. They say you’ve got my 50% beaten if I don’t psyche you out. Really? Tell me what psyches you out? Is it the girls? Is it the throne? Is it the fire? No, Anna Stone, I know what scares you. It doesn’t have to do with any of this. The image, the persona I’ve crafted, the character I become when the lights come up and the music blares…it isn’t what sends that chill down your spine, at least, it shouldn’t be. It’s not what I do to engage the fans, because that’s all this is, it’s window dressing. And the window dressing isn’t what outsmarted Chuck, out-brawled Shark, or crippled Corey Casey. No. It’s not the way I walk to the ring, the music I do it to, the women I do it with…it’s not even the clothes I wear when I do it.

Stygian stands in the center of the ring and throws his arms back. Like the Iron Man disarming sequence in Iron Man 2 his coat flies off behind him and vanishes. He holds his arms up and his shirt flies up into the rafters. He steps back and out of his boots one by one, and they split and take off under the bottom rope. Then his belt unbuckles and his pants split at the seams. The front flies past the camera and obscures it. When it clears, Stygian stands in the middle of the ring wearing a pair of black boxer briefs. He flexes his arms back and forth a few times. He cracks his neck from side to side. He hops back and forth on the balls of his feet, he shadow boxes, he throws a looping roundhouse kick with each foot and sighs, catching his breath.

Stygian: That’s strangely liberating. I see why the MMA guys do this now. No t-shirts, no costumes, no nicknames sequined onto your tights. Not even shoes. Just you, as a man, in the ring with another man. The same goal, tacit; to best one another in an athletic test of combat ability. They say the first exhibition combat sport was wrestling, you know? Greco-Roman Wrestling. They say the competitors would compete naked. I’m not bringing this up to suggest the inherent homoerotic subtext of grappling sports; or even suggest that we should grapple naked, Anna…you’re not my type for one. For two I’d hate to have to show your boyfriend and his family, who think they’re tough and dangerous what tough and dangerous really is. No, I’m just pointing out that it was at that point where the sport, the competition was most pure. No pay per view buyrates, no posters, no tickets sold, no corporate sponsors or any of that bullshit that pollutes the sports world at every professional level in this day and age. It was man-to-man, just as it was the night you watched me destroy your mentor.

Stygian: You had a ringside seat for that one, didn’t you Anna? I spoke at length to Johnny Styles last week about how we view our heroes. We’re never quite able to see them on our own level. We’re never able to humanize them. Whether it’s our parents, a favored teacher, a childhood role model…or a mentor…we never are able to see them as human beings ever again. And you and Brandon Macdonald…well that relationship is very intricate and complex, isn’t it? Childhood friends as I understand it. He was James Van Der Beek and you were Katie Holmes and Ottowa stood in for Dawson’s Creek. Or something like that. I’m going to be honest with you, I don’t know enough about Ottowa or Dawson’s Creek to say for sure if that’s an accurate metaphor. I don’t know enough about that, but I know enough about you. Not personally, but I know the type. You high school sweetheart left you and made himself famous. You went and made something of yourself just in case you ever saw him again. When you did, you’d made good and he took you back. To be honest, I’m pretty sure you’re still banging him, but we’ll get to that. Brandon Macdonald was your first love, wasn’t he? And what’s that old song say? The first cut is the deepest? We hold our first loves on this pedestal, don’t we? Keefer Sutherland has this commercial out now about some girl he knew in high school, I think her name is Susan Glenn. I saw it once, and I was drunk. But he talks about all these things, like she floated on air and shot pyro out of her ass, or something. He just talks about this pedestal he had her on for so long. It’s the same pedestal you kept Brandon on, isn’t it? The one he was on while you did…whatever it is…you do at a Tim…what the fuck is a Tim Horton’s anyway?

Stygian looks over his shoulder.

Stygian: This is usually the point where Lilah pulls the right answer out of her ass, but, uh, I beamed her out. And I can’t text her because my phone is in my coat and it…

Stygian turns around and faces the direction off in which his coat flew. He turns back to the camera and shrugs.

Stygian: I didn’t think this through, apparently. Well, whatever. You did whatever you do at a Tim Horton’s, then you picked yourself up off the mat, got your broadcasting degree, and eventually you got that second chance. Your first love, your first cut pulled you up onto that pedestal with him. He brought you into his new world: pro wrestling. He trained you; he introduced you to his friends, hell I think you two were even engaged, weren’t you? Doesn’t matter. I don’t need to know the extent to which you and he took this. I know the place he holds in your heart. Deny as you will, dismiss it however you like. I don’t need you to admit it to the world, Anna. You can’t help but admit it to yourself. Your friend, your mentor, your lover…he was a hero to you.

Stygian: So how did it feel, Anna? How must it have felt to watch me destroy him? Because after a certain point, go back and watch that tape. Watch that match again. After a certain point, it was just a matter of time. Brandon was beaten. He was like a pitcher whose arm had given up. He was just throwing junk. Don’t try to defend it, don’t try to deny it, you were right there! I was in the ring with him. It might have been courageous and awe-inspiring, but let me tell you something: after the second Baneblade, he was done. Yeah, he kicked out of two more, but his punches were weak. They had nothing on them. He was dead weight every time I dragged him up. He gave me everything he had, but in the end he was a broken man who didn’t know when he was beat. At what point did it become uncomfortable, Anna? Watching me take your pretty boy and pound him into the mat, over and over? At what point in the dismantling of the man who trained you in this sport did it become painful to watch him thrashing helplessly in the jaws of the trap? When did he start to look like a rabbit in a wolf’s mouth, being flung back and forth until the life drained out of him? At what point did it become pathetic, watching a once-great man, a man who unlocked your heart, uncrossed your legs and taught you this sport, the sport he was supposed to be the best in the world at...when, in the process of my destroying him did you bury your head in your hands and start sobbing silently, hoping it didn’t come over the headset? Did you lock it in, or did you have to hit the mute button on your microphone and I drove him into the mat again and again and again?

