"Remember What You're Fighting For, Not Just The Gold, but for what you believe in: family."

Unaired footage- Following The First Vignette From Don Hendrix.

{The Don turned off his camera to his computer, letting a sigh of relief escape his lips as he looked outside his penthouse window, taking in the beautiful view of the Germany scenery placed in front of him. And for what he thought was his best first step into approaching his first OWA World Championship match ever- suddenly, the doubt that he cleared himself of months ago when he started running a Mafia, became the Don of the Antoniano Famiglia, it all started creeping into the back of his mind once again. Was that truly his best approach? Hendrix starts fighting his thoughts of "it was good" versus "no it wasn't" as he grips his head- the pain of fighting one's true inner self is a battle of all mankind. Hendrix rests his head on the desk in the penthouse…. Before suddenly hearing…}

?: "Look at you now…."

{The Don looks up, and behind him, expecting someone be standing there… but there isn't a person in that room other than him. He allowed Tony, Marco, and Matteo to roam Germany, experience the culture while Angelo, who has wrestled in Germany for more than twenty years has gone to visit old friends.}

?: "In front of you Anthony."

{Hendrix's eyes widen as he slowly turns his head to face in front of him… but all he sees is the window, and a reflection of himself… wait a minute… this reflection isn't right…. It's… it's…}

'Don' Hendrix: "....Brandon…"

Brandon Hendrix: "Surprised to see me, Anthony? After all, you buried me away in the back of your mind, trying to act like I don't exist no more, or that without me, there would be no Don Hendrix, would there? That if I didn't sacrifice what I have, you wouldn't be sitting there like you are now. And now, you're getting a opportunity at the World Championship that should be mine-"

'Don' Hendrix: "Yours? Did you win Ultimate X to win the Icarus Championship? Did you defend it three times? Because if you did, I must have missed that. Face that fact Brandon, I'm a bigger success in my short time than you were in almost ten years. It took you what, almost two years to win your first championship? It took me… a month? Month and a half at most to win the Icarus Championship? You needed me far longer than you think Brandon, and you're not about to take my work, my foundation, my family, and try to steal from me. You're gone away because you didn't care about anyone but yourself. You didn't care about your parents death because you went out and wrestled the next night. You didn't care about your daughter because you were out there bleeding out, getting electrocuted, almost dying- and you would have left Raelynn not only without her bitch mother, but her father too. It's bad enough that I suffer from this heart defect and can die at any moment, but I will not die for wrestling anymore. Ho troppo per cui vivere."

Brandon Hendrix: "Paint me the bad guy for Wrestling being the only thing I had after my parents died! It's the only thing I had. I didn't have Raelynn, hell I didn't even know if I was her father yet when I first met her. And when I found out, this was all I had still. Don't act like if you were leading a Mafia for years then suddenly something important comes into your life all of a sudden, you'd stop running that group. Think about i-"

'Don' Hendrix: "YOU'RE DAMN RIGHT I WOULD!"

{The Don stands up from his seat with such force, it sends the seat flying back. Hendrix stares at his reflection for a moment.}

'Don' Hendrix: "I'd give all this up for my family if it had to come to it. Because I care about my family. It took all this for me to realize how much I need my family. That's why I have to win the Immortal Heavyweight Championship! You wanted to win it for yourself. And don't lie to yourself, because I know. I know better than anyone."

Brandon Hendrix: "Of course you'd know me. You are me!"

'Don' Hendrix: "NO! I'm what you wanted to be so early on but was so Scared to do. This is your life now Anthony, and just like anyone else that wants to get into my way, you turn to a distant memory…..

Addio figlio di puttana."

{The Don looks down and closes his eyes, whispering "Go away" before opening his eyes and lifting his head up. And the old him is gone, and standing in front of Hendrix is the reflection of The Don. He stands in the reflection, chest puffed out, standing strong to finally rid himself of his past… now, to the future….}



'Don' Hendrix: "I remember in a distant time, me and former OWA Champion Michael Bishop sat inside of a bar, beer in his hand, root beer in mine…heh… Anyway, a beer bottle started a path that showed everyone how crazy I was about this sport. That's when the whole "Hendrix gone crazy" stint started, but after a match me and him had, he came to me and said "you are a future world champion. The world does not see it yet, but you will carry the torch one day". That stuck inside my head for a long time because you had the then OWA Champion, a man who went to Hell and back more than once, a man who made it as the Champion, Outlaw and World. He told, hell he was the first to tell me that I can make it. When I started a mafia…. A legitimate Mafia… he was still the one who called, texted, even showed up to my new place in Italy with his family for a weekend. He sat down in my office chair in front of me and we talked about his upcoming war, how this could be the end. How this is a war that's been fighting him on the inside and out…. And while his end could be different for him, for me and Night Two in the Immortal Heavyweight Championship Match, it can mean all the same. You think I can recover, after everything I've done, everything I've said…. How could I recover if I lose to a man that is banged up from a war not even twenty four hours beforehand? What would happen to me if I fail? What becomes of the Don then? It's simple…..

I walk out. I leave OWA, return to Italy full time and build my empire in the organization that I've cemented in my homeland. Do I wish to leave? Absolutely not. But I cannot show my face after Civil War if I lose. I cannot be a OWA Wrestler if I lose….. so I WILL. NOT. LOSE!"

{Hendrix's words echo like a thunder blast in the night sky. An added stipulation pretty much- Immortal Heavyweight Championship- and if The Don loses, he leaves OWA. And you never trap a scared animal in a corner, because that's when they fight back the hardest. That's when they bite the meanest. That's when instincts kick in and they execute the kill because it's needed, not wanted.}

'Don' Hendrix: "For ten years, I've been grinding. For ten years, I've been fighting. Ten years I've been surviving in a world that would like to see another man of another race, religion, or colour die in the streets unjustified. That's far longer than many unfortunate e innocente people can say. But through my fight of survival, I've became stronger, smarter, and wiser as each day passes. And while my wisdom will not help me secure the end of a decade of destruction I've been through, my strength here.."

{Hendrix points at his arms.}

'Don' Hendrix: "And here."

{The Don points at his head.}

'Don' Hendrix: "And while my gut feeling is the people like Ryo Sakazaki, C, Marce Rambeaux, Corey Matthis, El Landerson, Jessie B, DE’MARION, Jeremiah McGuire, RD3, Rich Gatsby, and Lazarus Arjen cannot handle those traits, the three Champions that are set in front of me are.

Makl, you are the biggest retard to walk into OWA. And that's talking with the sped that Odyssey had on their roster. You, speed running what I've said, missed out the importance of my message- my people should, and will, exterminate yours. While my actual home country should nuke your "I hail from but never lived there", judging by your "people who lived there versus people who don't" little speech, it's about extermination. You brag a lot about 'kicking my ass' when you never did so. An ass kicking is what my family gave yours the last time we met. I left you bloody, my family left yours broken, and it will continue by some miracle if you win at Civil War. But when it comes down to the three men with the biggest chance of winning the Thunderbastard, you're third. You're far behind the likes of Darkane and Elijah Hampton and you don't even see it. In that triple threat match, you had a two star performance against the rest. You Over believe your own hype. What King falls to non kings? I mean, that's how people like us who has a title like us- here's the difference- you're not a king. You're a regular man from a boring ass family that needs to call yourself king to stroke that ego just right. Let me tell you some titles that belong. Elijah Hampton is called the face of Olympus, and he earned that by being the Immortal Heavyweight Champion. I'm called the Don because I'm the highest ranking official of the Mafia and I earned that. Nobi is called the White Knight and earned that because that Caucasian saved us from a smelly piece of false Italian trash. But you, you haven't earned being called King Of anything. But you're going to come after me saying "but you haven't earned being called a Don". You speak to be heard, but says nothing of value. You don't earn the title, you take it. You really are a dumb bastard. A dumb bastard that will be eaten alive at Civil War.

Darkane, you're as dumb as Michaels. How are you going to say "Brandon was better! Brandon was better than The Don" but get your pussy hurt when i say "old Darkane was better"? And the simple fact you say I copied what Elijah Hampton says when I haven't paid attention to a Elijah Hampton shit show in months means you as well are saying things that have no substance. You see, you believe that but can say the same thing to everyone else and think it's alright. No it doesn't. It makes you a hypocrite. It makes you look like you're a little boy that didn't get his favorite video by standing there and screaming "HE SAID IT BETTER!!!!!!" stomping your feet on the ground like a spoiled little kid. I'm sorry that I hurt your feelings, you pathetic Dick! For a man that gets handed opportunity after opportunity when you don't deserve it, you complain too much. You were handed opportunities because people thought you could beat Jacon
…… god I can't speak anymore this is how annoyed I am Angelo…. Jacob Senn. And you failed! You failed and you failed! Your biggest ounce of success was winning another company's championship Because you can't win one of OWAs anymore! LET'S FACE THE FACTS DARKANE! YOU'RE WASHED, YOU'RE DONE, IT'S OVER! YOU'RE A FAKE! YOU'RE A FRAUD, A CHOKE ARTIST, A FAILURE, YOU ARE A LOSER! THAT IS WHAT YOU ARE! YOU'RE THE SCUM OF THE EARTH! THAT'S ALL YOU ARE! THAT'S ALL YOU'LL EVER BE!

Elijah, I don't know why you're running your mouth thinking differently. Option C has been your Kryptonite dog. Gioca a un supereroe e muori come tale. My story doesn't end because you say it does Eli, it doesn't even come close to ending. You will not be my downfall! I've worked too hard, sacrificed too much! Let me give you your flowers Elijah- you had everyone believing for a feel good moment that everyone can rise above the authority, the powers that be, and the favorites of the back. You winning that title for the first time inspired every single young fan we have that watches for some fucking reason that they can do the impossible. You inspired me to want you to be the champion whenever I got a title match. I wanted you to be the champion because you're the standard barrier for Olympus. For me to feel like everything I've built, I need to defeat the face of Olympus. And trust me, The Don does not give compliments out that much, but when he does, you should take them to heart. But when you fail to think that I'm not working, that I'm just sitting there with my feet kicked up all relaxed, that's when the disrespect begins. You claim I will never run this brand as Immortal Heavyweight Champion but you seek a false ritual that been painted on by the demons in your head that say you're going to be the hero in the Thunderbastard and that you'll be the hero that puts the big bad Don away from.OWA forever because obviously, you feel like I don't deserve to be in the big title picture, right? That the BIGGEST GLOW UP IN OWA HISTORY THAT WENT FROM UNWANTED TO UN FUCKING DENIED!!!! I'VE WENT FROM THE START OF THE SHOW TO THE MOTHERFUCKING END! I WENT FROM "EHHHH BRANDON IS ALRIGHT" TO "WHAT A MOTHERFUCKING PROMO FROM THE DON!". YOU DON'T GET TO.STAND THERE WITH KNOWING WHAT I'VE WENT THROUGH BECAUSE WE ARE NOT DIFFERENT ELIJAH!

… we're practically the same. We've battled systems that are the same. People that wanted certain someone's to be World Champion. And while they forced me out, you managed to stick around and win. I didn't get the opportunity to gain another opportunity for the title, but you did. If I did, I wouldn't be standing here battling to FINALLY become WORLD CHAMPION! THIS IS IT! I CAN POSSIBLY NEVER IN MY LIFE AGAIN RECEIVE ANOTHER SHOT AT BEING WORLD CHAMPION! AND IT STRIKES THE CORE OF MY WELL BEING KNOWING I WILL BE THE BIGGEST FAILURE IN THE WORLD! SO FUCK YOU ELIJAH! FUCK YOU FOR FAILING TO SEE THAT YOU'RE FACING YOU IN A DIFFERENT FORM! WELL HERE WE ARE NOW ELIJAH! WE'RE APPROACHING THE END! YOUR WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP WILL BE MINE! IT WILL BE THE DON'S! IT WILL BELONG TO THE ANTONIANO FAMIGLIA! IT WILL BE IN THE HANDS OF MY MENTOR! IT WILL BE PLACED BETWEEN THE GRAVES OF MY PARENTS! AND IT WILL REST IN THE ARMS OF MY DAUGHTER! AND NO SMOOTH CRIMINAL, NO GRAVEWORM, NO ROMANIAN, AND NO OTHER OF THE FUCKING JOB SQUAD WILL DENY ME ANY FURTHER!

TEN YEARS IN AND I'M DONE BEING DENIED! THE DON….. ANTHONY HENDRIX WILL BE THE NEW O.W.A. IMMORTAL. HEAVYWEIGHT. CHAMPION. OF. THE. FUCKING. WORLD!

I FIGLI DI PUTTANA FANNO IN GRANDE QUANDO PENSANO CHE IL DON NON RICHIEDI QUESTO! SONO DA CIRCA DIECI FOTTUTI ANNI! BACIA IL MIO CULO ITALIANO!

A light sea breeze caressed the pale sands of the beach and the surrounding nearby structures. The murky skies looked like a tell tale sign of a coming storm but that didn’t stop tourists and locals from scattering throughout the city. Some inhabitants came to the beach to pay their respects and to be immersed by the history. To put themselves in the shoes of those who fell before them. Darkane stuck out like a sore thumb and stood over the scenic view of the beach of Normandy. He watched the waves crash against the rock walls and the foam slither up and down the shore line. He wasn’t sure what to make of it, as he eyed a commemorative WW2 plaque in honor of the dead and eventually jabbed his cigarette out on it. He walked a few steps to his right, taking in the aura of the bunkers and grazing his hand over the wartorn reinforced concrete.

It was a sight to behold.

A sight filled with gruesome memories.

Memories that would last for an eternity.

“Thought I’d make a little pit stop before I head over to Munich.” Darkane wasn’t gonna let this opportunity slip by the wayside. It was rare nowadays that he was overseas.

“I often wonder what the last thing that went through these soldier's minds, other than a bullet, when they were rowing through the channel to meet their maker. They were sitting ducks after all, and I’m sure an array of limbs and body parts were already chewed up and left on the sands like a chainsaw ripping through flesh. We often go to these memorials to pay homage, to show our utmost gratitude and say our final goodbyes. We leave a rose on each grave with an American flag and I’m not really patriotic in a traditional sense but I can recognize the hell that these men went through. You just wonder if they had any children or a high school sweetheart dame they left a widow. You wonder how much they had to prioritize fighting for their country against the fear of death and which one would prevail. No amount of training can prepare you for a death sentence that you could see from miles out on the waters. Just imagine one day you’re coming home from college, you aced the last test of the year, you’re going to meet up with your beautiful girl, life is good right? Then you receive your dreaded draft number and are shipped off into the war on behalf of your country before you even know what hit you. Even though you’re still wet behind the ears. Even though you’re still a fucking baby, you were essentially cargo slingshotted into a warzone, inevitably to be another statistic.”

His words were harsh but needed to be said as he brushed his matted hair back and took off his leather jacket. It was hard to get a read on Darkane sometimes and he remained stoic, perhaps lost in a time capsule of his own. He peered down at the beach, imagining the warfare that once took place and thought how helpless the soldiers were. He also thought about Civil War, how it was fast approaching, how everything was on the line and how sure of himself he was about winning it all. Darkane stuck his hands in his jean short pockets, resting against the bunker, a slick smile forming on his face.

“It's good to see you embrace the hate Mark. I didn't think you had it in you even though you are a broken record. At least you admitted to changing your tune and doing a u-turn on yourself. That's a vital step. It's hard for people to come to terms with change. It's hard for people to accept the constant ebbs and flows that go on in their everyday lives for better or for worse. It's good to see you try and scale mountains that you will never be able to fully ascend, not due to the extreme weather conditions or a lack of peak physical prowess, but because of Darkane. Because of me. The Death Reaper tagging alongside your journey like a tumor, sporting the same smug smirk that you fucking despise; that you loathe with every fiber of your being. I am the GraveWorm that you want to eradicate and it feels so damn good. I'm glad you're not shying away from your inner contempt, I'm glad you’re channeling it in such a positive and healthy manner. That's key. It really is. I’ve never seen someone march so elegantly to their death and you make it look like a breeze. You look so composed and while your veins will pop out of your head, while your fists will tremble, know that your acceptance of change is a good thing. It's admirable. I knew you were pissed off, but it’s past that. You are obsessed. Sickly obsessed with the Seventh Ward and I know you wear your heart on your sleeve, you wear it like a badge of honor but you will not defy the odds and plow through the obstacles that impede you. You will not see an end to your ongoing suffering and heartache. You will never find an escape route. As hopeless as you are, I want to give you a gold star, Mark. I want to congratulate you because you have come to terms with the fact that you are unraveling. I called it right out of the gate, I knew you would get here. It was only a matter of time. I tried to show you the signs but you wouldn't listen. Now look at you.

