Darkness is like a solid thing in the damp room. There are no sounds save for the steady wheezing coming from some unknown source. The wheezing is cut almost completely by a gasp for air, the sound of a man who was formerly drowning, but has been revived by cardiopulmonary resuscitation. The quiet sound of someone moving in the room can now be heard, but the wheezing continues. The moving becomes a little frantic, the sounds of searching in the darkness, of a man crawling on his hands and knees, feeling with his mind. A hard bump is heard like the person in the darkness has run into something made of wood. Then a voice which is nearly a cough.
Shit!
There can be heard some more moving from the area where the bump was heard. Some small items hit the hard floor of the room. Finally, there is a plastic like shuffling in the air, and a clink. With a metallic scraping, a flame erupts, cutting through the darkness, but still surrounded by it. The flame comes closer to the lips of some face, the face of SAM. SAM inhales deeply, then coughs and sputters for almost five minutes. He hasn't had a cigarette in weeks.
SAM falls against a wall in exhaustion. He puffs on the cigarette, creating a glow in the room which is very weak. He leaves the Zippo lit on the table, which has a glass of dirty looking water, a pack of Seneca full flavors, and an ice-pack. A camera is set up by the wall, and the red light on the front of it lets SAM know its running. Blood is all over the floor, and it is obvious that it comes from SAM, who is still covered in it, along with various bruises, abrasions, and contusions. He leans his head back and tosses the cigarette across the room, still burning.
SAM leans his head back against the wall and closes his eyes. He replays the scene in his head of what happened after Ruffhouse went off the air...
SAM is walking around in the back mumbling to himself with his Brutality title on the ground in front of him, when all of a sudden. A man with long black hair walks up, we can only see the back of him but he's wearing a cape. He taps SAM on the shoulder and before SAM can turn around, he's shoved into a coke machine. SAM falls to the ground but isn't injured. He jumps right back up into the face of the man. Who in the hell do you think you are?
From behind him, comes a voice.
Wicked D: It doesn't matter who he thinks he is, what does matter is who he really is. His name is DRAVEN AZAGTHOTH.
You're brother, yes yes, I know the name. Although I don't know him personally like Ichabod has, but nonetheless. What have you to do here?
It's simple, I've come to be paid the debt that you owe me.
What debt?
Draven attacks him from behind and lays him out against the Coke Machine once more. Draven picks up SAM and tosses him through a glass pane window. Draven drags him out and plants him on the concrete with a CORPSEGRINDER and then knocks the Coke Machine over onto him. Wicked D crouches down over SAM's protruding head with his face right over his.
SAM, we've gone back for years. If my youngest brother here disposed of you so easily, how can you face up to Ichabod's greatest foe to date? I know what cures Ichabod from you, and I have that knowledge in my possession.
Wicked D stands up and lifts the coke machine off of SAM, SAM coughs from relief from the weight of the machine. D picks him up and then slams him down stomach first onto the concrete with a modified Sambo Suplex. He pulls out a pair of handcuffs and locks them around SAM's wrists and he and Draven pick him up and carry him away.
SAM opens his eyes with a look of disgust for everyone he's been near in the past few weeks.
Fuckin SAM, what the hell was he thinking? His beef is with Reverend, not me. I have never had anything to do with him. Look at the trouble you've gotten me into, SAM! I don't know where you are, but if I ever find you, I swear to Christ I'll make you wish it was Reverend dealing with you.
And Wicked D, there are other ways to stop electronic things, ever hear of an electromagnetic pulse? What they hell gave you the right to kidnap me and beat me nearly to death? You're time is coming, you've pulled some pretty messed up shit in the past, but this takes the cake. SAM is gone, but I must sustain his injuries as the cost of getting my life back.
As soon as I figure out where the hell I am, and as soon as I can stand, I'm going straight into training for Ring Wars, for facing the men that SAM has played with the past few weeks. I am not quite sure what is going on right now, but I know that you, SAM, are history. If you ever try this shit again, I'll do the one thing Reverend was never able to figure out how to, and thats to just take you in my bare hands and crush you.
So it is Ichabod once more. SAM has been dispelled by Wicked D and his friends, but if he is truly gone, we'll never know. History dictates that he'll be back before long with a new and more devious plan.
This whole time, Ichabod has waited, almost as if in the backseat of his own head, while SAM was at the wheel, creating, destroying, remaking. The only time he was able to exhibit some control was during his brutality matche, when SAM, who never was much of a wrestler anyway and had realized through Dick and Kris Starr that he couldn't do this alone, let Ichabod take back over for a short time. It was Ichabod who destroyed both Wafer and Justin Payne. He still felt the respect for them that SAM expressed, but he knows that he will have to face both of them one day again. Ring Wars will be the first chance.
Since SAM took over, my name has been dragged through the mud and basically forgotten by everyone. Wafer is the only one I know of who still refers to me as Ichabod. And that is only through his ignorance of the facts. I have a job now, I have to get up there and clear my name. If Triple X is listening, I hope he'll still consider me a part of his team. Ever since I dropped the World Title, I've been on a steady fall from grace that only ended Monday with the Brutality Title being gained. I now have to go through the reparations and fix what SAM broke. You and I nearly killed each other at King Karnage before SAM took me, and you and I both know that we are worthy opponents, and that we would make deadly partners. As for Cheapshots, after what you and I did to Smoke Dawg, you should know that the two of us can throw around more than your average opponent.