Stygian: This right here…

Stygian stands in front of the camera and flexes, displaying his impressive physique. He balls up his fists and adopts a fighting stance for a few moments. Then he smirks, chuckles, and drops his hands back down.

Stygian: This is what destroyed Obi Wan, Anna. Seven foot, three-hundred-fifteen pounds. Built be genetics, forged in the weight room, honed in the gym and tempered in the ring. You have to know that, because Brandon Macdonald has to have told you that a hundred times. Tell me this much, Anna, why? It’s not just because you want to prove yourself against me, is it? It’s to impress him, I know that much. Is it to avenge the loss of his career, or to prove that he picked the wrong girl? That’s all I want to know. Not that it will much matter, to me. My path is clear; my course of action is set. I’ve worked very hard to get to where I am. I have things I want to do. I’ve proven where I belong in this company, and shown the world where I belong in this business right now. The way I’m heading now, the direction I’m travelling from here on out is to establish my place in the history of the sport. Do you really think you can stop that? The “great” Anna Stone?

Stygian: You know, I’ve stripped myself down, Anna, why don’t I do the same for you. Again, not literally. But let me pull back the curtain on Anna Stone and show the world what you really are. Everyone talks about how you’ve acquitted yourself so well, your impressive rookie year. You’ve won what? Eight matches and a title. A title you rechristened on your own damn authority, and the Commissioner of IWF backed your play because you’re still banging him. That’s the only thing that explains all of this Anna. You get your pick of opponents, you get a title match, what, your fifth time out, and then you get to circumvent the tradition, as much of a tradition as can be for a company just finishing up its first year of operation, of passing up a word title match to try and settle a score for your old flame.

Stygian: You’ve built and crafted this perception of yourself every bit as much as I’ve crafted image I project to the cameras and to the wrestling world. Hand-picked opponents, sporadic matches, all brewed over pillow talk with your secret fling and brought to life in the ring. They hold you up, your story, your background, your success as an example of everything that’s supposed to be right in this business. In truth? You’ve been handed everything. I wondered, I’ve wondered since I left and it started how the hell you’ve pulled it off. At first I thought it was just natural talent. Then I came back and I watched it. You show up to work, maybe, maybe once a month before a pay-per-view. You pick your opponents, your pick your matches, you pick what days you actually want to show up and give effort, you pick your opponents and you make your matches. You made this match. You haven’t earned it. You didn’t earn the right to thumb your nose at the privileges of Path To Valhalla. It’s all possible because of something I should have seen all along. You haven’t earned your career, you’ve slept your way into it. It’s an insult to this company, this business, women everywhere; and it is an insult to me!

Stygian: So you’re a lovesick, twitterpated little girl who’s freaked out because Brandon gave Karly Zedic a ring. You thought you’d dodged a bullet when he didn’t marry the Matthews slut, but he’s handed out, what, his third ring, and this is the second one that hasn’t gone to you? So what do you do? You make the big play. The one man Brandon never beat, the one who put him out of the sport…this isn’t about any of the bullshit you said it was about. This isn’t about proving yourself against the best, this isn’t about giving me an excuse to do something with the belt I stole to egg Corey Casey into a match that I have little use for since I won that match and retired Corey. This is you trying to prove a point before Brandon walks down the aisle and finds someone waiting at the altar who isn’t you. This isn’t about competition. You wouldn’t have cheap-shotted me and kicked me in the head. You wouldn’t have tried to do it again after that momentous match with Johnny Styles. So stow the purity and the need to beat me to prove something to yourself, this is you trying to prove something to Brandon Macdonald.

Stygian: You signed on to try and show Brandon something you knew Karly Zedic never could. But here’s the thing, Anna: you can’t do it either! Think about this for a second. Your mentor, your hero, the man who took you under his wing and taught you everything you know about this business…and I thrashed him like a tiger chasing down a civet and rending him tooth and nail until he quit struggling. I took the world title from a man they said nobody ever would beat. You watched him struggle, you watched him fight…you…watched…him…fail! And wether you’d admit it or not you’ve watched them all. You watched me beat Dan Alexander nearly to death once. You watched me break his back on the steel ring steps later. You watched me stand toe-to-toe with James Shark and put him through a table. You watched me trick Chuck Matthews and beat him in the center of the ring. You watched me drag Corey Casey into the most demonic structure anyone’s ever held a pro wrestling match inside of, and break his back! He’s lucky he can still walk.