Completely infatuated with two men who have ruined your fucking life in spite of the Immortal Heavyweight Championship.

The buck doesn't stop at just destroying your life, the buck stops when I am the triple champion. And as much as you want to drive a wedge between Laz and I, we know exactly what’s at stake. He knows I'm gunning for his head come hell or high water. We both accepted this from the get-go. I'm not going to let a potentially low number draw deter me from scalping skulls and leaving bodies where they stand. It's not a matter of trust between us two. We've fought like our heads were on fire unlike cousin Mark. We’ve bled buckets on the streets of New Orleans all the way to the streets of South Korea. There was a period of time where we refused to see eye to eye. It was a period of time where we wouldn't accept anything less than each other's guts seeping through our fingers. I've learned since then that we are better as one cohesive unit; as one cohesive force than we are at each other's throats, but that still won't stop me from sinking my jagged teeth into his jugular. If he doesn’t try to do the same, then that’s on fucking him. I want Laz to try his damndest to butcher me into a thousand bite sized pieces even though he doesn’t give a fuck if he wins or not, the pure euphoria he gets to mutilate any and all that stand in his way is the key component. And I know you’re going to try and masquerade yourself as an unstoppable killing machine; while sinking to the bowels of depravity which isn’t even in your lane, but there’s nothing worse than a wannabe Darkane or a wannabe Laz. It just doesn’t fit you Mark, you’re not capable of acting beneath yourself and stooping to the lows that we can. You don’t have the gall or the black heart in you, you get cold feet. It’s like saying El Landerson is a jacked up powerhouse or that he isn’t a fan of incest. There’s no connection there and as I’ve said before. I will use your fixation on The Seventh Ward against you. I have before and I’ll do it over and fucking over again until you’re knee deep in hospital bills alongside baby back Mark and Harman. It’ll be one big family reunion.

Harman doesn't need anybody to fight on his behalf. He wants you to quit, he doesn't want to see you put In harm's way. He rots there in tears trying to suck down water through a straw but knowing it just leaks out through his neck must be torture. And when he looks over to his left and sees the fried face of cousin Mark, it doesn't make him feel much better. You are more or less shooting yourself in the foot trying to avenge Harman. He's going to need one of those electronic larynx’s to even say the words I love you brother while he sounds like a fucking mangled R2D2. You won't be able to deliver any reassurance or any clarity, or any satisfaction, or a positive outlook. There's nothing left for you to do but join him in your own hospital gown. I get that you feel the need to pay him back for lifting your spirits and offering a helping hand when times were hard hitting, but the best thing you can do and the right thing to do is grab one of those comfy hospital pillows. You know, the jumbo sized ones they keep in the back and press it down on his mug as hard as you can. I want you to feel his last breath convulse against the warmth of your embrace so at least you can check off your good deed of the day and maybe then you'll actually feel like a killer. That's the closest you will ever come to my fucking level.

That includes your precious Prestige Championship. At the end of the day both the Prestige Championship and The APEX Championship play second fiddle to the Immortal Heavyweight Championship, that much is  fucking clear. What isn’t clear is your apparent love and adoration for it. You’re not a good liar Mark and lies can get you in troubled waters. You sat there with a straight face and looked me in the eye right through the flames and told me that The Prestige Championship was albatross or in layman's terms a burden to bear; like a curse, you felt like it was weighing you down. It’s either one or the other, either you want to love it or you want to move on. I’m getting mixed signals from you Mark and you want to suck off the Prestige Championship by mentioning Hampton who fucking lost to Maggall, Nobi and Bad Boy Know of all people in a winner take all tag team contest. Maggall himself is nothing to write home about either, he’s an inconsistent tub of shit who doesn’t know whether he should stay or go. Ryo Sakazaki never benefited off The Prestige Championship, he was just a placeholder and now look at him. He’s an easy bucket for whoever gets him in the Thunder Bastard. And RIP? RIP isn’t even in this company anymore, despite the teasers. The Prestige Championship hasn’t propelled shit, it’s a middle of the road championship where it should be. It’s not a fucking booster. Nobody has been able establish a long, star studded reign with the fucking thing. It’s been passed around from alpha-to-alpha for years. The sooner you realize that the sooner you’ll be able to part ways with it and you will part ways with it. When I take your ‘sweetheart’ away from you, when I make more of a mockery of The Prestige Championship than it already is. I hope for your sake you don’t get separation anxiety.

There’s a ton of fresh talent in the Thunder Bastard but fresh doesn’t exactly mean legitimate. You could scoop up a handful of them in your palm and it’d be hard to distinguish between the faces, some of them are content with just being there, yet others want to push things to the limit. Marcé Rambeaux is throwing his hat into the ring and suffers from a case of foot in mouth, that’s of course before he gets involuntarily slaughtered with the rest of the young sheep. You come from the BOBW woodwork, a developmental shitshow that replaced OWT for about a month, so already you’re raw but you’re out here flexing your muscles, tearing the straps off your shoulder and dubbing yourself a Hate Bred War Machine. That’s a far cry from what you really are, in fact, nobody really knows who you are, which is the entire fucking point. How are you going to shoot from the hip and call Mark a fraud, which he is by the way, no arguments here, but from the position you’re in? That’s not gonna fly well when you end up with egg on your face. But that’s not the worst part of it, this is coming from a guy who has NO WINS on the main roster and two fuck-I-hope-nobody-saw-that mortifying fucking losses against C and Wraith. A guy who is a part of this roster yet managed to dip outside the Olympus bubble and miss the boat completely. And you wanna drag the APEX World Championship through the mud even though in its current standing, it makes you look like fucking dogwater by comparison. It makes me laugh how everybody has roasted The APEX World Championship, yet here you are fighting for it at the same fucking time. I guess beggars can’t be choosers. Marcé I guarantee that you would trip over yourself for The APEX World Championship if it meant putting yourself on the map but you would rather be selective, right? When there’s not even a pebbleof mouse shit to your name, you’re out here calling shots like you’ve been around  the block, as if you were a savvy veteran in OWA. Pounding on a few test dummies in BOBW isn’t going to wow anybody. Stumbling right out of the gate isn’t going to impress anybody. You have a lot of catching up to do if you wanna impact this match, otherwise you’ll be turned into Marce stew and when you make your quick exit, when you run into the likes of Darkane, you’re not even going to make it back to the Olympus roster. Instead you’ll be on a one way ticket out of here, joining the rest of the never was’ and never will be’s.

Which is exactly what Gatsby is and if it wasn’t clear by now, the big GAT in town has lost his fucking marbles. That was the most pathetic display of waving the white flag I’ve ever seen, but it shouldn’t come as a surprise as Gatsby is further proof that hearsay shouldn’t be treated as unequivocal truth. Jesus Christ pick yourself up. Going after dust mites like El Landerson is obviously the biggest troll job in OWA’s five year history. I find it really hard to believe that you carried other companies on your back considering you’re a brainless melted stick of fucking butter. I thought Mark Michaels was the poster boy for coming undone but you take the cake. I guess it’s a good thing, as barren as the Olympus roster really is, you don’t have what it takes or in your eloquent words, you aint shit. It’s about time you hopped off your own hype train, now you can see what everybody else sees or lack thereof. You’re not a trailblazer, you’re not leaving a row of flames and catastrophe in your wake every time you step through those ropes. It’s rather disheartening to see a man blessed with so much god given power and untapped potential, completely flame out as a total fucking impostor with nothing left but mashed hamburger in between his ears. I don’t think you expect empathy nor should you, but I’ll throw you a bone. I’ll give you one attempt to Gatsplex me into oblivion and when you fuck that up, I’ll shovel your skull into sixty thousand strong and they can toss it around like a beach ball. Anybody could pick out the crestfallen look in your eyes anyway after you collapsed against Hampton. It was at that point you knew you fucked up beyond repair, it was at that point that you climbed into your own casket yourself and screamed BURY ME. Wherever you go from here, whatever you do, just remember, you were never good enough to begin with.

Oh Elijah, your riveting story about the adversity your father went through and the subsequent effect it had on you is truly heart wrenching. I can’t even begin to fathom the ripple effect it must have sent through your family but I need to tell you something - other than Mark Michaels and his totally hollowed out, fake condolences (just before he proceeded to rip into you by the way), if we’re calling a spade a spade, very few genuinely care about your impassioned sob story. Ron must be turning in his grave hearing you lament over his death instead of focusing on the task at hand. You don’t need to concern yourself with your father Elijah, he paid his dues, he fucking lost to cancer and there’s not a damn thing you can do to bring him back. Let him rot in peace. Feeling sorry for yourself is a shitty look and what makes things worse is that you’re still in denial that he’s gone. I’m going to make you get over that hump real fast because the true cancer, the true abomination, the true malignancy, the true bane of your existence is Darkane. I’m not going to wait around while you’re still agonizing over someone whose flesh has been swallowed by an army of fucking maggots by now. It’s been four years since he croaked Elijah, he’s not gonna be walking through that door. He’s not going to give you a reassuring pat on the back when you’ve lost The Immortal Heavyweight Championship. He can’t even say I love you son anymore. You can drone on and on about daddy dearest and the profound impact he made on you but that won't bring you any closer to him and I see you down there soaking your eyes with a tortured soliloquy, trying to persuade the audience, trying to get them on your side but they’re not captivated by you Elijah. Even your old man is cackling under the frozen soil. You want to be something he can be proud of, you want to follow in his footsteps and carry on the tried and true tradition of the Hampton’s by being a decent human being but after Civil War, you will let him down from beyond the grave when I crash your fucking party and take away the one thing keeping you whole.

I think back to last year when we were both in precarious positions. Where you were pitted against me under the wrath of Jacob Senn at War And Thunder in a last man standing match. Neither of us wanted to participate in it as it felt like a lose/lose situation, that’s because it was. Jacob Senn concocted a master plan. He was lost in his own power. Either I win and stay on Olympus or I lose and you get to challenge Jacob Senn at Game Over. It was at War And Thunder we battled our fucking hearts out. We had no other choice. We knew he was a tyrant hellbent on bringing chaos to the Olympus brand. We knew we had to play by his rules or at least play the game within the game. By that point in time most of us marched to the beat of Senn’s drum just to survive another day so when you and I clashed we used our pent up aggression on each other. We were battered and we were left for dead but we would not go into the night on a fucking whimper. We would test each other’s mettle, we would push each other to death’s door if that’s what it took. We met each other head on, we met for what we thought was right. Even if we were wrong, we were going to show Senn our resolve. As I reflect upon that night I did the one thing I couldn’t afford to do and this was my lack of judgment, my choice and nobody else's. I can’t turn back the dial and go back in time. I hesitated to crush your fucking brains into juice with that sledgehammer as I couldn’t pull the trigger. I wanted better for you Elijah. I wanted you to flourish, but knowing I had you dead to rites in hindsight, knowing that you were half a second away from perishing by my hands is bittersweet. Bitter knowing that I chose not to finish the job, sweet knowing I can actually fucking go through with it this time around. It has me enthralled, it has me excited, why do you think I’m amped up about facing you one on one near the finish line? It came down to a choice back then, a pivotal one at that, it wasn’t for a lack of ability or whether I’ve been on a downward spiral. It was a simple choice that you’ve made a lot easier for me now.

And when you’re on your knees, helpless and alone, there’s nothing stopping me from smashing that proverbial hammer onto your dome and ridding you of The Immortal Heavyweight Championship for fucking good. I will avenge myself no matter what it takes. I don’t care who awaits me. I don’t care if Jacob Senn rises up like a great goetial demon king from the dead. I don’t care if Lazarus is waiting at the end of the tunnel tapping his palm with a led pipe. I don’t care if Michelangelo shows up, I don’t care Matt Miles shows up, I don’t care if Iwade shows up, I don’t care if the skeletal remains of John Doe fucking show up. I’m not going to stop until I’m the triple champion. The only thing you can do is wonder how you let it slip away. You’ll echo the same sentiments of the others I’ve cut down. Such as Finnegan Wakefield, Graham Baker, the current OWA World Champion, Stark, Liz Karlson the list goes on and on and on. You’re gonna wonder in the same way you wonder in regret about your father Ron, about the missed opportunities to say what you never got the chance to tell him, about how cancer took him in the blink of an eye and how there was nothing you could do to stop the inevitable.

I am the inevitable, Elijah.

And just like these once brave men who died in the midst of battle. Your sacrifices won’t go untold, but as time tends to heal most wounds.

Yours will be bound to you forever.”

Darkane eases off the bunker, slinging his leather jacket over his shoulder like a proud tattered flag, leaving his words to marinate. He wanted them to sting as much as blunt honesty could, but he knew there was a bounty on his head. He knew that every last man that entered the Thunder Bastard wanted to kill him and The Seventh Ward. He wore those threats like souvenirs, he flaunted them like medals of honor. He welcomed the world to his doorstep.

And he wouldn’t have any other way.

War is upon us.. 

Every year, it was the same. Lives lost. Recovery times that just didn’t exist. Trips to therapy. Trying to figure out a way to continue the year without mentally breaking. Final Destination was the big event, but did he ever really take the time to enjoy it? Had it not been for a blockbuster match or opportunity, his mind would have gone right back to those who he had lost. Yet, the truth always remained. Theodor Pavel needed this war. He needed the moment. He just..didn’t want it. 

Hamburg, Germany

For the first time in nearly two months, our friendly Romanian wasn’t in some hotel room. Living out a suitcase wasn’t what he had in mind, but the lack of family played its part. He had a choice to travel out to Japan and stare at a wall for three days, or go see his extended family. It was the home of Guthrie Graupe. His Iron Heart brother made the invite during their trip to Germany and it felt like the perfect place to try and forget the hard times. Did it work? Well, one can hope. 

Sprawled out on the couch in the living room, Theodor’s eyes were glued on the television. Despite being zoned out from the chaos that was ahead of him, he hadn’t wavered on the idea of fighting one last fight and moving onto the next part of his life. Some commotion came from across the living room, interrupting his self-pity. As his head turned to look, he saw Graupe and Lillie relaxing on the opposite couch as they talked about something he didn’t quite hear. It wasn’t anything of importance, he thought. 

As his mind wandered back to the television, he realized he was watching a pretty ironic show. Game of Thrones. A show that was recommended to him several times over, but television wasn’t really for him. Still, the dialogue had him listening. 

“You need a woman. Nothing like a woman after a fight.”

The words of Bronn had piqued his interest, somehow. It took a quick text over to Michael Bishop



Within twenty minutes, Theodor found himself in a video conference with Michael Bishop and Jeff X. Jeff was drinking a beer while Bishop looked like he was out and about. Both men looked amused by the idea that Theodor had in mind. 

“Why am I in this call again?”

“Too good to pass up. Theo, I want you to share the screen on your phone.” Bishop had a look of pure amusement on his face at the idea of Theodor trying to find a woman in Germany.

He had just finished setting up his profile. Hopefully, he did okay with the profile. 

“Alright, let the games begin!!” Jeff’s enthusiasm was contagious as the three laughed. Theodor’s laugh was a little more out of discomfort, but it was time. Theodor opened up Twitter on the shared screen. While confused with the first picture to pop up, he heard laughter from Jeff.

“That’s a guy.” Jeff made the obvious remark regarding the picture. 

