[i]In the February, in the state of Michigan, KnightMask, his palms ravaged with callouses, exploded off one muscle-up after the other on the empty playground's pull-up bar. His black sweats and his mask were his only defense against the temperature and they were a paltry one. The cold pressed upon him from without, while beneath his clothing, his muscles seared with fatigue. Eventually, he found himself unable to do another muscle-up. Refusing to relinquish his grasp on the bar, he continued with pull-ups, the burn becoming more and more acute with every repetition. At last, his grip failed him and he fell to the snow covered ground below. He began a set of Hindu squats, one exercise that wrestling greats seemed to almost unanimously advocate.

He loved working out, even in the cold.

He loved Stryper, blasting his ears through the head phones inserted beneath his mask.

He loved Iron Maiden's 'The Trooper'.

And yet, as Stryper's cover of 'The Trooper' played as he did one Hindu Squat after another, he still found himself fighting the demons that had haunted him following his ADCC world championship win. The fact that the way he'd chosen to live his life--behind a mask--had contributed to someone's humiliation, the fact that he had apparently reached the pinnacle of submission grappling at the expense of someone's livelihood...the guilt seemed to become something palpable, physical...a demon reaching up from the Earth and pulling him down each time he bent his legs for another rep. He'd promised himself to use his winnings from the XWF to support the man and his family...but with his first match yet to come and his overall career still a question mark, well, it made that promise a pretty impotent defense against his inner-demons.



KnightMask:...alright, that's 60, 61...62....

If he didn't get in quality training time before his debut, he'd be toast against someone as talented as his opponent, World-1 International. He grinded through the Hindu squats, searching every nook and cranny of his soul to find some sort of inner determination or fire to inspire him to keep working in spite of the pain. Normally, it wasn't a problem. But now, the physical torment of Hindu squats combined with his mental torment just seemed like too much to endure.[/i]

KnightMask: Maybe I just need to hit the mats and do some rolling.

His old gym, the Moongoose Den, had banned him after the news hit them that he'd been supposedly caught with PED's by the ADCC tournament officials, but another local gym, Hagar's Slam Masters, had readily accepted him. He wondered whether that meant that they believed him innocent...or whether they just didn't have a problem with steroids. Of course, on THAT count, he was wholly innocent. The PED accusations just seemed like a way for the ADCC officials to appease the Brazilian jiu jitsu community, much of which was up in arms about a catch-wrestler, let alone a masked catch-wrestler, winning the prestigious tournament.

Actually, he didn't really believe in steroids, or the idea of investing more faith in a chemical than in your own will-power. And if he was being honest with himself, he didn't really find himself comfortable around people that were on steroids, much of the time.

KnightMask: Ah heck, the guy takes me in and hear I am speculating about whether or not the guys in his gym are a bunch of juicers...fact is, they're probably just a bunch of nice guys...

Later, at Hagar's Slam Masters...

As Knight Mask approaches the door to the gym, a universal gym is hurled through the front window, smashing into an unlucky passing taxi cab. From within, a voice bellows, "EVERYONE GET AWAY! I'M ROID RAGING!!!!!"


....TO BE CONTINUED...