Stygian: In reverse order, I was more violent than the most violent man in professional wrestling, I was smarter than the smartest man in professional wrestling, I out brawled the best brawler in the sport, I broke the most technical wrestler in the sport and I beat the best wrestler in the world, put him out of the business, took his world title and took the title of best wrestler in the world. You picked the wrong fucking guy to prove a point to your boyfriend with. What’s wrong with showing up at his house wearing an overcoat with nothing underneath it? It’s a much more reliable plan than picking a fight with a seven foot killing machine. There are certain older cultures who believe that if you kill a man, you take his power. If you defeat him, you take what he has, what he possesses into yourself. If that’s true, then I am the most violent, smartest, toughest, best wrestler in the world. Truth? I don’t think I took any of that. I’m pretty sure I had it all before. I’ve always had it. I’ve had it since I came back from Japan. I’ve had it since my first match in UECW, I’ve had it since my match with your beloved Brandon, I’ve had it since I broke Corey Casey’s back…I even had it in the ring with Johnny Styles. Yeah, I lost to a legend. A legend who’s seen them all and beaten them all. I’m not ashamed. I’m not ashamed of losing to Johnny, I’m not ashamed of losing to Robbie hart, because both have pushed me to refine myself, to refine my skills and keep improving. To ascend to the pinnacle. This thing you think you’re doing? This match you’ve taken? This is the most misguided romantic gesture since Juliet took a sleeping pill and forgot to text Romeo about the plan. I think you must think you’re really as good as everyone is telling you you are after less than a dozen matches. Well Juliet? The dice were loaded from the start. And I bet, and I’ll put a Baneblade through your heart. And I forget…I forget the movie song. When you realize that you’ve got the idea wrong?

Stygian smirks and the camera closes in on his smiling face…then it pulls back to reveal him in his full ring gear, with Lilith and Lilah at his side once again.

Stygian: This might be with everyone thinks of when they think of me. But there’s substance under the style. Underneath all of this? Underneath all of this is the man who’s been in the ring with just about every big name IWF, NLWF and UECW ever had, and he’s beaten them all. I’m sure you’ve got people who are telling you, I’m sure they’re all telling you that this is all that I am. That the image is what you have to beat. No, darling, you have to beat the man. It wasn’t a coat with Tron lines that broke Dan Alexander’s back. It wasn’t a ring entrance that crippled Corey Casey. It wasn’t an image that drove the life out of Brandon Macdonald and sent him packing. It was a man. It was I. But you need to tell yourself something to keep from pissing yourself as you wait in the ring for me. So go head, tell yourself it’s just a show. Tell yourself it’s just an image. That’s fine. Have fun in Chicago. Come for the show…stay for the beating. You want to be a star? Good news, you made it. Bad news? Your next match is going to be your last match. They don’t call me the Star Destroyer for nothing.

The camera pulls back, and a wall of fire erupts all around the ring. When it clears, Stygian and the girls are gone.

What Have You Earned? NOTHING!

Stygian sits at his table at the IWF Fan Expo leading up to From the Ashes. His table is right off the main stage. Behind his table is a huge blown up version of one of his posters, with him in his old ring gear and the IWF championship belt on his shoulder, and the girls peeking out from behind him in front of a cascading wall of fire. Stygian and the girls sit at the table as a dwindling line of fans gets autographs, some take pictures. Stygian is dressed in a red From the Ashes II promo shirt and blue jeans. Lilith is dressed in a stylistically cut and re-stitched Star Destroyer t-shirt that clings to her like a second skin, and a black denim mini-skirt. Lilah is dressed in a red Chicago Bulls jersey (#23, Jordan) way too big for her, that’s been taken in in all of the right placed and turned into a mini-dress, the way Mariah Carey’s had been done at the 2003 All-Star game for MJ’s retirement. As the last fans, a group of high-school aged boys, present t-shirts for the trio to sign, and lean over to take a picture, an IWF security guard comes and points them towards the doors. Heather Thompson takes to the stage and announces that the IWF Fan Expo is over, and will the guests please make their way towards the exits. Stygian sighs, leans back in his roller chair and puts his feet on the table.

Stygian: Jesus that was intense.

Lilith: It seems to me like you hate this part of the business.

Stygian: I do.

Lilah: You’ve never have really gone out of your way to embrace the fans.

Stygian: That’s not it.

Lilith: Then what is it?

Stygian: Sitting in the same spot for five hours.

Lilith: Yeah, I feel you.

Lilah: Totally.

The girls stand up and stretch. Lilah puts her hands on her hips and bends her upper-body in all four directions. Lilith bends down and touches her toes, then stands and bends backwards, a loud series of cracks rings out.

Stygian: Damn, are you alright?

Lilith: God! There it is. That’s almost orgasmic.

Lilah: Sounded like you broke your back.

Lilith: Nope, exact opposite.

Lilith sinks back into her chair and folds her arms up behind her head. She crosses her ankles on the table. Lilah turns and leans on her ass against the table,

Lilith: I really like that dress.

Lilah: Chuck Matthews gave me the idea a couple weeks ago. He said it’d go over with the Chicago fans really well.

Lilith: It did with Mariah Carey wore it. It’s on that Chicago Bulls tribute from that pizzeria we went to last night.

Lilah: It’s very tight.

Stygian: In all the right places.

Lilith: That was probably done on purpose.

Lilah: Damn right it is, I breathed out and held my breath while she was doing the measurements.

Lilith: Just like I taught you!

Lilah: Yep!

Lilith: I’m so proud.

Lilah: I thought you would be.

Stygian: You realize that the two of you primarily are employed to be eye candy for the fans.

Lilith: Of course.

Lilah: Duh…

Stygian: You could have told the seamstress to make it two sizes too small and she would have.

Lilith: Jason, Lilah has finally mastered one of my many tricks, do not trivialize this accomplishment.

Lilah: Yeah…all that stuff she said!

Stygian: Far be it for me to trivialize a milestone in Lilah’s path to the dark side.

Lilah: If you two only knew…

Stygian: Oh really.

Lilith: Jason, we talked about this.

Stygian: Did we?

Lilith gives her husband a knowing look, and he nods.

Stygian: So we did.

Lilith: A lady has to have her secrets after all.

Lilah: It’s part of the mystery of woman.