“Theo, I thought you were into little Asian girls.” Bishop retorted, causing confusion on the face of the Romanian. 

“I’m confused, this is not a woman.”

“Did you put women under what you were interested in?” Theodor thought it over, going back to the profile. It was mixed up, causing him to change it over. Jeff continued to laugh, taking another drink.

“How many swipes until we get to Filth?” 

“I said no to her.”

Once the settings were changed, the first female popped in. A lovely lady, Tilli was her name. Twenty years old and she seemed like a normal person. 

“She seems nice.”

“Really, Theo?”

“Come on..”

While still trying to figure out how to maneuver through the app, Theodor was stuck on the first profile. 

“You have to swipe.”

“How in the hell would you know that?”

“I’ve heard things..”

“Which way do I swipe?”

“Left!”

“Left!”

“Okay. She seems nice, yes.” Theodor seemed interested in Tilli. She liked things and he liked things. He watched on as the next picture came up. An immediate left came from both Bishop and Jeff. He looked confused as it was someone he wasn’t interested in, but did it anyways. More pictures, more left swipes until one caught their eyes. 

“Right.”

“Swipe right, Theo.”

“Why? She’s attractive. I don’t know what a creampie is but maybe she is a cook?” The three went quiet for a brief moment. 

“Swipe..Right. You got this.”

Theodor decided to swipe right. Still unsure with what he was doing, Theodor looked at the picture of a weird woman who looked to be interested in some dark arts. 

“Right.”

“Theo, Left.”

“I don’t see how this is helping with war, guys.”

“Theo.. Come on man. Swipe Left.”

“Fuck that, go Right!”

“Fine. If you want to wind up with a kidney missing, swipe fucking Right then.”

Not wanting the idea of the missing kidney, Theodor promptly swiped left much to the chagrin of Jeff. 

“How you holding up anyways? Are you ready for this, man?”

It was a thought provoking question as Theodor put down the phone for a moment. The thought of going into another war with his brothers just meant it was another chance that he may lose them. He watched Michael Bishop die in front of him. He watched Jeff X and Chris Sabertooth burn in Hell for several minutes. Any of those times, he would have traded his life for theirs. Maybe it wasn’t valuable enough. 

“I’m having trouble, Bishop. I’m going to go in there and fight my ass for you both.. But.. I don’t know how much more of this I can handle. Different faces, but same enemy. It has to end somehow.”

His two Frontline brothers heard him out, but he wasn’t finished.

“I mean, we’ve done this so many times. Dimensional Warfare, War Against Havoc, now another one. I just don’t think this is going to be the ending we really want. Even IF we take them out and Abolos is gone, how soon before another enemy comes and threatens the world? We’re the world’s police. All we see is death.”

Despite some comforting words from his brothers, they continued to swipe away at the women in the Hamburg area. Most of them were getting rejected, but a few seemed to catch his eye. Finally, one caught all of their eyes, causing them to laugh. 

“No fucking way.”

“Dude, that can’t be real.. Swipe right!!”

“Absolutely not!”

The profile was simple. It said “Rin” and a very obvious picture. 

“She has ruined so much!”

“It’s not her. No way is that her, for real.”

“Swipe right and send a message to her. Call her a whore or something.”

He HATED the idea of trying to communicate with anyone who was Rin Asakura or even tried to be her. Theodor’s irritation in the matter had grown to new heights, glaring at Jeff and Bishop. 

“I am NOT going to talk to her. She has taken everything away from me. This stupid shit has been because of her and Nakajima.”

“Havoc.”

“Whatever. I’m not going to talk to this bitch.. I will not! My mind is final.”

A quick swipe sent “Rin” away, leading to a strong glare from Theodor at Jeff via the screen. Bishop looked astounded while Jeff was laughing. 

“You should know by now that I will not even conside..”

“Theo..”

“Yes?”

“YOU SWIPED RIGHT!!!”

“Yes, for rejection! I do not want to talk to her!”

Theodor’s stance was firm, but Jeff continued laughing. 

“Theo, you swipe right if you select them. You have picked Rin.”

“I feel like such a matchmaker..”

“Fuck off, Jeff. This isn’t good. I don’t want to talk to h..”

“Little demon babies.”

“Anya will have a time traveling little sister.”

“Thirst trap pictures for the rest of your life.”

“Probably a lost limb or two.”

“Being called a racist every three seconds.”

“So many options. You have to message her.”

This was so baffling to Theodor. Rin Asakura was an enemy to them. He didn’t know the best way to go about this, but knew damn well he wasn’t going to ever get along with Rin. Much like how Hana had caused problems for the entire world by being engulfed by Havoc, Rin was far worse in his eyes. A personal enemy. 

“Look, I know you guys are trying to help me. As soon as I saw her, I was reminded of how much we have to deal with. I can’t forget what Havoc did to us. I can’t forget what the Golden Dawn did to us. Now, we have to deal with both. At this rate, we’ll have even more enemies once we get to another war. Then what? By Great War Ten, we will have the entire world to fight. Maybe going on here wasn’t a good idea.”

“Theo, we were just fucking with you. You don’t have to talk to her.”

“Yeah, do what you want to do. All we care about is what happens in the end, and we will continue to fight.”

Reality had begun to set in again on the Romanian. He didn’t know how to react to another war, but did so in the past with fear and uncertainty. He was going to fight, regardless. The loss in Dimensional Warfare had to be rectified. 

“I know you two are helping me with this and all, but you know where I will always stand. Landri told me a quote that has gotten me every single time she said it when I felt like giving up. She told me ‘Fight Together, Fight Forever’. Now, that’s always been her group’s message, but it’s true here. We need to fight once more. We need to win once more. After that, who knows? I worry for you two only because you tell me what was taken away in death, but I promise you both that I will not let it happen to you again. No.. Not again. I can’t.”

As much as tonight was meant to be fun, something had taken over him. The harsh reminder of past wars was catching up to him. 

“I’ll catch up with you guys later, I need a moment to think a few things over.”

“Absolutely.”

“Yeah, we got you. Hang in there, buddy.”

After receiving the support of his Frontline brothers, Theodor closed out the video and tossed the phone onto the couch. His head dropped back against the edge as his mind had wandered from joking thoughts recently to the horrific sights of death that he struggled to erase. 

“Hey, are you okay?”

Theodor’s attention slowly turned from a sense of fear to Guthrie’s wife, Lillie. She pulled up a seat beside him to hear him out, but Theodor’s words were not going to come out right. After handing him a pillow, Lillie glanced at her House of Paine training partner some three years ago. Theodor’s head rested against the pillow, struggling to clear his mind. 

“I hate these things..”

“I know.. I can handle this though, tell me everything on your mind. You’ve listened to my problems for years and didn’t judge me, I won’t do it to you.”

“Promise?”

“Of course, I promise.”

As the frustration was strangely melting away, Theodor glared up at the ceiling as he was about to get the entire world off of his chest. 

“I feel terrible. I mean, I feel REALLY terrible. All this time, I was struggling with the idea of trying to balance the happy family, being a pro wrestler,maybe doing MMA again on the side for the fun of it. I never envisioned that my entire world in America was built around war. As soon as I signed, I wanted the world to know me as a good wrestler and fighter, but instead I’m the guy that has fallen into the craziest shit that nobody should have to suffer through. War sucks. It really sucks, Lillie. There’s no way to get around these things. No matter how many times I told myself no, I wouldn’t do it.. I kept coming back. I kept falling into this belief that it was always going to be the last war. Then it begins again. 

Then, there’s peacetime, at least I think it is. Nobody’s dying, mostly. Just a chance to prove that I was a good wrestler, but I wanted to be the greatest one. I wanted to be the best, a Champion that people could look at and be proud of. That hasn’t happened.. I choke and I fail. In war, I lose family..”

“It’s not your fault.”

“Yes, it is. It is my fault that I put war over my wife and daughter. Who does that? Who in their mind would sacrifice that one thing that makes them happy and trade it for a life of pain? I’m in a war. We have to win this war, but what are we winning? We win nothing. I know Jeff is a smart man and I’ll follow him through the depths of Hell.. I know Bishop is my mentor and somebody that I would trade my life for if I had to. But after that.. What? What’s there? Now, there’s even more responsibility. To fight alongside Sabe, Devi, Bouchard, Felix, Filth, Angelina, and Asakura. It’s even more on the plate because I can’t let them suffer what Kenny Drake and his family did. I can’t allow it. Instead, we’re stuck with this concept that we must fight everyone and somehow come away with a victory. This isn’t just a war to me, it’s the end. It’s always the end. End of something. End of my younger years. End of peace. End of my marriage. End of everything.”

Haunting words came out of the mouth of the Hands of Ice. Lillie, despite trying to be supportive to her friend, bit her lip as she wanted to make a joke to help him laugh, but it wasn’t going to happen. The humor was dead. She didn’t know how to react to all of this. 

“Look, you’re in a bad situation. It’s okay, though. No matter what happens in this war, know that you have people who will always care about you. We’ll always be there.”

“I don’t know. This seems to be more complicated than a simple line of saying I will be there in return, but I don’t know where I will be. I don’t know WHO I will be. With each war, each massive battle, I find myself feeling less. This sounds very weird, but the less I feel, the worse I feel. Each time I watch somebody suffer, my body itself will no longer feel pain, but my mind does. I feel the pain of others. I feel the pain of who I will be having to fight.”

“Who are you fighting, though? You kept talking about Rin. Okay, that’s one person. But all of these people fighting a few enemies? You’re going to win.”

“I won’t. Not that way, anyways. You have Havoc, the greatest enemy I’ve seen. It has taken over Hana Nakajima. Chris is distraught, I don’t know what he’d be willing to do. April Song is caught in the middle of this thing. She is not a bad person, you know her well. You know she’s a good person but she is caught up in such a mess. I want her to get out of it while she can still have some type of sanity. FTM are in there. They are tough fighters, along with Diantha Rosso. All amazing, but in this for the wrong reasons. Why are they even doing this? They want to push their beliefs, but damn it if this wasn’t the place to do it. Do it through conversation, accomplishment, something. Not a war of Evil, don’t side with people who want to end the world we live in. 

Jason Long was a Champion. He unleashed the beast that was inside of Edward Softly. Abholos.. The monster that everyone said was unstoppable, yet he keeps disappearing. When he shows up, destruction comes. I don’t know what else can be said about him but I do know that he can be defeated..”

With each word that was spoken, his intensity began to build. He knew the enemies, but struggled to understand their motive. What was the motive of FTM? What was it really? Something didn’t add up with them. 

“Maybe they’ll be smarter? I don’t know anything about them, but I do know that if you show the weakness in Havoc, you might actually be able to stop the others from helping and possibly join your side. You have to find a way to do it, otherwise maybe Havoc will engulf them as well?”

“I don’t know.. What possible good will it be if they continue the path they’re on? I’ve fought alongside Maggall for a few minutes. I know his movements. I know the way he works. He wants to inflict pain and he thinks this is going to be his playground. Raivo and DT.. I’m not sure on them. DT always seemed like a strong competitor and Raivo has been a great wrestler, but they’re entering something they can’t predict. If they commit to Havoc, they may be unstoppable. We have to stop them at the pass before they get too deep in.”

It was interesting that Theodor left a name off the list of enemies, but Lillie figured it out. She gave him an unconvinced look as he continued.

“You don’t believe me?”

“I do. I also believe that you’re avoiding a whole different problem.”

“Skylar?”

“Not quite.”

“Arata? I know he and I will never fully see eye to eye. I don’t even know who this man is anymore. Is he who he says he is? Is he going to show that he’s a liar? I don’t know. So many things on my mind when it comes to him that I can’t make a decision. All I know is I have to trust my brothers. If they trust him, then I will have to trust him as well. In war, you can’t really decide WHO you trust, but WHO you don’t. There may not be an option in the matter. Right?”

“Theo?”

“Yes.”

“The other one.”

“I won’t. No, I cannot talk about her. This is not up for discussion because she is a huge part of this problem. I don’t know where her head is at, but I do know that she deserves to be vindicated when the time is right. I cannot sit back and let her fall further into the path of the liars. Understand me?”

“It’s not Misaki..”

“I KNOW THAT.”

“Okay, so you know that this is not you fighting your wife. You know that. You also know that this is deception. They’re fucking with your mind because they know what’s going to get to you. This is going to get to you and you can’t let them. I know Misaki, and trust me, she’s not going to care whether or not you think this person looks like her. She cares about her daughter and her family. You are her family. You are still her husband, so don’t be doing this tinder shit and don’t be letting Ruri or whatever her name is get under your skin. They aren’t the same people!”

The redhead began to lay down the law. Despite his best efforts to get Misaki out of his mind, he just couldn’t. 

“Why are you being so harsh? I didn’t sign up for THIS. This was something that happened, something that I have been absolutely stuck with since starting my wrestling career. Do you think it’s easy to wake up every single day, KNOWING that your family is in danger? KNOWING that without putting in the best effort to ensure that the world doesn’t collapse into panic due to your mistake? Yeah, I feel these things every day and it’s all because of one simple decision to help somebody against somebody else. It’s a trap. It’s something that I’ll forever have to deal with and it’s not going away. OWA was the destination that I meant to come to. It was the place that Morgan placed me because it was the premiere place to wrestle, but I haven’t done much of that, have I?

No.. War. Kill people. Nearly be killed. Maybe this hasn’t dawned on you because you haven’t been here to deal with it. To come in right after a war and have to fight the man who nearly killed your best friends, to nearly kill your family. No, I’m here. I’ll be here for a long time, and I get that. At the end of the day though, I’m responsible for a lot of lives going into this. Not because I lead by title, no that’s Jeff. Not because I’m the man who leads the land with sheer talents, that’s Bishop. Not because I’m trying to help find the good in my wife by eradicating the evil that once consumed, that’s Sabertooth. Not here because it’s a point to fix mistakes that I’ve seen another version of me do, that’s Asakura. Not here to prove a point, that’s Devi. Not here because I want to be in this, that’s Thotyssey. I’m here because I’m Theodor Pavel and I DON’T HAVE A FUCKING CHOICE.”

His skin nearly grew red with the pure frustration of being stuck in this war. He wanted to be home with his family. He wanted to see his daughter who hasn’t been around in months. By the time he would see her again, he may not even recognize her and she may not even recognize him. All of those things were coming to a head for him. He knew this, but he also knew that he was unprepared for war. How could one be prepared for another one, with brand new enemies and allies who don’t know what they are getting themselves into. This wasn’t something to wash off, or something to do on a Saturday night. This was a fucking war. 

“I’m stuck. As long as Jeff and Bishop need me, I will always be there. Same goes for Sabertooth. Now, it’s a simple task of walking into my possible death and that’s something that most people just groan at. You think Marie Bouchard knows that? Probably not. Angelina, Felix, and Rebecca know? Probably not. Violet is worthless, but the fact is that it’s my responsibility to them as well. I can’t let them go that way. These guys, they move onto championships and main events.. I move onto therapy sessions and an empty house. So, if you’re asking me why I’m doing this to myself, it’s because I’m here. This is what I do. It’s not a choice, it’s reality. They wipe out the planet, guess who else is gone? You. You’re gone. Graupe is gone. Your niece and nephew..gone. All dust and bones.

So, you can imagine how my decisions are not going to be taken lightly..”

The room fell silent. Lillie, saddened by the decision that was made, continued to watch the intense Romanian’s eyes as they hadn’t left the glare on the ceiling. He was in his own Hell, but it was one created by good intentions. Everyone loves good intentions. 

“Then I guess you need to get ready. Just do one thing for me, okay? I don’t know you don’t owe me a thing, but Theodor.. Don’t die. Please.”

It wasn’t long before Lillie had gotten up and left the room for the night. Her words echoed throughout his mind as he slowly sat himself up. With one final thing before he fell asleep, he sent a final text to Bishop and Jeff.

“I need to get to work. It’s Time.”