I can only ask, not demand, that you not take this from me, X. There are few on the true path to the top that deserve to be there. You, Cheapshots, and myself. B-Pac, who comes and goes as he pleases, thinking he may always have his main event shots, is merely someone living under a delusion of his own grandeur. He talks of being owed this and deserving that. He talks of you and Cheapshots basically putting him on the backburner for your own purposes. Waah, waah, what a crybaby. B-pac has mentioned you and basically forgotten about me. He conveniently forgets that I was the first of a long line of people to put him in his place. It is because of me that he nearly lost his shot at King Karnage. I have taken him out before, and this will be no different.
Smoke Dawg, the great "my-shit-don't-stink" proponent of saying and doing two different things. Recently he's been on a cocky tirade of laying down idle challenges and achieving them, so that he may add to his rather dubious list of accomplishments. Well hell, who exactly are you trying to impress here, Smokey? So you beat B-Pac. So you beat Chandra. So you're the captain of a team of men who are way overconfident. This adds up to mean exactly squat to me. Men like the men in team world title talk a good game, its true, but we usually back it up with equally great accomplishments. You just go out there and grab every victory you can that, no matter how small, so that you can make your record look impressive. You hold on to that Intercontinental title as if its your affirmation of skill. If your victories, and that title or yours, are the only thing you can brag about, what then will you brag about when Triple X, Cheapshots, and I take both away from you at Ring Wars? Will you brag that you put up a good fight? Will you brag that you still have your ORS? Small victories, just like everything about you. Small.
Wafer, the one man who stands to take something from me. Wafer, you have once again forced me to gain respect for you in the past few weeks. From my somewhat limited position in my own fate, I've watched you take WOW by storm and climb to the top quicker than anyone has. In this day and age, the WOW is so big that most new people float around at the bottom, feeding on what meaningless matches they can for months at a time. You overcame all that. No, its not because you are Smoke Dawgs partner. Its because you are Wafer, you are awesome, and no one can deny that. No matter what befalls you, you always manage to impress upon everyone this image of greatness that can't be shaken.
But the truth stands evident Wafer. Your record against me isn't so great. I'm not trying to brag, and I'm not trying to take anything away from you that you deserve. I'll never deny that those matches were the hardest of my life. But you can be beaten, and you can be beaten by me. You are the one who cannot deny that. Ring Wars its for so much more than the Brutality title, and respect for one another. This time it is for the greatest prize, a prize which none of us have ever held. Even Triple X, the top of WOW right now, has one thing more to aspire to.
In this mix we have former World Champions, former Intercontinental Champions, and all legends. We have six men with nothing to lose and everything to gain, for all of us will have our fifteen minutes of greatness, I can see that already. Everyone of us will at least for a moment taste the bittersweet touch of that which only one of us will hold after this. The WOW Undisputed Title, the newest and most coveted prize we'll ever know. We each have our own reasons for wanting this. Triple X and Cheapshots, my teammates, have to prove once and for all, beyond a shadow of a doubt that they really are elite. Smoke Dawg has to complete his career by attaining that which has eluded him for over a year. Wafer needs to secure his spot in the WOW Hall of Fame. B-Pac needs to prove to himself that he can alone preside over the WOW as its top draw. And I, who have already attained all these things, must prove to myself and everyone that I've not fallen away from the honors due me, that I can still hang with the other names in this match, that SAM was merely a fluke and that I am not dead, and never will be.
Ichabod pulls himself up using the wall and grabs the Zippo, waving it around slowly, looking for the exit. Oddly there is no door in this room. But finally, he sees a closet. Going to the closet he presses against the back wall. Unlike the rest of the room, which is made of brick, the closet wall is of wood. Odd, of course, but thats the builder's fault. Ichabod removes his shirt and sets fire to it, the pushes it against the base of the closet wall. Then he goes to the back of the room and waits as the wall catches. Smoke fills the room. Ichabod sits and closes his eyes as the sprinkler system hanging over the room comes on. Ichabod removes his pants. He lets the water soak him through and through, wearing only his boxers. Finally he runs toward the wall and crashes through it. He waits for a moment as the pain from his injuries subsides. He is now between two stone walls, a clausterphobic minute space. The water wets him, but here out of the sprinklers, he'll dry quickly. He moves as fast as he possibly can, uses the water to make himself slicker... He has a moment of second though and goes back to get a piece of wood that is pretty thick, and is still burning between the walls, untouched by the sprinklers. He holds it up as he moves through the dark crevice. The heat from the burning wood causes him to sweat profusely in this enclosed space, making him stay wet and slick. Finally he comes up to a wall made of particle board. He uses the wood to beat on it until finally it cracks and then he flings himself the best he can against it, shattering it. He comes out in a dark hallway and makes his way to a door, then opens it into the night. He steps out and turns around to see that it is an old hotel. People are going crazy due to the fire alarms going off. He laughs to himself and walks around the parking lot. He looks across the street to where sits a police station. In the parking lot is a silver and black chopper. He smiles and walks over to it, easily starting it. He hits the gas and takes off into the night just as all the police officers he can see are heading over to the hotel.
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