Stygian: “Mystery of woman”? Is that a Dr. Ruth book?

Lilith: If it’s not, it should be.

Lilah: Or like, a cheesy mystery novel.

Lilith: Either or.

Lilah: So what is the mystery of Anna Stone?

Lilith: Bet you thought you had that one solved.

Lilah: All that stuff about her still wanting Brandon.

Lilith: Not only did she attend his wedding, she was the maid of honor.

Stygian: And do you think that makes me wrong?

Lilah: It doesn’t?

Lilith: Sun Tzu.

Lilah: What does the Chinese restaurant in Englewood have to do with Anna Stone.

Stygian: Sun Tzu, Chinese general, wrote The Art of War. he said, amongst other things, “keep your friends close, and your enemies closer.”

Lilah: Do you really think she challenged you to try and prove something to Brandon?

Stygian: Not only that, but I think she only got away with it because she’s still banging him.

Lilah: Yeah, but he married Karly.

Lilith: How do you know?

Lilah: You guys never check your IWF email accounts, do you?

Lilith: Never.

Stygian: Not since Shark sent around that god awful thing. What was it called?

Lilith: Blue waffle.

Stygian: Yeah, that…never check IWF Email ever again. I deliberately banged my head against the keyboard when I set up a new password.

Lilah: How do you guys keep up with where we’re supposed to go, what we’re supposed to do, where our flights leave from and stuff? What if an important memo comes down?

Stygian: I figure if it’s that important, they’ll find me.

Lilah: What about that new lady running things?

Stygian: Oh, yeah, what’s her name?

Lilith: Isabella something.

Stygian: Isabella, Lya, Pinta, Nina, Santa Maria…

Lilith: …Juan, Sanchez, Villia-Lobo…

Stygian: …Maloogaloogaloogaloogalooga…

Lilah: Make all the jokes you guys want, that woman is on a mission.

Stygian: I’ve dealt with crusading executives before. I pretty much just ignore them and do whatever the hell I want to do. That’s what I’ll do with Isabella Lya Sanchez and the IWF Board of Directors. Whoever the new Chairman of the Board is? Guess what. Fucks given: zero.

Lilith: Besides, what does this do with Brandon Macdonald and Karly Zedic getting married?

Lilah: Nothing.

Lilith: Then why the hell did you bring her up?

Lilah: I was just talking about the company email. And on the company email, there are about a billion pictures and a hundred videos of the wedding in Vegas floating around. Face it, you were wrong, Anna doesn’t want Brandon back.

Stygian: I am sure she will say so.

Lilah: Hello, she was at the wedding.

Lilith: And nobody’s ever been at the wedding of someone they wanted for themselves when they were marrying someone else.

Stygian: There’s 25% of all romantic comedies ever made.

Lilith: And certainly nobody’s ever stood by while their friend makes off with the person they love.

Stygian: Another 17%.

Lilith: And nobody has ever loved someone while they’re married to someone else and waited for the right moment to step in and pull them apart.

Stygian: That’s most of Julia Roberts’ career.

Lilith: And John Cusack’s.

Stygian: And America’s Sweethearts would be the cherry on top of that sundae!

Lilith: Because Julia Roberts and John Cusack are both in that one.

Lilah: I know. I still don’t see how you get off on saying Anna still wants Brandon.

Stygian: Still wants him and still has him. She just isn’t the girl in the spotlight. The elements are too perfect. And also? Would you rather fuck something that has squirted out James Shark’s demon spawn, or Anna Stone?

Lilith: Neither are my type.

Stygian: Mine either. I prefer…

Lilat grabs her boobs and jiggles them, cutting Stygian off.

Lilah: We know, Jase.

Stygian: But, if my options were something Shark’s dick had been in, or Anna, I’d take Anna. Besides, my bet isn’t that Brandon wants her. He just fucks her and uses his job to get her preferential treatment. The crux of my theory is that she still wants him. And no amount of biting her tongue at his wedding can make that go away.

Lilah: You really think that’s why she’s fighting you?

Stygian: Not only do I think that’s why she’s doing it, I think it’s why she was able to turn down a World Heavyweight Title match to come after me. I can just see it now. He finishes plowing her, flops off to the side, she rolls over and starts running her hands over his chest. “Brandie…”

Lilith: Brandie…haha nice.

Stygian: “…I know I’m supposed to fight Chad Mason, but you know what the bigger match would be? If I could beat Stygian, that’d be so much bigger than beatinc Chad Mason for the title.”

Lilith: Well, it would.

Stygian: Of course it would. But how does she get to buck tradition and get away with it? If you look at Anna Stone’s career, all the way back to NLWF, it’s nothing but a pattern of Anna Stone getting preferential treatment because she was fucking Brandon Macdonald. That isn’t the exception…that’s the rule.

Lilah: Is it? I haven’t really looked it up.

Lilith: You can bet Jason has.

Stygian nods, and reaches under the table to snag a Diet Pepsi from a cooler resting there. He cracks it open and drinks some of it down, before setting the can on the floor nxt to his chair. He sighs and looks into the camera.