“Going into this match, I would have never guessed that my patience would be wearing the thinnest when it comes to you, Mark. Perhaps it’s because I had higher expectations for you, which is something I know you never asked for and I now realize it was a bit unfair for me to do so. But perhaps I thought that way because, on a few occasions, I’ve gone out of my way to sing your praises, to give you your flowers. And I genuinely meant every word. I never asked for you to pay it forward, to gush over my accomplishments, or stroke my ego because I admit, I do have one — guilty as charged. We all do. Some are just more bloated than others. But I suppose we can only say we respect the other before it’d just be us talking in circles and it becomes tiresome for all parties involved. While there is a part of you that thinks my compliments were backhanded, and I suppose I can understand how you would interpret it that way, I guess I was kind of sugarcoating the truth. Not because I don’t think you can handle it, but because you’ve been dealt a shitty hand as of late. And I didn’t want to pile it on when you and more importantly, your people, are down. I didn’t want to make this personal, you know? I already have a laundry list of names that I harbor ill will towards. I didn’t want to jot down another. But when I have this — this Immortal Heavyweight Championship in my possession — it’s important to remember that nobody has my best interests at heart. Not even you. And that’s okay. Because I know what this title means and symbolizes to other people. The status it gives, the bragging rights that come with it, and how self-gratifying it feels to win it. Shit, I mean I would know firsthand since it wasn’t too long ago I was chasing after it and later on, securing it. And now I have an entire locker room trying to pluck it from me, thinking it’ll be as easy as removing a petal from a flower. This title loves me, it loves me not. This title loves me, it loves me not type shit. But this is nothing new, people gunning for me that is. This has always been the case. It’s just never been all at once, in one match. It’s a tall task, that much is true. And I’m gonna have to pull yet another rabbit from out of my hat if I want to walk out still as your IHC. I’m up for the challenge though, for I’m locked in, and in the end, I will find a way. I have no other choice but to. But I must say, I look at my current situation and I’m out here feeling like Joel and this title being my Ellie. Making sure it doesn’t fall into the wrong hands while traveling from point A to point B. Hands belonging to some clickers, when it hasn’t yet clicked to them that the chances of them slinging this title over their shoulder is null." 

"Because I don’t want this title being passed around or being reduced to a game of hot potato. Which I suppose you could say regarding all of the world titles as of late. Me with the Immortal Heavyweight title about a few-ish months, a little less, ago. Jason Long with the OWA World Championship. The Banshee with the Women’s World Championship. All being short reigns across the board. Which just goes to show how stacked the three rosters are. Anybody can beat anybody — to a certain extent. But there’s some context I should probably add, given the fact that some reign’s abrupt endings were out of the champion’s control, but I digress. Right now, it’s not about that. It’s about you, Mark Michaels, and you have my full undivided attention for the next couple of minutes. I see you. Or more so, I hear you. Over there ‘avin a giggle mate? Now how should I respond to such blatant disrespect, hmm? Should I take a page out of your playbook and say something along the lines of, “Go ahead and smirk Mark, do it while you can now because I’m gonna take my fist, and knock your jaw clean off you shit-talking bastard.” Naaaaaah. I’m a lover, not a fighter maaaaaayne. All peace and no war. I could get all worked up, but instead, I choose to be over here chillin' like a villain, as I remain cool, calm, and collected, you know the vibes. But here I sit, taking all of your words in — them being some strong choice words. I’m not here to make threats. I’m just here to talk it out. One grown man to another. Let’s talk about the Prestige Championship for a quick second, shall we? Why yes, yes we shall, cool. Love the enthusiasm. So look, I notice we aren’t exactly on the same page when it comes to that title. A title we both know a thing or two about. But you technically didn’t win the Prestige Championship before me. Now, if you’re talking about the lineage of said title, then sure, you’d be correct. But I was more or less talking about the physical title itself. I did create it. Saying it was made with my own two hands was a bit of a stretch, but I was involved in the meetings when designing the plates and gave my blessing on the final product. I threw the Hybrid Championship into the rubbish bin because well, I thought it was rubbish at the time. Looking back, it wasn’t my proudest moment. But I wanted something a bit different. To start fresh and give it a clean slate. And the rest is history. And now you hold that championship. The title I moved on from. While you’ve won it and the Hybrid Championship on numerous occasions. Talking about how you’ve elevated that title, no matter the version of it, for the past two years. That’s not exactly the flex you think it is. Because after a certain period of time, you need to move on up, like any business. Take on a bigger workload. Be a constant challenger or defender when it comes to world championships. And you haven’t. You haven’t taken that next big step that we’ve all been waiting for while we know you have it in you to do so. But the truth of the matter is, you’ve been at this for years. Whether it’s now, with your current rugged look with your hair down to your shoulders and a beard to boot, or back when you were clean shaving, bragging about the number of followers you have on social media. You haven’t been able to win the big one. The world championship is your white whale. And I for one will do everything in my power to keep it that way and make you go fish.” 

“You have some nerve to talk about family, Darkane Toretto. I get it, I’m not your blood — although you’ve made me lose buckets of just that over the past few months — you scraggly motherfucker. I’ll be sure to bill you. Look, I know that I didn’t grow up with you in the bayou. I wasn’t pickpocketing Pokémon cards with you in elementary school. I didn’t pull up to the Darkane household for gumbo potlucks. And I wasn’t bonding with you over hijacking Priuses, tricked-out Fiats, and mopeds. No, I had a good head on my shoulders. While I’m aiming to boot yours straight off yo neck. All because I did view you as family, Darkane. A brother. Someone I thought I could trust even though every single person in my life warned me not to. Because of your past, because of your track record, because of — the fact you’re you. I pushed all of your baggage aside and gave you a clean slate. Thinking I could change the bad boy! I had your back, through thick and thin. While in return, you stuck a blade in mine. Playing the long game. Playing me like a fiddle. Congratulations. And at first, I was in denial, you know? Maybe that chair or lead pipe or whatever the fuck it was, slid out of your clumsy ass butterfingers. It had to. It had to be an accident because I know you wouldn’t try to fuck on me like that. Maybe it was a Darkane look-alike? Maybe you swung at the wrong person because you had one too many and your hand-eye coordination was trrrrrash. I gave you the benefit of the doubt because of everything you’ve done for me. I watched the replays back a few days later and my eyes failed to accept the truth. And the truth is it was all by design. You had this plan cooking all along. And I shoulda smelled that stanky ass dish you served up for me from a mile away. A dish served up cold by a cold-blooded bastard. The warning signs were all there, the flashing amber lights telling me to turn around, take a detour or something, but I was too oblivious to notice. To notice that you and Jacob Senn were cut from the same cloth all along. Rip off that mask so I can see the ‘fuck me up’ haircut underneath, Jacob. But I just want you to do me one last favor, just this one — pinpoint the exact time frame when you started to become uneasy of my sudden rise up the totem pole. Was it when I was challenging Jacob Senn for this championship? Or did the jealousy stem from when I won it and you assessed your current situation? And that’s when you decided to pull the trigger? Not sure why I’m even asking this because it changes absolutely nothing. You don’t care. You never did. And that shit hurts. Like, a lot. But do you know what probably hurts the most? It wasn’t even the physical and psychological toll you put me through. It wasn’t even when you cost me the title because I got that back with the quickness on the following Olympus. Didn’t even have time to mourn the loss. It just plopped back into my lap.” 

“No, what hurts the most is — I don’t remember. Not as in I don’t remember what it is, but I barely remember anything after what I’ve put my body through in such a short period of time. The damage Senn, Project Smile, The 7th Ward, Rich, and Drago caused. I know I’m not going to get any sympathy from you because in your mind you’ve been put through way worse during your seasoned career. Tis nothing but a scratch for you. But it wasn’t just one blow to the head that caused my brain to slowly turn into scrambled eggs. It’s been the repeated shots. From all the chair shots and the lead pipes and the barbed wire bats and the street fights and falling off roofs, crashing cars, participating in flatline matches. I’ve been going full throttle. I always have been. I’ve been in OWA since 2020, which I know doesn’t make me an OWA original by any means, but I’ve had zero breaks and zero sick days and unused PTO since crossing my one t and dotting my one i on my contract and that’s because I won’t let the coach sub me outta the game. I haven’t been put out on the shelf for an extended period of time. I didn’t die like a half-dozen of people in this company have. When I lost my world title I didn’t pull a Noah, a Graham, or a Senn and vanish into thin air shortly thereafter. I’ve been here, day in and day out, honing my craft, reppin this brand, showing out in front of these fans simply because they deserve it. By no means am I looking to get a head nod of approval or a standing ovation for just doing my job. I’m just telling it like it is. And what it is, is I’ve paid the price. The bumps and bruises are bound to affect my daily life. Such as going to google something and forgetting what it was a few seconds later. I knew that when I signed up. The moment I stepped inside that ring, I would never be 100% again. This line of profession isn’t your typical career path where you work in a cubicle for 40 years to collect that pension. This is jammed-pack action and you’re lucky to make it two years here with the quality of talent that OWA has. Most burn out after two weeks. But off the top of my head, I can’t remember some rather important shit. For instance, Elijah, name every member of The Dynasty. Ok, easy. Senn, Darkane, Matt, and myself. But there was a fifth that showed up a little later from Japan. What was his name? And my mind goes blank. Hey Elijah, the biggest win of your career was when you dethroned Jacob to become the Immortal Heavyweight Champion. What was the name of that pay-per-view? I — don’t remember. Fuck, I don’t even remember who I faced at Final Destination unless I look it up or somebody blurts it out, then it slowly comes back to me. But I don’t remember who Darkane faced either that night. Shit’s frustrating but I’ll get through it. Just know, that I’m aware that some of my opponents are listening to this, thinking that taking me out Old Yeller style and taking this title off of me would only benefit me in the long run. While I disagree."

"Because this title is all I have left. Everything and everyone else has left me. This profession is all I know. It’s where I feel wanted and it’s where I belong. And because of that, I have no problem with putting my body and my life on the line every time I step between those ropes because this —  is my life. And I will continue to fight. I will continue to tape my wrists and lace up my boots tight and walk down that ramp not because I have to, but because I want to. Need. Because I need to. Just like I still need that match with you, Darkane. I’m basically trying to will it into existence at this point. But until then, The Thunderbastard will suffice. I’ll take what I can get. And that’s a mindset we share. Ever since you won the APEX World title, hell, even before that, yes, you’ve racked up some wins, they’ve come in bunches and yet, you’re anchored with that. That title. It’s done you no favors. In fact, it’s held you back. Because while you’ve knocked down every opponent that’s come off that assembly line, you haven’t been rewarded for it. While you lay out open challenges for that title, the reason why you get no response other than the sound of a tumbleweed rolling into the frame is because that title isn’t worth it. But with your chest puffed out and with the way you’re talking, you would think our titles would be swapped. Or at the very least, you would think you’ve been the number one contender by now. But you haven’t. And you know, if this title is what you’ve wanted this entire time, you could have very well asked me instead of plotting against me on the low when my back was turned, of course. That wasn’t very Darkane-esque if you ask me, but then again I feel as though I never knew the real you anyway, so maybe it was on brand after all. But I do stand by my comments that my name carries more weight than yours in 2023. And you can go burn some more faces of children or switch it up and use grandparents to send your next message and it won’t change a thing. Not even sure why you took offense to that proven factoid. It’s not even an insult. With everything you’ve accomplished, you are held to a higher standard than most. And even though it appears as though this is considered a down year for you, it would still be a career year for 95% of OWA’s roster. I’ve said it time and time again, that while I have lost every shred of respect that I once had for you as a person, I still respect you as a competitor. Because you’re one of the best to lace up a pair of boots that this industry has ever seen. And with the way things are going, in due time, I’m going to pull up a seat at that table right next to you. Hell, I even remember before our match on Olympus, I admitted that I don’t know if I can beat you, that’s just me being honest, but I would love nothing more than to find out. You know, the same match where I decided to pin Mark instead of you after OZIAS’ behemoth ass fell onto the both of you? All so you could preserve this whole not getting pinned or being submitted for a year thing that you clutch onto. And because when I finally hook your leg, I want it to mean that much more.” 

“The length of your Immortal Heavyweight championship reign will never do you justice, Rich. Twenty years from now people will look back at this title’s history and see that I won it twice and that I dethroned you only two weeks into your reign. But there’s more to it than what meets the eye. I didn’t just waltz in there and take this from you as you fell to the ground so you could roll over and die. You are many things, but a pushover, you are certainly not. The last time we squared off in that ring, you made me work. You made me sweat, you made me bleed and a couple of tears may or may not have streamed down my face. Thug tears, of course. Heading into this match at Civil War, I made sure to do my homework on my opponents, it’s the smart thing to do, right? To cover all the bases, to be brought up to speed, and to reduce the element of surprise. So I rewatched our match back just a few days ago so it could be fresh in my mind. It started out with me busting you wild open. And when I say started, I’m talking a minute into it. You kinda had it coming since you thought you were slick by cashing in a contract that was never intended to be cashed in the first place, but it’s coo’, Rich. Water under the bridge. So we follow that up with some kendo shots, some chair shots, which was child’s play compared to what we had in store for each other later on. Such as throwing me off a balcony, crashing 20 feet below. After what I went through with Drago a couple of weeks prior, that should have been the final nail in my coffin. But it wasn’t, as I managed to breathe new air into my lungs and I kept going. I wasn’t going out like no punk, believe that. So you threw me head first into a glass window which wasn’t very cash money or you. I was bleeding. You were bleeding as we left a trail of blood in every and any direction. I then stapled that cut on your forehead shut. Which was very kind of me, if we are being honest. Ignore the part where I reopened it a few moments later. That wasn’t my intention. I just didn’t like my stapling job. Thought I could have done it a little cleaner, so I redid it. And I needed some brass knuckles to speed up the process because the staples look liked they hurt. I’m basically a medical professional after I played the Operation Board Game once for like five mins until the dude died, but there’s neither here nor there. But speaking of things that hurt, you jammed a screwdriver into my face, meh, it is what it is. Nothing a bit of super glue couldn’t fix, so all good. And then to finish the job and slam the door shut on your reign, I hit you with The Book of Eli to seal the deal and become the first ever two-time Immortal Heavyweight Champion."

"The point I’m trying to make, as I briefly go over some of our matches highlights is you’re good. Like really good. Dangerous too, no matter the result, which I’m sure we already knew, right? I didn’t exactly pull the cat or I guess Gat, outta the bag there. You’ve proven your worth against the likes of myself, Graham Baker, and Lazarus — which puzzles me as to why you decided to waste your breath on nonfactors such as El Landerson. I always thought you were about the bigger picture — perhaps I was wrong, but I digress. As I was saying, there is no easy outing when facing you. And with our encounters, I never leave our matches the same again. Truth be told I’m still feeling the effects of some of the stunts you put my body through and even with that, I genuinely want to run it back. Not because I’m like Lazarus who puts his cute little suspenders down and legitimately gets off to pain and blood and violence all because it makes him feel allllllive. What makes me feel alive is walking down that ramp and feeling the crowd’s energy. But the reason why I enjoy facing you is because it makes me better. And that’s what I’m looking for. For the iron sharpening iron. I want to push the envelope as your champion. I want to bring something new to the table so these traditional singles matches aren’t going to cut it. With the continued harsh conditions that I face, who knows how long I’ll have this title for. It could end at Civil War. It could end a week after, a month after, or a year after. There’s no telling — but no matter the duration, I want it to be memorable. And I want to give the fans the matchups they’ve been clamoring for. This ain’t boxing, Rich. I ain’t ducking anybody by kicking potential matches down the road as far as I possibly can. You guys want to see me face Rich again? You got it, at Civil War. Darkane? You got it, at Civil War. Lazarus? Nobi? RD3? Mark? You got it, at Civil War. Or what about some of the fresher faces such as C, Marce, and Jessie B? You got it, at Civil War. These are the same people that have often gone out of their way to question the legitimacy of my reign. Thinking I’m too unfit to continue to hold this and that they will take the baton from my cold dead hand and carry on where I left off, as they leave me in the dust. While in actuality I will continue to lap every last one of them."