Stygian: It’s not often a reporter can ask me a question that I haven’t asked myself a hundred times. I pride myself on been three moves ahead. It’s how I prepare for the world. Unlike most of you, I actually have to match wits with a mastermind. I’ve had one of the devious minds in the history of the sport stalking me for over a year now. A man who fancies himself Batman to my Superman. A man who tries to play Moriarty. A man smarter than Chuck Matthews, more violent than Corey Casey and better than Brandon Macdonlad…a man who has been trying to get me in the ring for over a year now. I have been hunted by a man who took in, trained and built a beautiful young woman into this business for no other purpose than to get her into the ring with me so he could bash my skull in—with the same bat he gave me for Christmas that I used to bounce Corey Casey off the Hellzone and break his back—and try to end my career. You people are scrambling to beat Chad Mason like it’s something hard to do. I’ve had real predators chase me down. So I make it a point to be three steps ahead of anyone who might come across me anywhere. The wrestlers in the ring, the reporters out of it…everyone.

Stygian: So it was a surprise to me when a reporter from PWI, covering all this build up and spectacle associated with IWF rolling out its purported “biggest event of the year”, managed to slip a question to me I’d never considered for myself.

Lilith: What was it?

Stygian: “Why wrestling?”

Lilah: Like, why do you wrestle?

Lilith: Pretty sure that’s what it means, yeah.

Stygian: Why do I wrestle? I had to stop and think about it. Why…do…I…wrestle? You know something? My whole life has sort of been this one charmed endeavor after another. For every bit that Brandon Macdonald tries to hold his image out as it? I actually was the stereotypical “All American Boy”. I was tall, athletic, handsome…I was a star athlete, I had the cheerleader girlfriend, I had the high grade-point average. I was in student government, I got awards for this community service and that activism endeavor…I was a second-team All-American basketball player. I was recruited by every team who’s been to the Final Four in the last 30 years. Name every major perennial college basketball power there has been…they all wanted me. I turned it down to accept a commission to the Air Force Academy. I joined up to become what is looking like the most useless job in the history of the armed forces: I was gonna be an F-22 Raptor pilot.

Lilith: I don’t see how that’s useless, lover.

Lilah: Because we’ve spent 78-billion on the damn thing and it never has, and probably never will see active combat.

Stygian: Yeah.

Lilith: I’m not even going to ask, I already know.

Lilah: The Me Paradox?

Lilith: Of course, darling.

Stygian: Of course. And even when I was heading into something that was going to mire me in obscurity. I was going to be in one of the most expensive footnotes in the history of the world. Then I grew seven inches and they reassigned me as an engineer. I wound up earning engineering degrees from one of the most revered polytechnic institutes in the world. Once I got out of the Air Force…I could have moonwalked into a six figure job anywhere in the world. High six figures. I just now started making what wrestling considers big money, and you want to know the really funny part? Not too long ago I sold a patent to Apple, and have another one being bid on by several defense companies that are going to net me more in a month than I’ll probably make if I stay in this business 30 years. So when I think about that…I look at my life…two beautiful women, a big house on the big side of town, a small fleet of vanity cars I’ve bought and built into every movie and TV car I grew up lusting after…hell I just restored an ’85 Vandura into the A-Team van. I spent more money fixing up the van than it was actually worth NEW! So when I look at my life, and I realize I really don’t much need wrestling, that question the guy from PWI asked? It really struck home. Why wrestling? Let me tell you why.

Lilith: With a gratuitous amount of sarcastic enthusiasm. Oh, tell us!

Lilah: Don’t be a bitch, Lil.

Lilith: Well sometimes he wanders around and around the point for twenty minutes without even coming close to it.

Lilah: You like it when he’s doing it with his tongue.

Lilith looks first to Lilah, then to Stygian and shrugs.

Lilith: …guilty.

Lilah: Then shut up and let the man talk.

Lilith: Fine. Stygian, why do you wrestle? Regale us with the earth-shattering answer!

Stygian: You couldn’t help but put that little bit of bitchy into it, could you?

Lilith: Of course not.

Lilah: Just tell them why you wrestle, before we go another ten rounds on this…

Stygian: Why do I wrestle?

Lilith: That’s the answer we’ve been trying to get around to.

Stygian: If you’d quit interrupting me…

Lilith: Well you keep coming back to that.

Stygian: I’m trying to build it into a sweeping, grandiose statement. A declaration, a mission statement. Like a platform or something suitably impressive. And you keep cutting me off at the knees.

Lilah: Oh, for Chrissakes.

Lilah slips around Stygian and behind Lilith, clamping her hand over the blonde’s mouth.

Lilah: GO! Hey, no tickling…

Stygian: Why do I wrestle? Because it’s the only thing I’ve ever had to work at in my life.

Lilah: Finally! OW!

Lilah takes her hand off of Lilith’s mouth rather suddenly, and comes away holding her left boob.

Lilah: I think you ripped my nipple off.

Lilith: I fight dirty!

Lilah: Yeah but that was a little severe.

Lilah turns her back to the camera and pulls the neckline of her jersey dress out.

Lilah: Well at least it’s not bleeding.

Lilith: The night’s young.

Stygian shakes his head and takes another swallow of his Diet Pepsi. He sets the can down as Lilah drops back into her chair, still rubbing her boob.

Stygian: I was saying…I wrestle because it’s the only thing in my life I’ve ever had to work at. Everything else in my life? I’ve lived this charmed life. I had the Midas Touch all through my life.

Lilah: Like, the guys who fix mufflers?

Lilith: How can you know the cost of the F-22 and not know the fable of King Midas?

Stygian: You’ve forgotten the first half of Lilah’s Paradox.

Lilith: Right…Lilah doesn’t know anything unless she knows everything.