 
 

 
It’s been over a year...
 
 

(In Hartsdale, New York, DT The Ruler is shown, standing with a personal member of his security to each side of him, standing in the Ferncliff Cemetery and Mausoleum. The weather was awful that morning, but it seemed to not make him budge much. He held his umbrella still unmoved)

Another...quiet place to collect my thoughts. Another quiet place to mentally prepare for the war coming. It’s switching between rain and snow in these parts, but at least I can be here without much interruption. Truth be told, I hate graveyards, grave sites, whatever words you use for them.

(The rain let up for a moment)

The most interesting of areas are those of the fallen soldiers, the ones who put their lives on the line for others. The fallen of the military are seen as the most tragic and get the most decorations, considering many of them don’t even get to see the results of the battle they fought. Most don’t even find out the real reasons behind the battle or battles they fought, but let entities like the Government use them as pawns in Global Chess. Soldiers like Malcolm X, however, knew what he was fighting for, and the others around him in the Nation of Islam knew it, too. He did not go to the battlefield and unload a projectile weapon, but the war he fought was just as important, a spiritual war for all Black Americans, a political war where words wield the most power, above guns and knives, above explosives and missiles. And his war was far more important than even the one I’m fighting. My family, originating from Jamaica, also has ancestry that fought in wars for independence and freedom, and still are fighting everyday to preserve the freedoms they do have while still pushing for as close to the absolute as Modern Society allows. And I come to Malcolm X over Dr. Martin Luther King because....one of them acted heavily passive, and being passive doesn’t work in Professional Wrestling. And with that in mind, it would be disgraceful for The Ruler to back away from any fight in that ring. It would be disgraceful for one of the best-trained, best-educated, best-equipped, best-prepared troops to refuse to fight. The Black People generations before me fought with their lives for higher causes, sometimes even for other people’s causes alongside theirs just like I’m doing, so for me to back down in a War for something that benefits not just myself but Mr. Raivo, Ms. Diantha Rosso, Mr. Maggall, and the other Black People of this company would be embarrassing.

(The weather picked up its intensity for a moment, with the wind blowing stronger, pushing the light rain towards his face, but DT The Ruler didn’t move, holding his umbrella without worry, sternly looking downward. The two members of his security tried to do the same, but were ready to give in)

It’s been a long year or so, and if you told me a year ago that I’d be fighting in a major battle of this magnitude, after witnessing the last Civil War and not fully comprehending it, I’d laugh in your face. But here we are. The gears of war are starting to turn faster as the days wind down, with each day bringing all of OWA closer to the end of the Frontline. Each passing day brings the end closer for the Thots as well, but the Frontline especially are in for impending doom. Ever since I’ve returned to this business, to OWA, I saw Kingdom especially as a place that needed a worthy leader or worthy group leading it and controlling the flow of life throughout, maintaining control and order, bring a return to stability and emphasis on the results of the encounters in the ring. Everything from bell to bell should be the determining factor to how things go, but as we’ve seen, that is absolutely not true. It’s never been that way; it’s never gotten to be that way, and the main reason is because of The Frontline and all of the people associated with them now. Looking at the people that are members of it, the people associated with it- even from a distance- they are to blame for the coming event, the coming bloodshed. From the old members of the Frontline to the honorary, they are the problem and have been for a while.
But of course: we’re the bad guys.

We are the bad guys. we are the ones in OWA disrupting the natural order. We are the ones ruining things for everyone else, taking opportunities from everyone else, committing atrocities against all of the innocents, all of the respectful others who bear witness to it all. But then you look at the other side and you are reminded of the men who continue to Do As Thou Wilt, even at the expense of others while failing to uphold their vows as the stronghold of the Kingdom brand. Just looking at the team as they are is a replica of the biggest demon of them. Ever since I returned to the fold of OWA, ever since I have stepped back into the world of Professional Wrestling, all I’ve seen is the degenerate savage known as Mr. Arata Asakura fighting against The Frontline, now fighting alongside them. One of the greatest evils OWA has ever seen, a man who has been said to have committed war crimes on a whim like Erik “Killmonger” Stevens, a man who threatened to murder a stadium full of people in order to secure a title shot, a man who even summoned the powers of a God to better his chances to be a champion again, and a man who was said to have taken over the future when not kept in check.

And the man was forgiven.

Sad but expected that the so-called Frontline failed to uphold the duty they took upon themselves in that regard but what’s even worse about this all is that they forgave him. They let that man go because he’s supposedly “not the same person as before”. Sounds like something a woman would say after taking an abusive boyfriend back into her life. But nonetheless, they assimilated Mr. Arata into their little group as if he were Vegeta to their Goku, similar to how Sasuke was forgiven for his terrorist actions. The man was a literal warmonger and psychopath, a murderer and a cold-blooded degenerate, and he was pardoned. I look at the Prison system and how many Black People did lesser things and had their freedom taken. I look at even Black Men who follow the instructions of a routine traffic stop, men who even turned themselves in, men who were apprehended by officers without fighting back be brutalized, some even recorded being killed. And then I see this specific degenerate be considered...good. This same man even wished for the death of a member of The Frontline...

But we’re the bad guys.

Ms. Hana Nakajima is on our side, but you must feel a bit of remorse for her, for she is right now the vessel for a malevolent power that was brought into this organization through Mr. Christopher Sabertooth, a man she loved, a man who said he cares for her. Mr. Sabertooth has been seemingly experiencing death more times than Kenny from South Park, and I mentioned this before but all of this in regards to HAVOC continuing to be around against his will....is his fault. He as a man did not do his duty to protect his significant other, and he continues to pay a hefty price for his failure. The dainty little creature that is Ms. Hana Nakajima in his eyes...is gone...and it hurts him because that was his responsibility; HAVOC was a power, a being that he failed to control his way. And now, HAVOC is on the right side, the side that stands against him, the side that will remind him of his past evils, his current failures, and the wrongs he committed with that creature harboring his body. The same type of wrongdoings brought onto Kingdom through his thirst for power and lack of concern for others, just like Mr. Asakura.

But we’re the bad guys.


(DT The Ruler nodded his head in sarcasm)

The new King of Sleaze, the Alpha Manwhore himself, Mr. Jeffrey Atkins X, and I can’t help by being especially disgusted in how much he’s leading these whores with delusions to their doom! Does he really believe those skanks by his side betters his chances of stopping us, stopping people he and his little clique have failed to contain and contend with? Does this man really believe he is going to challenge us on any front with what we want to happen, with what we want to do? I want to really think these Frontline Bros are just damn idiots all-around, all morons believing they’re going to win a fight against men and women with stronger determination, stronger will, and in better position than all of them in this coming battle! Gassing all of those whores up is the biggest mistake he has made since...just a few months ago! How does he one-up himself in such a fashion and in such a short time?! A man who stands as OWA’s foundation but can’t even control his libido. The man could barely protect someone he was in a relationship with, but he’s going to be a threat to us....in what way?

(DT The Ruler pulled out a cigar from his coat, and one of the security members lit it for him under his umbrella)

But of course, for standing up for ourselves: we’re the bad guys.

Then there’s Mr. Bishop, and I have not forgotten about what happened between Final Destination up to Game Over. I have not forgotten that he still has a pound of flesh to return to The Ruler. I have not forgotten him attacking me while Roid Raging...because he failed to protect himself from one of his current running buddies. And the worst part is: that was forgiven for his crime, for his sin, for his horrible, deplorable action against him- taking his life, leaving his family vulnerable without him- and everything else he did. Yet Mr. Raivo can’t be forgiven for what he did in order to get the opportunity that OWA kept FAILING to give the man! Not only that, but going into this whole ordeal, Mr. Bishop decides not only to encourage a bunch of emotionally unstable whores how to use a gun, but then calls up an emotionally unstable PTSD-riddled psychopath in order to help his side stand a chance. Have he and his cohorts learned in regards to bringing in these types of people, knowing they're planning to toss him to the side once the battle is over? That's how you get the HAVOCs and Abholos' of the World, and I know what it's like to be used and pushed to the side...

But again: we’re the bad guys.

We’re the Big Bad, the villains in this plot. Yet these....”men”....are the ones that are going to save the day. And that is very wrong. The men are some of the biggest disgraces I have ever seen! Of all the representatives of this company over the past year-plus I’ve been here, these me-

Oh yeah, Theodor Pavel is involved, isn’t he?

Forgot about him.

And as easy as it is to overlook that man, honest truth I shouldn’t because of what he did at the return show, blindsiding myself and Mr. Raivo and daring to insult us as if he made a real impact. Imagine a man who hasn’t won a single title in over a year believing he has any reason to step towards current Champions like his presence matters! The man failed in his mission to become World Champion after having a better chance than most, throws a tantrum at everyone the first chance he gets, and damn near attacks his own so-called brethren out of frustration, all because he learned that all this time he talked, all this time he thought he was out here as the secret Main Character in OWA’s struggles when in truth: he was only filler episode! He’s a sidekick, a nice weapon but not fit to lead, a knife in the drawer that is multi-purpose but not exceptionally sharp for any one task, and it broke him. He found out he was Kyrie Irving and not LeBron James, he found out that in all the skill he displayed against others, when the time came to show out: he didn’t get the job done in the end! Then after flipping the table for months, Mr. Pavel...is also forgiven.

But we’re the bad guys.


Us.

And to think I used to feel for the boy, having experienced being overlooked, stuck as a forgotten member of a Boy Band-like alliance, having to fight to be seen as their own man after also being part of another Tag Team against my will, and fighting to the top of the business in the past...alone. More than once.

See, while many of these things I’m recalling are in the somewhat distant past, while some of these events I’m talking about as if they happened yesterday, I keep these things all in mind for when I need to remember why I am doing what I am doing, why I look to knock down these perceived pillars of OWA, men who had the audacity to believe they are doing something for the greater good in this all when all they’re doing is continue to be self-serving and won’t admit it! Like others who claimed to be the saviors of this business, the ones to bring everyone towards the light from the darkness, knowing damn well these specific individuals love it as well. And they get constant focus, constant attention, opportunities they do not deserve to continuously get, but we know why that is true.
But before I got to war and settle this issue once and for all, before I head to Germany to out the Thotline in their place, before I show everyone against us who their Master and Ruler is.....something needs to be addressed, and that is a Conservative Talking Point brought up recently. You see I was catching up to a news interviews Mr. Raivo has been part of, as I wanted to hear what that man had to say about our opposition, and though of course that media outlet is trying to restrict his voice, I can’t help but scratch the record when I heard one word:

It’s always the MAGA hat wearing mutants, the sheltered Mad Men emulators, and the out-of-touch deplorables trying to throw stones in their glass house, attempting to sling mud and disrespect and silence anyone that speaks of their grievances, and it makes me sick! They insult us, hold us back, tear our progress down, and attempt to marginalize our accomplishments before we say anything to them, and it’s not happening anymore! I’ve been saying this for months at a time that all we wanted to do was wrestle and be given our just due. Myself and Mr. Raivo in particular haven’t taken breaks, haven’t stopped, and any time we are requested to come to the ring and do what we tell everyone we can do, we do it better than anyone else! I don’t use my own money, my own vehicles and planes, take time out of running my other businesses because of entitlement! I don’t train at three and four in the morning on a regular basis, meet with medical professionals daily, and study on my opposition’s abilities and tactics because of entitlement! And anyone who uses such language when referring to any member of For The Minorities has got to be out of their mind! To have the nerve to even suggest we are mad because of privileges we did not work for is beyond asinine! We are the way we are because of the same reason our ancestors were whenever they slaved away yet were still considered a fraction of a human, and that is opportunity and rights due to us for what we’ve done. All that needed to happen was everyone on our side be given their opportunities, their chances to be the leaders of the company, to be featured on posters and advertisements, to be given title matches and Main-Event slots, be given the opportunities we worked for against even the worst of each brand, the opportunities others get handed to them for just breathing hard enough at any OWA event. THAT’S IT. IT’S THAT SIMPLE, and all of this could’ve been avoided.
 
 
 
 
(DT The Ruler’s phone suddenly rang)
 
DT The Ruler: ...Speak.


.....


.....


Yeah, I’m at the graveyard right now. I’m leaving for Germany soon.


....


....


No, no. No need to overreact. I’m not here believing my time has come. I don’t ever act as if death is approaching. If it comes, it comes, but I’m not going to be in the Grim Reaper’s Waiting Room. Everything I do and everywhere I go, I move as if death is not coming. I don’t have time to worry about something everyone experiences, and as a competitor, being scared of death is a sign of weakness. I’m in a business where people get their limbs stretched, limb broken, brains scrambled, and necks twisted regularly. All my life, I came to the understanding that you can go any time. But I’m not going into this fight especially like I will. I’ll be back from Germany as the victor, I promise you that.
 
 

It’s been said that family is everything.

For a long time I thought that was a crock of shit. For a long time I was a lone wolf and I was generally hostile towards others. There was nothing but malice and misanthropy in my heart. I wanted nothing to do with anybody. I wanted nothing to do with The Big Easy Undercity because I was sick of the constant drama, the stagnation and the petty crimes at the tail end we would commit only to get booked behind bars overnight with a slap on the wrist. My roots are firmly planted in New Orleans, I can’t change that. New Orleans is where I made a name for myself, at least in The Seventh Ward. But it was a place in large part I wanted to forget for a multitude of reasons. I could sit here and lie to you and tell you that home is where the heart is but that couldn't be further from the truth. It’s well documented that I abandoned my brothers for ME. To establish my name and obviously The Big Easy Undercity took it to heart. They were spearheaded by Laz and he ultimately kidnapped my sister and held her hostage in repulsive conditions. It wasn't until she crawled back in my life that I started to unwind and I began the slow trudge to repair a relationship that had been in pieces. To have that moment of clarity ripped away from me. To see the terror in her eyes when she was chained against her will ignited a fucking spark in me that I never knew I had. And I tried, even if I wasn't in full health, I tried to save her and I paid for it with my life. Everyone under the sun has lambasted me for not exacting retaliation but Laz and I have a steep history. It goes back decades. We ironed out the minute details and it’s still a work in progress. I helped save Laz’s fucking daughter from certain death and you can't put a price on that. But that won’t stop me from slamming my foot on the gas and dragging him through extreme levels of barbarity conjured from months of torment. My perfect idea of revenge would be winning three championships in one fucking night and cementing myself as the clear cut best OWA has to offer. Who are the rest of you to stand on your soapboxes and dictate how I go about my business when you can’t even handle your own, like Mark Micheals when he couldn’t even save his cousin from becoming a hot pocket on his own turf.

I'm by no means the standard bearer of what it means to be a family man and when it comes down to it I don't want to be because sometimes you'll have to make difficult decisions that have a bunch of different outcomes. There's no such thing as a perfect family commodity. Everybody has their shady under the table dealings. It's just a matter of who you want to know and why. I never expected Lazarus to show up out of the blue. I thought he would have been gunned down or serving hard time in the big house, but that goes to show it’s impossible to expect the unexpected. Surprises always seem to pop up out of nowhere. I never expected to reconcile with my sister. I never expected to perish in a warehouse in Seoul. I never expected Aizen to come roaring back and grant me a new lease on life while I was still getting my rights read to me by the grim reaper. It comes down to how you adapt, if you can’t adapt then you’re in for a shock to the system. I've had to acclimatize throughout my life and some situations were harder than others but every chess piece I've moved, I moved for a reason. Call me meticulous, call me underhanded, call me lucky, it’s all the same shit to me.

Those same principles can be applied to the Thunder Bastard. You have to be methodical, you have to think outside the box, you have to shine in your own element if you want to be the fucking king. The purists out there will say it's unbecoming to think that way. They’ll say if you wanna prove your merit and achieve immortality, then you shouldn’t resort to unsavory tactics. I’ve heard Mark Micheals rehash those same tired ass objections about feeling cheated or deceived, often laying out inefficacious examples to highlight his arguments, but Mark, I don’t believe you quite understand that sometimes you have to get your fucking hands dirty. There is no moral compass in this match. Nobody gives a shit about the imaginary halo around your head when they’re in the trenches. Nobody’s out here to be a fucking upstanding citizen apart from Elijah. If you’re not willing to go the extra mile and do whatever’s required even if it paints you as a villain then be my guest, sit back on your cold hands and watch me rocket past you. That’s been your goto formula for your entire career, what’s one more night for good measure? Poor Mark Micheals yearns for a fair fight and that’s the hill he’s gonna die on. Coming from the same miserable fuck who was riding shotgun in The Awakening once upon a time and pulled all sorts of fast ones. Imagine having your tongue launched up Fiora’s prostate while trying to pull your own weight when you were the proverbial horse’s ass of the group. Oops, was I supposed to sweep The Awakening under the rug? I remember you quite vividly back then, doing Fiora’s bidding just to keep your foot in the door before I powerbombed him off a Chaos Crypt and hammered the final nail in The Awakening’s coffin. I know they haven’t been on anybody’s radar in two years, I know they’re old news, but I bring them up because you know a thing or two about being a ‘vulture’; carrying out the orders of a giant fucking pussy no matter how asinine his requests were. You know exactly what a pack mentality is.

Look no further than your boy Harman who thought he finally cracked the case and cornered Laz along with a shit ton of ragtag gypsies, but he should know to never trap a monster from the sewers. I can still hear the frantic gargles from Harman after getting his throat lacerated in my head before he took a ten story nose dive. That’s only a tiny dose of the punishment that awaits you Mark. I’ll make what Laz did look like a walk in the park. Harman should have known better than to kick a hornet’s nest and now what? He’s bed-to-bed with your cousin Mark, but at least he’ll get some valuable family bonding time if nothing else. They can watch you fucking die at Civil War with IV tubes winding out of their veins. The Seventh Ward have run through you, your relatives, your followers yet for some reason they want to put their credence in The Romani King, a ludicrous false idol who has bitten off way more than he can chew. I'll make you fully understand that you just don’t have what it takes to overcome me. I don’t care how many times I have to hammer it home. I’ll beat that dead horse until there’s nothing left but the imprint in the sand because you will crack, Mark. I can already see the foundation coming apart at the seams. I got your emotions in a fucking blender and you’re within a cunt hair of going postal which plays right into my hands.

If you’re gonna gratuitously cherry pick which year to try and defame me I don’t think 2023 is the best starting point, Elijah. I’ve witnessed just about everything there is to see in this business and if 2023 is an indicator of my so called ‘regression’ when I haven’t been pinned or submitted since, what? Final Destination 4? When I had the herculean task of dethroning super saiyan Senn and Lazarus who was shot out of a cannon? If that’s your assessment of ‘struggling’ then you need to reevaluate what it really means to keep your head above water. I question a lot of things about you Elijah because there are questions still left unanswered. I held both our names under a light for a reason. If you want to narrow it down under a 2023 microscope then have a field day but the name Darkane isn’t dead and gone by any means. I’m a fucking icon Elijah, that’s not just a figment of my imagination, it’s been echoed by my peers more times than I can count and while you’re inching up the rankings, you know as well as I do that the Thunder Bastard is the tallest task you’ve ever had to deal with bar none. I ended your first Immortal Heavyweight Championship reign not out of resentment, desperation or for ‘shock value’, but to let you know that I’m on the fucking prowl for the Immortal Heavyweight Championship. That’s the whole point. Do you really think I had any idea Gatsby was hiding in the shadows with Option C in his back pocket? He went incognito and wasn’t even on the card prior to my arrival. He called his shot and acted on an impulse. I attacked you because I have that kind of pull Elijah, regardless of what your bizarre perception is of me. It’s a pull that I earned through much adversity. The APEX World Championship wasn’t tantalizing enough, it didn’t scratch that itch. I wanted to hook a bigger fish and you just happened to be in the trajectory of my warpath. I was never throwing hissy fits either. I was throwing out open challenges, daring ANYBODY from any brand who had a fucking lion’s heart to step up to the plate and lock horns with a legend. And do you know what happened? I mowed them down one by one like dominoes in record time no less. Why? Because I know I can lay waste to anybody in OWA and knock them off their pedestal including yourself on any given night. It was never about the limelight or being vainglorious to me. I couldn’t care less about that trivial bullshit. It was about the grind, it was about going out in front of millions and changing the landscape in ways never thought imaginable on an immaculate stage.

A stage that’s too bright for you.

A stage that you’re not ready for.

You can symbolize yourself as a proud virtuous champion. You can flash your pearly whites and say the right things to the press. You can cross every t and dot every i, but nothing ever goes according to plan. You think you got your bases covered due to your positioning on Olympus’ hierarchy and because you possess what everybody wants. That is a power position, but it doesn’t mean you should shift gears into cruise control because you’re sitting pretty at the top. I’ve ripped through men that were a cut above you who shared the same sentiment, world champions who believed they were torch bearers. Faux leaders who thought they could sell you a narrative that they were the cream of the crop, just like you and when they were vanquished by me, they vanished into thin air without a trace. The jury is still out on you and as far as living rent free in your head is concerned, the proof is everywhere. I have you on bated breath to ‘finish the job that Laz started’. I have you seeing flames from costing you the Immortal Heavyweight Championship and tarnishing a long standing brotherhood. I have you on high alert because you know I’m your biggest fucking threat. I have you jumping out of your seat to get me one on one and the feeling is mutual, but my reasoning isn’t based on mindless retribution. My reasoning is based on my track record. It’s based on the belief system I have in myself. It’s based on my voracious fucking drive to be triple champion. It’s based on how I know without a shadow of a doubt I will take your Clark Kentesque delineation of a champion, your far fetched boyhood dream of becoming a world renowned spectacle and fucking grind it into mush. I never tried to ‘ruin your career’ at Hardcore Havoc but at Civil War you can be rest assured I will wipe you off the face of this fucking earth.

I can end careers in the snap of a finger.

Don’t forget that.

Even careers that are in their infancy like Don Hendrix’s. He’s barely into his wrestling life cycle and I’m gonna have to be the one to extirpate it before he breaks any ground. Nobody’s gonna weep waterspouts over his loss. He's made a complete ass of himself and is further proof that frontal lobotomies are still a viable option even though he’s already a stapler headed Italian Quasimodo. I don't understand this weird fascination with comparing the past and present renditions of Darkane everybody has. You’re piggybacking off of Elijah’s hot take and making it seem like I've lost a step when you’ve barely made it out of the gate after a long, tumultuous hiatus of self-loathing and wrist slashing as you fucking booked from OWA the first time when you were habitually soiling yourself on extinct shows like Atlantis. Then you went through your ever so empowering Lets Go Brandon phase and that shit the bed almost immediately. Fast forward to the Brandon. Fucking. Hendrix stage as if originality was your calling card. He flamed out too and went belly up, scrambling back to the drawing board in the control center once again. It takes a lot more than fancy catchphrases and a revitalized state of mind to power up the rankings in OWA. I don’t care how many kicks at the can you get, your stock will never rise in OWA. You can try to reinvent the wheel as many times as you want but you’re gonna be known as the guy who had home field advantage going into night two of Civil War and pissed it down the drain. So if you wanna play the compare and contrast game in regards to my career, maybe next time take a look in the fucking mirror and study your reflection. I mean really study it. Because after Civil War you won’t see ‘Don’ Hendrix, the Italian stallion prodigy, you’ll see the same old ho hum my-life-sucks Brandon Hendrix. The same Brandon Hendrix that throws in the towel far to easily and buries his head in the sand whenever shit hits the fucking fan. I’m going to show you that side of yourself, the real core Brandon Hendrix after I annihilate you on night two. I’m gonna twist the knife nice and slow; I want you to feel everything that’s coming to you. The grief, the madness, the embarrassment of absolutely blowing a golden opportunity to the old rotted out, over the hill Darkane.

And I should have been aborted?

Considering how young you are I probably ran into mama Hendrix once or twice at the whorehouse. I could get a whiff of her from miles away. It smelled like spoiled ragu on a tuna boat. Didn’t she coin the infamous term spaghetti blowjob? Now that I think of it, I could be your real daddy, you know the one that wasn't lost into the Witness Protection Program when you were eight years old and I’m going to absolutely son you at Civil War. Play as many mind games as you want but realize that I am the unequivocal master of disassembling tortured psyches like yourself and sending them out to pasture. I'd worry about yourself and how you're going to have to explain to your family that ‘Don’ Hendrix ate shit once again but before you do that, at least put on a nice suit. That way you’ll look dashing when you're sinking to the bottom of the ocean in cement boots.

When I get a whiff of new meat my ears usually perk up especially if they're leapfrogging over from the Kingdom brand like RD3 has, but this time it felt lukewarm. He said there were looks of pure shock and bewilderment when he arrived on Olympus but It was monotonous at best. The crowd hits the fucking head as soon as you come out. You're the type of guy who believes he's more valuable than what he's actually worth and you garner no reaction whatsoever. You're flavorless and while you think you're scheming mad man more often than not you’re left ‘shocked and bewildered’ when you’re dropped on your head. The day you get me to shiver in my boots is the day you actually develop a functioning personality and start steamrolling through the roster. I’ve faced you many moons ago. This was when you were bathing in millions and shitting out gold doubloons. Back when you were pampered and walked around with a silver spoon up your ass but now you’re just Kingdom leftovers, wandering astray, looking to find your footing, looking to start anew but failing to realize that it doesn’t matter what you do. The name Reginald Dampshaw doesn’t send off the alarm bells, it just puts people to sleep. Cry me a river about feeling doubted, feeling slighted, feeling overlooked and laughed at. There’s a fucking reason you are. Nobody’s going to spoil you with love and adoration, nobody’s gonna be dancing in the streets in reverence and celebration, you’re a victim of your own hype. I guess that’s what happens when nobody else puts any stock into you, you gotta light a wet match in a dark cave to try and find some inspiration but you’re running on empty. I don’t care how vile and malevolent you think you are, you’re fucking outdone in that department by me in spades. I will heave you off the Olympus deck to where you came from but Kingdom will just think you’re damaged goods as is. So I guess it’s back home to England, where they will be screaming ‘off with his head!’ as you return in a pine box, but they won’t have to worry as I will have mounted your skull on a pike and left you in the middle of a muddy battlefield.

There’s not much conviction in Nobi’s voice these days. He’s drowning aimlessly near rock bottom and nobody is gonna throw him a life vest despite his rosy intentions. He’s questioning himself, he’s not sure of himself, he’s shuffling his feet, his head is pitched towards the ground, he’s looking for a spark, he’s looking for something to reinvigorate the gaping void in himself. You have a somber tone Nobi and it's rearing its ugly head. You have for some time now and to me you're close to kicking your career’s bucket. I know you wish you could turn back the clock and be a triple champion as you once were. I know that's a burden that claws away at your sanity, despite the happy-go-lucky mask you wear, but you need to shoulder that burden yourself. You've had opportunity after opportunity to escape the clutches of your detractors, to break free from your insecurities, but again you come off Olympus having succumbed to ‘Don’ Hendrix. What makes you think you're going to survive the gauntlet until night two when you can't even ax ‘Don’ Hendrix? I know you're capable of it. I've seen you do some special things but that was when you believed in yourself. Nowadays you're just mailing it in, looking for any excuse to fade away but you don’t need one as your current downfall is enough justification. What happened to you Nobi? Has father time finally started pounding on your door? Do you lack the fiery passion you once had? There's more questions than answers and at Civil War you won't find what you’re looking for/ You can raise your hand and paint these nonsensical ass scenarios where you could have walked out the APEX World Champion. These coulda woulda shoulda’s aren’t real. They're fiction. They’re fairy tales. They’re narratives that you want to sell to make sure you don’t look as painfully inept as you are. The notion that I haven’t knocked you out therefore I haven’t beaten you is one of the most cringe worthy cop outs I’ve ever heard. I've had turds that took longer to pinch off than the duration of that APEX World Championship match at Boiling Point last year. I fucking dominated bell to bell and you were just an afterthought yet I’m Senn’s bitch? Nobi, you’ve been EVERYBODY’s bitch for a while now and after Civil War you will be my bitch, you will be my fucking mutt and I’ll drag you around wherever I may roam.

Right to Laz’s doorstep.

Nobi’s head won’t be a peace offering, it’ll be another casualty, another bloodsoaked piece of evidence that I’m just as capable of as much violence as you are and that’s your issue. You believe there is no equal when it comes to outright brutality, but I taught you damn near everything you know about it. I’m a deathmatch god, weapons and their uses are a novelty to me. I was the one who burned the kid into toast. I was the one who dug you out of the sewers when you were barely surviving in the slums of New Orleans. This old dog still knows how to hunt. When it comes down to us, it isn’t just a matter of who the better man is, it’s about who will blink first when we try to cut each other into pieces. When I took you under my wing back in New Orleans I knew exactly what I was getting myself into. I knew you were a troubled kid, I knew that you liked to pull the wings off of flies, I knew you liked to torture animals and other fucking people when it came down to it because it was a release. I also knew that unless you proved your worth I was gonna put you out of your misery as you would have been more of a nuisance than a valuable asset but you wouldn’t let that happen. There was something inside of you, an inner resolve, something caged, something feral and I loved what I saw. Every heinous act of debauchery we committed was us learning from each other. It was a bond that was hard to break and the Big Easy Undercity ran shit for a long ass time. I wanted to mold you into something truly, truly nefarious and I have.

And for one night I’m going to have to take that away from you.

I’m going to remind you of who your master is.

As I create, so I destroy.

When I cradle you into my arms and rock you gently into the night. I can assure you that you will reach closure. I will finally put this blood feud to rest. I will put you to rest. I will make you sleep.

I will make you whole again.

And OWA will never be the same because of it.

( The scene opens with static interface cutting in and out on the early Minnesota morning sun just peaking out through heavy grey clouds. A heavy snow pack lies on the grown as even more flakes drift down. In the distance we hear footsteps, rhythmically producing a crunchy sound against the compacted snow that grows louder and louder, as the footsteps become faster and faster with their tempo. they draw nearer. The footsteps are those of The OWA Prestige Champion, Mark Michaels, who pushes his pace even faster as he begins tackling The long road ahead of him up Eagle mountain. Michaels starts his run up the cold mountain trail. What would normally be something akin to a warm up run for the Romani King, becomes a much more treacherous, and difficult task in this harsh weather, Still Mark pumps his legs as fast as he can up the trail,. The snow grows deeper and deeper, knee high in fact as he climbs higher. Michaels stumbles briefly, but he fights his way out of the pit of frost, and proceeds to the top undeterred by the chill in the air filling his lungs. Finally he is at the highest peak. He takes a moment to gather himself as he looks out over the horizon. The footage intercuts with images from the last few episodes of Olympus. Shots of the hardships that have come the Romani King’s way. Being assaulted by Lazarus Arjen and Ozias. Darkane whipping Mark with the APEX World Championship. Harman Aredelean having his throat slit, and Mark’s cousin being pushed face first into a roaring fire. It all races through Mark’s head on repeat, his blood boiling, his anger feeding his will, driving him, pushing him to the point of willing to do anything to even up the score against the Seventh Ward. Michaels exhales, he knows that his body is in top condition for what lies ahead, the trials and tribulations of the Civil War pay per view. His unrelenting determination will serve him well, for in just a few weeks time he will have to do everything in his power to claw, stomp, and cut through an entire roster in the Thunderbastard match, and Brandon Hendrix the following night. The static clears as with another long, deep, breath, the Prestige champion starts to speak.)