Stygian: Basketball, school, the Air Force, my quirky little inventions I come up with fucking around the house? They all came to me easily. They all came to me without effort. But wrestling? Wrestling has been hard. I’ve never had to work harder for anything in my life than I have to become an elite professional wrestler. This is the only part of my life that has ever challenged me. I have had to bust my ass to get to where I am. I’ve had to work to learn this business. I’ve had to fight to make any progress. I’m constantly working to evolve and take the next step in the ring. Even now, as I sit here and am widely considered the best wrestler in the world? I work to improve myself. I’m busting my ass training with a wrestling legend, a kickboxing legend and a sumo wrestling legend to add new wrinkles to my game, to improve myself. I’ve never had anything handed to me in this fucking sport ever. EVER. Everything I’ve gotten in this business? I’ve gotten through work. I’ve either busted my ass to get what I want, or I’ve beaten down whoever had what I wanted, put my foot in their throat and torn it out of their cold, dead hands; the way I took the World Title from your hero.

Stygian: When I started in this business I was wrestling for what felt like tab
Scraps in sweatboxes all up and down the California Coast. I made less for working the event than I did for bouncing at the bar across the street from the arena after the show. Bouncing with ice bags taped to my shoulders or my knees. With my arms taped up, or with 17 fresh stitches in my forehead. Bouncing when I could barely walk because I wasn’t making enough in the ring to afford things like eating every day and sleeping in something that wasn’t my car. Yeah, I was in my 20’s and now that I have the financial security that I don’t have to worry…I can look back on it and laugh. I can say it was fun in a Wooderson from Dazed and Confused kind of way. And yeah, I could have pulled the plug any time. I could have shaved, cut my hair, put on a suit and gone to work at just about any defense contractor in the world. But do you know why I stuck with it? Because the triumph was its own reward. The rewards were small at first. At first it was a triumph to get through the night without embarrassing or injuring myself. Then winning a match was my major triumph. After that? Winning more than one of them. Soon I graduated to stringing wins together. Then I moved up to winning a title. A real title! It was a belt they’d bought cheap from some other company that had closed a few years before and had to scrape their name off the belt. The damn thing was more tarnished than the SMU football program in 1987. It reaked of cigarette smoke, sweat and old beer that had been spilled on it when everyone and their dog was running the beer-swilling brawler schtick, but you know what? It was mine! It was my belt. I’d busted my ass for it. I’d spilled blood for it. I’d spilled my blood to claim it. I had to work, to fight, to struggle for it!

Stygian: That’s why whenever someone walks into this sport and is just handed something. I resent it. I resent that guys who washed out of more mainstream combat sports are awarded high-profile matches at the top of the card just because they deign to get into a wrestling ring. James Shark, who’s drinking, drug and women problems made him an unreliable hire in boxing or MMA? Who’s been in and out of jail more times that I’ve been in and out of my wife. Who’s constantly getting on twitter and picking fights and winding up on TMZ. James Shark was a chronic embarrassment to every sport he was ever in. James Shark was run out of every boxing promotion and MMA company he ever tried to get on in for being an unprofessional thug who couldn’t keep his naturally black ass out of jail? James Shark who was run out of IWF more than once for his antics walks into a High Impact Title match with me? James Shark who keeps walking back into professional wrestling and is handed title shots and contracts. Not because he’s earned them. Because he used to be marginally famous in other sports? It’s insulting to guys like me.

Stygian: Or Cody Taylor. Another guy who couldn’t make it in Mixed Martial Arts. Cody Taylor seems to think he was this great fighter. He seems to think he’s some kind of MMA Superstar. Hell this guy’s so full of shit he claims to have beaten Alistair Overeem on the card Overeem got thrown off of for testing positive for performance-enhancing drugs. Hell Overeem can’t even apply for reinstatement for another three months, and Cody fought him at UFC 146? Dana White let a guy who supposedly brushed him off to wrestle, fight a guy who was suspended? Dana White hates pro wrestling. He won’t have anything to do with it after Tito moonlighted a few matches back in the middle of the last decade. I realize everyone says “oh, it’s just a wrestling storyline” but try to make some fucking sense, Cody! Hell Cody’s so dumb that he can’t figure out that his wife gave birth to “Cody Jr.” less than seven months after the first time he put his dick in her. This guy wasn’t even an MMA “star” on the level of professional fuck-up James Shark and he walks into IWF and gets title shots against Robbie Hart. Gets shit handed to him because he told on hell of a lie. And how did he pan out? He killed Robbie Hart’s unborn kids, fell in so thick with James Shark that when James embarrassed this company…again, and got fired…again, who was with him? Who was his copilot when James went down in flames? Yeah, handing those two the keys to the fucking kingdom because they were bullshit artists in two other sports…that was fucking brilliant.

Stygian: Or Brandon Macdonald, your hero and knight in Shining Armor, Anna. Walks into NLWF and gets handed belts, hell at one time he had six of them. And why? Because he had a marginally successful MMA Career. He fought and beat a bunch of washed-up guys who didn’t know when to quit like Chuck Liddell and Tito Ortiz. He beat Lyoto Machida? Oh wow. Once people figured out to quit chasing him around like the Coyote and knock him the fuck out, he suddenly wasn’t so tough anymore. Dude’s lost three of his last five, beat a washed-up Couture, another one of your supposed trainers, and turned down a shot at Bones because he’s scared Jonny boy will fuck him up again. Yeah, Brandon Macdonald was a great MMA champion the way the Houston Rockets were great NBA champions; by doing it when the talent was weak and most of the significant contenders were old. Yet Brandon Macdonald walks into NLWF and gets handed whatever he wants on a silver platter because he used to be famous in another sport. And as long as Brandon was the unequivocal king of whatever company he was in? Life was good, wasn’t it? Six titles in NLWF? GREAT! Hiring thugs to mug Robbie Hart for the IWF title? Fantastic! But the first time Brandon looks across that ring at a force of destruction he can’t even begin to fathom how to beat? Stygian points to himself. Suddenly the New England Patriots practice squad is looking mighty good.