Mark: A wise man once said that the more money you come across, the more problems you’ll see. More and more recently, people, all of them well meaning, have come up to me and said things like Are you okay champ? You seem different, what’s wrong? They keep talking about how they noticed a change in me, hell I can’t deny that I’ve noticed it myself. But truth be told, for the purposes of tearing through the seventh ward like tissue paper, I think this change suites me just fine for the time being. People are saying Mark can’t you see how Darkane has you fired up?! How can you keep focused on winning the Immortal Championship when you’re so angry that you’re lashing out at Hugh Jass? Will your anger blind you when you’re in the Thunderbastard match, and cost you the title? Fact is Darkane and Lazarus have made this more than personal. Right now beating them unrecognizable means more to me than achieving everything I set out for when I started wrestling, more than a life long dream that I’ve fought through pain, and suffering to keep alive. Yeah, I am red hot right now, and that fire that the Seventh Ward lit in me, I intend to make sure that fire burns both Darkane and his little blood sucking leach buddy right in the ass! I’m not gonna lie, I’m not gonna pretend, I’ve always been a heart on my sleeve kind of guy, I don’t need to worry about not being focused, because I intend to drown everything out till I annihilate the Seventh fuck heads. Oh but you’re in control of the situation right? You got the mind games, you got the numbers advantage right? Tell me what should happen if you two are the last men standing? Better yet how could one of you trust the other to keep the save you from getting your ass beat in this match knowing they’re just another obstacle between you and the title? It’s every man for himself, and yeah you two have some kind of unholy alliance, but Lazarus said it himself that he would stab his own brother in the heart just to win at Civil War. Thankfully for you two, I’m coming to Civil war making damn sure neither of you make it to the final two. See it’s not the dream of being the world champion that keeps me up at night, it’s knowing that I’m gonna do things that I should regret doing, but I’m not.

Doesn’t matter where they go, what kind of hole they hide in, who’s skirt they’re hiding behind, I will find them. Lazarus, underdeveloped dickhead, since finally decided to quit acting like a little chicken shit, and to come out of whatever rat’s nest you’ve been hiding in since what went down inside the warehouse, I’m gonna focus on you first. I hope you know that you can’t hide when that bell rings. Come civil war, I know exactly where you’re gonna be and when. Lazarus I’ll be anxiously awaiting the moment that buzzer sounds and you Drag your sorry ass down to the ring. If you thought the beat down you got inside the warehouse was rough, just wait till you get a load of me. I sure as hell don’t fear you, and after I’m done only time anyone is gonna remember you is when they step in dog shit, and are reminded of the time Mark Michaels curb stomped your fucking head into mush. Now you may talk about pain, and suffering, and having to learn how to survive when you were a child, well
Guess what? Every single gypsy in camp you crashed learned just that. They didn’t need to be beaten by their fathers, they learned the world was far crueler and uncaring from birth. They’ve all dealt with hatred ten times greater than what you got for them. You think there’s some code that gonna keep me, or them for that matter, from tearing the seventh ward seven ways from Sunday?! We’ve spent our lives having to lie, cheat, steal, and everything in between just to have breakfast in the morning. No, if there’s any code among us, it’s that if you fuck with one of us, you fuck with all of us, and we don’t let this kind of shit go. So at Civil War I’m finishing what Harman started, and when I got ready to unleash will leave Lazarus, the Edgelord, Darkane wannabe unresponsive. Sidebar, damn if you didn’t have your own number there man. Expect no mercy, That ain’t no bullshit, No Delusion, no pie in the sky pipe dream. That is a promise. If I have to I will chase you round perdition’s flames till the end of eternity if it means getting to put you down. You wanna talk about abuse, I will beat you worst than your daddy ever did no cap. I can, and I sure as hell will not hesitate when it comes to putting you down, boy. You see Harman was always about two things. He was about getting the big payday, and living it up while he could. But more than that he was about family. So when I go into the ThunderBastard, I’m not just doing it for myself like every other man in this match. I’m doing this for the guy who was there when nobody else was. I’m Doing this for the guy who took me from the lowest valley, and helped bring out the king in me. I’m doing this for Harman. I’m doing this for my little cousin, baby Mark. I’m doing this for every single man, woman, and child that you go around threatening to take away what little they have. That’s why There will never be any white flag, why I will never surrender, why you will not be rid of me till I take MY pound of flesh out of you Darkane, out of you Lazarus, and everyone else in your goth kids cuck club.

So Go ahead and smirk Darkane, do it while you can now, because I’m gonna take my fist, and knock your jaw clean off you shit talking bastard. I’ll make you swallow every word you’ve spoken against me, and my people, till you fucking puke from it. I’m not saying this to scare you, I’m simply giving you fair warning. Because while you think you’re standing on tippy top of mount Olympus, I’m about to go off in Zeus mode and hurl your ass down like a lightning bolt! So go ahead, keep acting like a smug prick, keep trying to belittle The Prestige championship, I’m gonna kick your ass and show you what a real champion is. I know it burns you up inside that I’ve taken what was just considered a low tier title and made it a breeding ground for the best talent to compete, meanwhile hardly anyone could give a rat’s ass about Darkane’s run with the Apex world Championship. See my title isn’t a crutch, it’s a crown jewel. Its not a relic whose bones got dug up, bought on the cheap, and paraded around to squeeze a few bucks out of because nostalgia. The prestige championship isn’t a way for me to tack on a couple zeros at the end of my paycheck like the Apex title is for you. The Prestige Championship means the world to me, because it shows that you are one of the best in the world when you get to wear it. Think about how this title elevated not just me, but guys like Elijah Hampton, Ryo Sakazuki, And even for a time guys like Magall and Remming Prescott. Holding this means you’re pretty damn good in that ring, and that’s all any wrestler worth his check should ever be trying to prove. You feel like the Apex world championship is a weight around your neck. But even though you don’t want the fucking thing, you won’t pawn it for some beer money, or trade it for a night with highway Hellen. You put your title on the line because you loath it, I put mine up even though I love it. And because I cherish the Prestige championship, I will fight every bit harder, I will go tooth and nail, till that bell rings and my hand gets raised. Because while dreaming of being a world champion doesn’t keep me from getting sleep at night, it sure as hell keeps me getting back up every single time I get knocked down till I pay you back for all the pain you inflicted on me, my cousin, and all my family.

You know I wish it was just me versus these two seventh ward jackasses, but it seems like some others want to throw some shade my way. People like that Olive Gar-Don Hendrix, want to flap their gums, and shove their foot in their mouths. Well I guess the only remedy for that is for me to shove my foot up thier asses!

Brandon real quick dumbass, there’s a difference between Romanians who hail from Romania, and the Romani people who never had a country to call their home. But let’s forget that you completely whiffed on that one, what’s more is that you bring up this fact for… I can’t quite figure out what the hell you’re trying to infer. You talk about all these people living in Italy, so should I talk about Italians living in the United States? What about the U.K.? Can you please explain to me what the fuck 1,168,552 people living in Italy have to do with me kicking your ass at Civil War? Bro shut your ignorant mouth, because it’s better to be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt, something you prove time and again. Next time you feel like piping up, do everyone a favor and save the drunk history lesson for Theodor Pavel, or better yet, take that lesson and shove it straight up your ass! Of course that’s provided you can squeeze it in there along with your head. Brandon there’s nothing you can do, that’s worst than what my people have endured for generations. We been persecuted, abused, and were nearly obliterated in a genocide. But guess what, we survived, and now we’re thriving. That’s what my people do, THAT’S WHAT MARK MICHAELS DOES! You think I didn’t grow up my whole life hearing limp dick assholes like you say they want to wipe gypsies off the earth? you think you got me shook with this wannabe mob crap? You wanna be the mob? HOW YOU GONNA BE THE MOB WHEN WE THE MOTHERFUCKING MOB RIGHT HERE?! You wanna talk history Brandon, let’s talk about some that’s relevant. Brandon Hendrix makes his long awaited return to OWA, gets his ass whooped by Mark Michaels in minutes. A few months pass, Brandon works his poor wittle heart out to win world’s best suck up for Remmington Ivory Prescott, Gets his ass whooped by Mark Michaels again. Seeing how you’re such a history buff Brandon, I’m sure you know what they say about those who fail to learn from. After I’m done tearing through mother fuckers in the Thunderbastard, you’ll be doomed to repeat our history.

The way I see it, Brandon, I know you feel like you’re hot shit right now because you managed to turn beating two choke artists, and a guy who’s only won a single match, into a golden opportunity. To which I say Bravo pal, what balls you must have. Here’s the thing, if you listen back to that last promo you said something pretty interesting. You said nobody thought you would make it past C in your first Icarus Championship defense. Think about that for a second. For all intents and purposes, you were the underdog in a fight against a guy who hadn’t won a match WHILE YOU WERE THE CHAMPION. Yeah you won, but when the bar is so low does it really matter? Oh but you beat Nobi. yeah so has everyone else on this brand. If that resume is supposed to impress me, brother you are in trouble. you had a good little hustle with the Icarus title, the thing is I live everyday hustling like a mother fucker for my daily bread. For longer than I can remember, I’ve been having to figure out the angles, what I could say, what I could do, and busting my ass every single second I could till I was able to put food on my family’s table. Let me put it to you this way, if this was a Movie it’d be the Godfather, and you would be playing the role of Don Barzini who pulled all the stings and thinned out so much of the competition that he was a lock to rule everything. Then one day he’s going about his business, till his ass gets whacked, and all that planning got undone in a matter of moments. See you may be the Don Brandon, but I’m the Capi dei Capi, the boss of bosses my friend. I got here by working a lot harder, and a lot smarter than some Sicilian wanksta jackass. I’ve suffered, I’ve endured, and if nothing else I at least have the balls to not back down when some Parmesan prick comes spitting hot garbage they he can’t back up on his best day. Brandon, everything you’ve spent the last month putting together is about to go up in smoke, Or let’s me say this another way, come Civil War, quando affronti il ​​re zingaro sei fottuto.

Reginald, I know you’re new on the brand, but if someone has something to say to you, they ain’t running around talking behind your back, especially not The Romani King. If I got something to say to you, I’ll look you right in your eyes and tell you to your face like a man. And if that doesn’t get the message through, I’ll be happy to meet you in the ring and knock your damn lights out. That said you asked a very interesting question. Have you ever felt cheated? I’ve been out right screwed, although I don’t believe I ever sat and sulked about it. I don’t believe in it, it wouldn’t get me anywhere anyways. So I’ve never dwelled on being cheated, instead I always got up, dusted myself off, and started climbing back up the mountain. But push come to shove, twist my arm, yeah I know exactly what you’re talking about. I hate that feeling, and you can bet you’re bottom dollar that I will move heaven and earth if need be to never feel that way again. Now I know that you’re feeling the same way, and I know that your coming in filled with piss and vinegar, ready to make yourself the top dog, ready to grab the brass ring. I know you’re coming in here ready to shake up the world, and tilt everything on its head. I hate to be the bearer of bad news for you pal, but you are about to run head first into a 250 pound brick wall. I know when you walked out through the curtain last Friday, it was a cool moment, and I’m certainly excited to have a veteran talent to lock horns with, but weren’t you playing road mom a couple weeks ago? Driving the car from town to town, making sure your boys got their lunches? Reggie, do you think I’m shaking in my boots when just a week ago you were spinning your wheels while a monkey gets more screen time and a better reaction than you? Look not saying you don’t have talent, but a fucking monkey?! No offense but if you need to be the champion for some new dawn to arrive, it’s gonna be a long night for you pal, that’s all I’m saying.

Now understand that not everyone in this match, is someone I have a problem with. El Landerson, Nobi, they’ve been respectful enough to not talk a bunch of shit, so I got no gripes with them. Only thing I’ll tell them is good luck out there, stay out of my way while I’m tearing the Seventh Vail to shreds, and no hard feelings if I have to finish off either one of them at the end.

Elijah, First let me give you my condolences. You know I appreciate the gravity of sharing that kind of loss, and I can more than relate to that kind of pain. That big C is dirtier bastard than Hendrix, Darkane, and Lazarus put together. I’m sure your dad was a hell of a guy, and he’d be proud to see his boy holding the gold. Now that said just because I can sympathize with you losing your dad, that doesn’t mean I’ll go easy on you, or let you have a free pass at Civil War. You will be getting my best out there, and I wouldn’t expect anything less than you if our roles were reversed in this. I respect you as a competitor, and I’ll go even further to say you’re a funny guy my friend. Seriously I laughed quite a bit when I heard the stuff you were talking about me settling for less. I giggled when you praise me having values and beliefs, then you fail to recognize how those same things are what always push me to do better, to push myself harder, to push past the pain and go that extra mile. I found it so funny how you talked about that interview I gave, saying I was feeling myself. Calling it a puff piece, and being damn near blind to the point that I’m done fucking around, and now every last son of a bitch in that ring with me is gonna find out what happens when you jump in the pit with a pissed off a 250 pound Romani Bull. And man that line about That creating the Prestige championship, and how holding this belt put you on the map, what a knee slapper, that shit was hilarious, especially when you consider the fact that I held that title before you did, and what’s more, I beat the guy who beat you for it. And while we’re at it, I’ve spent the last 2 years elevating this title, and making it mean something. I didn’t just give the title a fresh coat of paint while using it as a stepping stool to something else, a platform to get my face out there like those people who are only famous on Instagram. I actually invested in this belt, I made it more than just another piece of tin floating around Olympus, and god knows when they got rid of every established title this brand needed one to anchor the show down with, and I was more than happy to step up. Then you went and talked about beating Jacob Senn, which yeah you did when had 2 shots at the bastard, and you had Aizen giving you an assist, and you got to pick the stipulation of that second match. Look, I’m not saying you Couldn’t have beaten Jacob, but when you compare how things went down with you opposed to how they went with me, it’s a bit more than apples and oranges here pal. Me I came less than an inch away from beating that asshole, and if it wasn’t for me getting a 3 man beat down while locked inside an electrified cage, hell If I had been given another match with Jacob instead of being shunted to the back of the line, I’d probably be where you’re standing right now. You are a great competitor, a great champion, I’m not taking that away from you, but after Olympus, I KNOW that every bit as good as you are. You think I’m just pitching a bitch fit, and blaming my troubles on that overgrown piece of dog crap Ozias? Man if that’s the case then I think you should just admit that you got bodied by Rich Gatsby in less than a minute, and that Darkane and Drago were just there having a nice conversation in the background while it happened. That’s the difference between us Elijah, I’m not asking you for anything more than to be honest with yourself, I wouldn’t expect you to ask anything less of me. At Civil War, I am fully expecting, and prepared for us to pick up right where we left off, and go tit for tat down to the wire. Elijah, any given night between us it could be a coin toss, but when it’s you and me inside that Thunderbastard, I’m snatching that quarter out of the air and putting it in my back pocket. I’m not coming to take a silver medal, I’m not coming to be a runner up. I’m am coming because Mark Motherfucking Michaels ready to finish a journey that started one faithful Saturday morning watching wrestling with my dad.

So Elijah, and anybody else who might be listening, you all better be ready to HAIL TO THE KING BABY!!!!


( Michaels voice echos out from the mountain. The sun starts to shine a little brighter as he stands determined, prepared, and ready to triumph at Civil War. )

“Not gonna lie, some of the comments that have been directed towards me thus far have been a little out of pocket — while ‘Don’ Hendrix believes wholeheartedly that he has the victory when it comes to night two of Civil War in his pocket. I would say that I admire the confidence, but I’m not so sure that’s what I would call it. I think it’s fair to say you are toeing the fine line of that and arrogance — more so the latter. These past few days have served as a painful reminder that the Olympus brand is filled to the brim with such men. It’s an epidemic that I’m shedding some much-needed light on and I’m trying to do my part in slowing down the spread like the Good Samaritan that I am. Just like you, Hendrix, will be slowed down in due time as it would be an honor and a privilege to cut you down to size if I’m fortunate enough to survive The Thunderbastard the night before, of course. But that’s perhaps your biggest advantage — your size. You look the part, with a physique that’s been chiseled out of marble — even if they are popcorn muscles. You even try to act the part, while nah, the lead role is taken by moi. Sux, sorry not sorry. Although you’ll make a great supporting actor as you read your couple of lines and well, you’re kinda just there in your brief cameos, while I’m out there doing my thaaang in the middle of that raaaaang, front and center. What I’m getting at is Hendrix, you’re kind of the textbook definition of all tools and no toolbox. You prop yourself up as the next in line, the next big thing. And that it’s a forgone conclusion that this title will be in your grasp in the near future. Yeeeeeaaaaaah, not on my watch. Your hopes of being as such may as well be a balloon ‘cause imma shoot that shit down right now. This is mine, not yours, get your own. But what I will say is that the more I learn about you and the more I hear from you, my appreciation grows. Because when it comes to most opponents, their words, their messages need to be deciphered at times because there is more to it than what meets the naked ear. Not you. Because your level of thinking is only skin-deep."