Stygian: I’ve never embarrassed any company I’ve ever been in. yeah, the girls and I, we like to push the envelope. We’ve gotten a few angry letters from censorship advocacy groups. We’re blacklisted by every church and family group in every English-speaking country in the world. We’ve gotten some sternly-worded warnings from the FCC. You know where you’ve never seen me? You’ve never seen me on some chemical on TMZ at 3am spewing homophobic epithets or racial slurs. You’ve never seen my mug shot plastered all over the dirt sheets…not for anything I actually did. There was that bullshit about me allegedly killing Dan Alexander. I’ve never run from a fight. I’ve never embarrassed the company. I’ve never showed up chemically impaired. I’ve never been unsafe to work with or unfit to wrestle. I never took a payoff from the father of unborn children to tag my pregnant fiancée in the stomach and abort those kids. And yet all the guys who have done all those things? They’re the ones who were handed everything. Hell I hear Cody Taylor was in line for a title shot before he shot himself in the foot. Jesus Christ. Keys to the kingdom and he never had to earn them! It’s bad enough Robbie wasn’t fired on the spot, but instead handed Cody Taylor a $20 and a coat hanger and told him to go to work and got a title shot out of it…but you were going to give Cody Taylor a title shot?

Stygian: All of the wrong virtues and values are getting rewarded around here. I’ve had one of the most dominant summers anyone has ever had. I spend the biggest show of the year indulging a little girl who never got over her crush. Meanwhile all of the manipulative, lying, scheming and underhanded fucks get all the glory? Robbie Hart paid a man to kill his unborn kids, how does he still have a job? Chad Mason got a gang together and tried to end the careers of James Shark, Jason Hawk, Chuck Matthews, and this guy someone got a world title match. People being handed things they didn’t earn. That seems to be what’s pissing me off lately Anna. And you? How are you any different?

Stygian: I’ll give you this much, you’ve won your matches. You’ve done that much. Of course you’re banging a guy who everyone everywhere stops just short of calling a mobster. The kind of guy like that, if he and his family weren’t so good at hiding bodies, would be in a small windowless cage for eternity. We all know what he is, none of us can prove it. And when you’re not blowing Brandon for favorable booking, your dropping your panties on Tony Soprano’s floor. But hey, you’ve won your matches! You tend to show up to work whenever you feel like it, so the number of matches you’ve won totals…about eight. But you’ve won them! And you just happened to get one of the latest draws in Path To Valhalla and win that. And somehow you managed to turn down a world title match because you thought there was a bigger payday in facing me.

Lilah: There probably is…

Stygian: But what right does she have to tell IWF Rules to go fuck themselves. What has she done to earn that right? Death Angel maybe has the right. Johnny Styles might have that right. Tell me where Anna Stone gets off?

Lilith: On Brandon Macdonald.

Lilah: And Tony Soprano, don’t forget that one!

Lilith: There’s an image I will never get out of my head.

Lilah: I know. Guy was a lousy football coach, why would Anna bang him?

Lilith: Huh?

Stygian: I think Lilah is confusing Tony Soprano with Tony Sporano.

Lilah: Which one hangs out with Tim Tebow now?

Stygian: Sporano.

Lilah: And which one is the fat mob guy form HBO?

Stygian: Soprano.

Lilah: And which on is Anna fucking?

Stygian: The fat mob guy.

Lilah: That’s even worse. I think I just threw up a little in my mouth. I mean, at least if she was getting a shot at Tebow…

Lilith: What is it with you and Tim Tebow? Ever since we signed those cheerleading uniforms and Playboy covers for his charity back in Denver…

Lilah: Hey…dude’s cut. A girl can look. He was into me!

Lilith: He was transfixed by your gigantic jugs, same as he was mine. That doesn’t mean he was in to us, it means he’s human.

Lilah: Oh…

Stygian: You’ve never paid for a damn thing in this business Anna. Don’t try to lie and make up the hardships you suffered trying to break in, because you never had them. It’s a matter of public record. You started broadcasting, you met up with Brandon, you got pulled right into NLWF. Then you ended up commissioner of another promotion, and conveniently won its tag titles! That there tells me all I need to know about how you feel about abusing the power of a commissionership to your own personal gain. From there you springboard into Brandon’s talk-show, another reward he gained from being marginally famous, and not because he deserved it, and into your IWF career. And that has led you here.

Stygian: You don’t know suffering. Maybe in your personal life. I understand you went into deep depression because Brandon left you. And you worked at Tim Horton’s while you moped, whatever that is.

Lilah: It’s like a Canadian Dunkin’ Doughnuts, only it’s owned by a hockey player.

Lilith: I told you she’d know.

Stygian: Of course she does. Anyway, Anna, you don’t know anything about suffering, sacrificing or working in this business; because you’ve never had to. You decided to dip your toe in, and got brought into what was a major promotion before Nick Ridicule grabbed the wheel and steered it into a telephone pole. You got handed a spot in NLWF and you got it for the worst reason of any of these people who’ve been handed things they don’t deserve. At least Brandon, James and Cody had professional fights before they got handed the keys to the kingdom. You got in? You got in because you were fucking someone. You’re no better than Alison Williams or Ashley Matthews. You rode a dick into the sport. You never wrestled four nights a week, then went to work without sleep the next day, in complete pain because you still had bills to pay. You’ve never been in a high-school gym or a bingo hall. You’ve never been at a state fair so close to the livestock that it was all you could do not to puke from the smell. You never piled into a car with five other guys all over six feet and two fifty because it was the only way you could afford to drive to the show! You’ve never sprinted in and out of the shower because it was so cold you were in danger of frostbite. That’s what most of us who weren’t fucking our way into NLWF had to do.