"You talk how I used to talk when I first started out. I would toot my own horn, I would say I’m better than everyone else, and that I’m the true star even though I had done jack shit to prove that. It’s following the blueprint of Generic Cocky Asshole 101. Congrats on passing that course, by the way. All you’re doing is making some reckless and baseless claims. Desperately trying to piece together a coherent thought or two so your narrative seems legit — I’m still waiting on the facts. And odds are I will continue to wait. I’ll continue to wait on you bringing something new to the table of discussion. I’ll continue to wait on you getting a clue Nancy ‘Don’ Drew and putting it all together. Because I do think you have some qualities to your name that will make you a big time player on this brand. But a guy that will struggle to get over the hump in the meantime. A guy who flirts with the main event scene every now and again but never becomes a mainstay when it comes to the top of the card. Just a plug-in guy when needed. Which you are rarely needed for. My words might not indicate it, but I do take you seriously. I wouldn’t be taking time out of my busy schedule to hit you with a rebuttal if I didn’t. I do think you are a threat and I’ve started to keep a close eye on you and how you develop. But at the same time, you do yourself no favors when you decide it’s time to flap your gums. Most in this Thunderbastard match, a match you opted out of for some reason, which is something I will touch on some more later, either today or the next time I show these pearly whites — but most of them won’t take you all that seriously because of the lack of competition you’ve faced thus far, which you yourself even admitted to. You beat Nobi, you beat Ryo — no disrespect to them, so naturally, I’m going to folllow that up with something disrespectful — they aren’t exactly world-beaters. They aren’t setting the world on fire unless that fire is lukewarm, then sure. You haven’t been battle-tested here. I have, on every Olympus, on every pay-per-view. And whoever wins The Thunderbastard, that man earned it through and through — at least I would like to think they did. Had to backtrack my statement a bit there because I remembered some of the names involved in this match. But when Night 2 finally arrives and you step into the squared circle with the Immortal Heavyweight Champion and that bell rings, you will be out of your depth. You’ll be in uncharted waters and this time you won’t have a floatie or a safety jacket to bail you out. I’m pushing you in. It’s sink or swim time.”

“I see you, Hendrix. Trying to sweep my accomplishments under the rug. Trying to downplay my win against Senn for this very Immortal Heavyweight Championship, as you leave out some key details and such — you sneaky lil serpent you. If only I could return the favor and do the same to your world title reign and compare. Apples to oranges naw I’m sayin? But I can’t, can I? Oh well. Maybe another day then — prolly not, but sure, maybe. See, you’re talking about a subject you don’t have the slightest clue about but that won’t stop you from running your uniformed mouth. You’re straight up acting a fool right now, you fool. And because of that, you’re making a rather weak ass first impression in the eyes of the reigning and defending Immortal Heavyweight Champion. I wouldn’t do that if I were you. Next time, you best come correct. But sure, let’s briefly skip down memory lane and go over my title win against Senn — and I mean briefly because this topic has been beaten like a dead horse by now. Your biggest takeaway from it was that Darkane somehow won it for me? Don’t get me wrong, he played a role. But you are going to completely gloss over Lazarus’, Alex Carter’s, Michelangelo’s, oh, and that 50-foot demonic creature from hell which is totally normal when it comes to OWA — aka Belial’s involvement? What an interesting way to spin it — I mean, it’s wrong, but interesting nonetheless. Yes, Darkane showed up. As did the rest of The Dynasty and Noah Reigner too, but their only purpose was so I could finally square off against Jacob on equal footing. No more bells or whistles, just an old-fashioned wrestling match. And I won. Which debunks your theory of me needing all this extra pizzazz and fireworks when it comes to match stipulations. Thinking I need to rely on weapons to get the job done. They are just tools. A means to an end. As are my hands. And you’re about to catch ‘em as I catch you slipping. SLUMPED! But speaking of slipping, your grip. Your grip on reality is slipping. You’re over there building castles in the sky. Dreaming up scenarios that is my reality. Everything you hope to be? I already am. Everything you hope to cross off on your checklist? I’ve already completed. Because I put all of my time and energy into this place, while you’re over there thinking about these other second-rate federations and taking this title and showing it off under their banner. You’re creating distractions out of thin air. And it’ll be your downfall.” 

“There’s a lot to unpack when it comes to Lazarus. Kind of. He made a couple of bullet points — and decided to really hammer — or in his case, lead pipe those points home by reiterating those few points over and over again, as if no one would catch on. You ain’t that slick. But, to his credit, he gave us a glimpse at this new side of him as he pulled back the curtain, let his guard down ever so slightly and be vulnerable while being emotionally stripped down. I thought I would never see the day. Some may see that as weakness, while I see it as someone being secure and comfortable in their own skin, not giving a single flying fuck or grounded fuck about what others have to say. That’s strength. Therefore, while you expect most to pounce at you while your wall is down and poke fun at you — I’m not going to follow suit. I could. I could cock a snook at you. Give you the same old same old. You being an edgelord, as you suggested. I mean — if the shoe fits. No. I’m not going to go down that road. Because while our backgrounds and upbringings couldn’t be any further apart — it doesn’t change the fact of what you’re capable of. I’ve shared the ring with you. I’ve spilled blood with you. You’ve hit me with a lead pipe, I’ve hit you with a steel chair. Tit for tat. Make no mistake about it, there’s no love lost here. And there’s some unfinished business to be settled. Perhaps The Thunderbastard will help sort some of those issues out as I look to exercise some demons. But I know it won’t be the end. It never is. You’ve been nipping at my heels since the day you got here. Sticking your nose in my business while I’m just trying to go about my day. Then again, it’s not just business when it comes to you. It’s personal. For a plethora of reasons. For all your actions, sure. Helping sway Darkane away from me, from The Dynasty and join your side in this war — that was my only ally left. Gone, just like that. This title has people switching up. Revealing their true colors. You hate to see it. Although I suppose it was expected. But let’s go back to this personal talk. You want to get personal? That’s fine. I can do that. For instance, you talked about your father. What he did, or more so, what he didn’t do, such as providing for you, making himself unavailable to you when you needed him the most. He played a crucial role in the young man we see today. Likewise for me. While yours slowly fell victim to the bottle, mine dealt with something else.  Cancer. Prostate cancer. Stage four. And let me preface this by saying this isn’t some sly tactic to have people side with me even more so heading into this match. Sometimes it’s therapeutic to get some shit off your chest, especially since I keep my personal life private."

"People think I’m a decent human being. But I pale in comparison when it comes to my old man. Without a shadow of a doubt, the nicest man I’ve ever gotten the honor and pleasure of knowing. And that just speaks to his character because I saw him damn near every day of my life. He was a genuine and hardworking individual and he instilled that in me at an early age. Don’t get me wrong, he wasn’t perfect. He had his own faults. But his unconditional love always shined through. Fast forward to 2016 — that year — that’s a year I would like to forget. As he had to sit my family down and let us know he had a visit with the doctors. Because he felt like there was something wrong with him. Labor Day weekend, he gets a call. And you could hear a pin drop as we waited for the news. The bandaid was ripped off — it was stage four cancer. The word cancer freaked me out. I assumed the worst. Because up until that point, I was fortunate enough to not have a family member or a friend go through it. With the uncertainty of how long he had left, I remember he uttered the line that no matter what happens, I want you to continue to be kind to others because you don’t know the struggles they are going through. Selfless. In 2019, he passed away. A year after my wrestling journey. Gone. Just like that. It’s 2023 and my heart and my brain still refuse to admit it. He’s just on vacation or something. He’ll be back. But perhaps what destroyed me the most was watching him get weaker as time went on. The strongest man that I knew — someone I thought was invincible, he was my Superman — could no longer move on his own. Could no longer walk on his own. Could no longer eat or drink on his own. Could no longer go to the bathroom on his own. Towards the end, before he became bedridden, I remember helping him off the kitchen floor after he fell. I remember hearing the word hospice. And through it all, he didn’t complain, he didn’t feel sorry for himself. He was at peace. That’s why I’m ashamed to watch back the bitch fest I threw about a month ago when I essentially complained about this Thunderbastard match. Having to defend it against the entire locker room. It’s unheard of. Watching that back, I want to smack my mouth clean off my face — only after I put a bar of soap in it because I knew my dad would be disappointed in how I handled that situation. He didn’t raise no quitter. But he’s the main reason as to why I put my all into this profession day in and day out. Because he’s a part of my legacy. With no him, there’s no me — literally. Without following his moral compass, I would most likely be a third wheel in the 7th Ward. And while having the name title of Immortal Heavyweight Champion is cool and all, it’ll always be a distant second best to having the title of being the son of Ron Hampton. And that’s something nobody can ever take away from me.”

“Speaking of titles, you’ve made it known that they aren’t your main objective. That you don’t do this for catching down accolades, but rather, you do this to catch bodies. You would probably rather collect your opponent’s teeth or a finger from off the canvas than collect championship gold. Because in a way, you believe you’re above such materialistic things. As you try to make a point that you don’t need this title to get people talking or be the center of attention. You’re out here slicing and dicing and carving up people’s throats like this is real life Fruit Ninja, while your compadre is burning children’s faces off. Using human beings as mere tools to send your message. Physically harming those who aren’t even combat fighters, that’s how you get some chatter going — so hardcore. But you’re a father right? A daughter — What’s her name again? Maisie? She’s your entire world, huh? You do this shit to put a roof over her head, to put clothes on her back and food on her table right? But you were cool with what Darkane did to that innocent child that night as you and OZIAS held off Mark? He’s shown what he’s capable of. He’s shown what he can stomach through. Who’s to say Maisie isn’t next? After what you did to his sister and all. I’m sure you don’t need to worry, though. Darkane never holds grudges or anything. He never tries to get even. He’s a forgiving man. I’m sure you’ve kissed and made up and admit you’ve made an oopsies. But you don’t care. Just like you don’t care about titles. Just like you don’t care about this Thunderbastard match. You want to make people suffer. You’ve made that known. You want to shave years off of your opponents’ careers and lives. I mean, Civil War is the place to do it if that’s what you’re going for. Especially given this match’s structure. Especially given the advantage that you have in your back pocket. The advantage that you earned. Like, did you guys know that Laz gets to enter this match last? If you didn’t, go listen to his promo and he’ll remind you every couple of minutes."

"We get it, you’re the big bad wolf and you’re looking to blow some houses down and strike fear into the hearts of many. While the only thing you are blowing — pause — is hot air. You think rather highly of yourself. As you should. You’ve made your name and presence be known. Shit, I can’t remember the last time you lost a match. Then again, I’ve had a lot on my plate, so maybe I’m giving you too much credit. I remember the last time I ‘lost’ a ‘match.’ You remember too, I’m sure. Because you were there for it. And you, along with Darkane played a major role — basically, you’re the entire reason why I lost this Immortal Heavyweight Championship the first time. And because of that, we got people like RD3, fresh off the Kingdom boat, mocking my short reigns when I should still only be on reign number 1. But it’s cool. I got this shit back in quick fashion. Because you aren’t the only one who is capable of toppling The Juggernaut in harsh conditions. I’ve beaten damn near everyone there is to beat — except for two people. The 7th Ward. And I’m not counting my win on the last edition of Olympus. Because my reign is forgettable anyway in the mind of Lazarus — that totally unbiased mind of his. And I had my chance to put you away, but then Drago happened. The guy I kinda went on to murder. For this championship. That’s the lengths I’m willing to go to keep this from falling in the wrong hands for the second time. And I actually kinda liked Drago. I respected him. So there’s no telling what I’m willing to do to you, Lazarus. I don’t even want a lead pipe to finish the job. I want the blood directly on my hands. I want your flesh under my fingernails. I want to gouge your eyes out clean from their sockets and place them directly into your mouth and move your jaw up and down until they turn into a paste and you swallow them down the hatch. Then again, nothing would change. Because you already can’t see. You can’t see what the bigger picture is. For me, it’s this championship. In a perfect world, I would love nothing more than to pin your shoulders clean on the mat or make you tap until your palm becomes beat red and raw and personally eliminate you from this match. But in the end, I don’t care if I even lay a single scratch on you and somebody else does my bidding for me. As long as I leave Civil War still as your Immortal Heavyweight Champion, then nothing else matters.”

“But I don’t just have a bone to pick with The 7th Ward. Enter, Nobi. A man I’m no stranger with. A man I’ve fought on a few occasions. A man I once respected and held in high regard. A man I seem to get the better of inside that ring, which seems to be a common theme when it comes to you. One of my first interactions with you, I knocked you down a peg or two as I ripped the Hybrid Championship from your grasp while I was still wet behind the ears. Still learning, still improving — which I continue to do to this day. But back then I was nowhere near the complete package competitor that you see today. And yet, I proved I was the better man that night and if we run it back one day — something you claim to want but we both know deep down you don’t want this smoke. But back to our Hybrid Championship match. I recall leading up to that event, I made a joke about how Nobi is this garbage of a human being while in reality, at the time, he was well-liked by his peers and fans. He had that golden retriever type of innocent energy. But little did I know I was onto something. Because later on, you decided to side with The Bad Boy Collective. In a last ditch attempt to revive your floundering career. You tried to make my life a living hell back then. You guys even took some of The Dynasty’s hardware — with the help of Titan and Alex Carter, of course. I’m starting to notice a pattern that outsiders have to intervene in order for me to drop a title — it’s flattering, really. But you had it made. You were sitting on cloud nine with your feet propped up and your hands behind your head — but soon that honeymoon phase wore off. You were kicked out. Thrown to the curb like Uncle Phil tossing his nephew Will straight out the door. And you haven’t been able to recover since. All you’ve managed to do is spin your wheels. The only things the former Bad Boy Collective member is collecting these days are dust and losses. And under different circumstances, maybe I would feel bad as I watch the former SSW World Champ’s career continue to spiral downwards. Maybe I would even offer a helping hand to pull you out of the muck. Seeing as how OWA has all these so-called time travelers around now because again, that’s totally normal, if you could go back and right your wrongs, odds are, you probably would. But I’m not here to deal with what ifs. I’m about absolutes. In this timeline, you fucked me over. While Father Time continues to fuck you over. You can no longer go in the ring like you once could and there’s no shame in that because you’ve been doing this for a long time. But because of that, you’ve been reduced to the role you shoehorned yourself into. Talking about salami, talking about body odor — it’s tough to watch. While your words are even tougher to listen to because you don’t know what you’re talking about. It’s never been your strong suit and that’s okay. You’re going through a late-career crisis. Thinking all of a sudden you are this measuring stick around here. Insinuating that I’ve been ducking you. When that isn’t the case whatsoever, Nobi and you know it. I don’t make the matches. Talk it over with Nate and if he gives it the green light, I would love to grant you one last match against me. But the reason why we haven’t crossed paths all that much over the past year is because our careers are going in two separate directions. I’m on the up and up — while you? Not so much. I’m headlining shows — while you? Not so much. People are clamoring for me to face the likes of Darkane, Lazarus, Hendrix — and have rematches with a guy like Rich and if he’s ever able to make a recovery after what I did to him, Drago Santiago. Your name doesn’t come up. Your stock is at an all time low. And at this point, we are all just watching to see just how low you can go.”

“And lastly, as for El Landerson?”

[SCENE FADES TO BLACK]