Lilah: If we’re boing fair, I only got into wrestling because I was sleeping with the two of you.

Lilith: That’s not entirely true.

Stygian: Yeah, Tina and I were signing with UECW and Mike wanted another valet for me cause that’s what he’d seen in Japan.

Lilith: Then he saw you and said “HOLY SHIT TAKE A LOOK AT THOSE!”

Stygian: Almost literally!

Lilith: You were at breakfast with us that morning because you slept with us, but you got signed on your own…ahem…”merits”.

Lilah does her customary “grab and jiggle” maneuver yet again.

Lilah: My “merits”. I’ve never called them that before.

Stygian: Still, getting hired to stand there and look pretty because you’ve got nice funbags is nothing new. Anna skipped years and years of paying dues because of who she was in bed with.

Lilith: Well that is the traditional way it’s done…

Stygian: You know, Anna? In a way? It's nice to be against somebody who's just being handed things and then being the final boss. You’ve spent your IWF career just marching in and getting to cherry-pick what days you show up. You decide when you actually want to be motivated to come in and work. And for the longest time, that’s worked for you. You want to rest up for Path To Valhalla? “Brandie, can I have a couple weeks off?” Sure, now open your mouth. Booked in battle grounds two weeks ago? “Brandie, I have that match you let me bully my way into with the Star Destroyer, make someone else do it.” Sure, now open your mouth. “Brandie, you’re getting married tomorrow, but I won’t tell Karly about us.” Good girl, open your mouth.

Stygian: There is no half-assing it with me. Because wether you believe what you said the night you challenged me or not? It’s true. I’m the biggest star in this company. I’m the measuring stick. I’m the champion whenever I want to be. Everyone knows it. It doesn’t matter when I finally decide to go after it again. When I want to? I will do to whoever it is what I did to Brandon Macdonald. I will walk down to that ring, put my foot down the IWF Champion’s throat, and take that title…again. I don’t care if it’s still Chad Mason. I don’t care if it’s Robbie Hart. I don’t care if it’s Death Angel himself. I will destroy whoever it is. I’m good enough to do it anytime I want. I can walk into any company anywhere in the world and beat their world champion. If that doesn’t make me the best in the world, I don’t know what will. Maybe after this contract with IWF is up, I’ll just go start doing it. Maybe I’ll take a bunch of one-month payouts and challenge every world champion in the world one-by-one. CWF, WEW, ASWF, UECW, SCW…I’ll just do a tour.

Stygian: And I’d do it because I can. Whatever motivations you had for making this challenge, and I think I nailed them, but even if I didn’t? It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter why you want this match. The sad truth is? I don’t care. What matters now is that you’re locked into it. Unless you drop down in front of our esteemed newlywed commissioner and suck start him like a leaf-blower? You’re locked into this match with me. I don’t need to know why you’re doing it to demolish you. I don’t need any of that bullshit to understand you, because I don’t need to understand you. My weapons are many and varied. And against you, my weapon isn’t psychology. I showed you I don’t need it. I could strip down to my Jockeys and beat you. You know it to be true. You know it’s not the image you have to fear, it’s the man. I don’t need to dissect you. That isn’t the approach. That isn’t my game plan. Sometimes I need to dissect an opponent to beat them. Not so with you. Sometimes motivation is sufficient enough to provide the edge I need. Usually it takes some momentous match. Usually a world title match, or a match with a legendary opponent. But the motivation, the only motivation I need, Anna Stone? Is how utterly sick you’ve made me. You used your pussy to get into this business, and all kidding aside, maybe you aren’t still fucking him…but you’ve used your relationship with Brandon Macdonald, the commissioner of this company to get what you want. I schlepped up and down California. I learned to work crowds and perform in big spots, win tough matches in Japan. I’ve slept on concrete floors, eaten uncooked Ramen, stitched up my own bloody gashes. I’ve been blown up by C4, flayed to the bone with barbwire, had my wife kidnapped and been buried alive. I have given everything to get where I am in this business; you’ve been given everything to get where you are. You and everyone like you? Just knowing that you didn’t work to get here, didn’t earn it…that’s enough for me. I don’t need any deep-seeded, well thought out game plan to win on Sunday. All I need is to know that you represent everything I hate in the way this business works to destroy you. You’ve been parading around here like you’ve accomplished something. You look good in a sports bra and running shorts, and you’re Brandon Macdonald’s friend, so you’ve been tolerated around here. No more. I’ve done nothing but win match after match after match, and all of the reprehensible people and the cliques have gotten the rewards? Fine. I can be reprehensible. I’ve done it before, and I can do it again, starting with what I’m going to do at From the Ashes. The last time I was in this kind of a mindset, I dedicated a series of loathsome acts to the memory of James MacDonald, every time I said “this one’s for you, James.” Well, I’m going to take out the commissioner’s childhood friend, his first love, and his wife’s maid of honor and de-facto best friend. Brandon gave you everything you’ve ever had in this sport, and I’m going to end it. Guess what? This one’s for you, Brandon.

Stygian finishes his Diet Pepsi and stands, stretching. He rolls his shoulers backwards and forwards, and they crack a few times each way. Then he crushes the can the long way in one hand, and tosses it at the screen, which goes black.