I could feel it.

The pounding in my skull, like a drumbeat that wouldn’t stop. Every step I took felt heavier, my body too tired, too worn to keep going. My hands trembled as I reached for the chair, the cold steel biting through my fingertips. But it wasn’t just the chair that weighed on me. No, it was the weight of my regrets. The weight of my mistakes, the weight of the actions I could never undo.

Scoops was still there, standing in front of me, but he wasn’t just Scoops anymore. In his face, I saw her.

Her!

Her bright eyes, full of life, full of hopes and dreams. She was staring at me with the same look of betrayal, the one she wore as everything fell apart. That look I could never shake, the one that haunted me, the one I couldn't outrun. I could feel the breath catch in my chest, my pulse quickening, and for a second, it felt like I was suffocating under the weight of her gaze. I staggered, my knees buckling as the memories flooded my mind, choking me, mocking me.

Get it together, Chuck. Fucking focus!

I swung the chair, the metal slicing through the air with a sharp ring that seemed to echo forever, but it was like I wasn’t in control. I wasn’t sure if it was the injury, or if I was just losing my mind. Maybe it was both. Or maybe I had never been in control, and only now could I see the truth.

The chair slammed into Scoops’s back, but when I looked at him, all I saw was her. Her face, twisted in confusion, wretched in agony. When I looked down, all I could see was her blood on my hands.

I brought the chair down again, harder this time. Scoops cried out in pain, but it was her voice I heard. Her pain. I could feel the tears building up behind my eyes, but I didn’t have the luxury of crying: not now, not here. I had to finish the match. I had to end this!

And so I did.

After the bell rang, I walked up the ramp with my heart caught in my throat, the bright lights causing the room to spin around me. Then came the shadows. They were creeping in again, stretching across the floor like claws, reaching out for me. The weight on my chest grew heavier as the darkness pressed in.

I walked up the ramp, ready for this miserable night to finally be over.

But then he stood up.

How could he still stand?!

Why would he do this to me?!

That’s when I heard a voice, her voice, calling me back to the ring.

When I turned around, she was there, standing behind Scoops now, her silhouette a faint, fragile shape in the darkness. Her voice echoed, soft and distant, a memory that clawed at my insides, gnawing away at my sanity.

“¿Por qué me hiciste daño, Padre?”

My heart lurched in my chest.

“Padre...”

Scoops tried to get up again with a microphone in his hand, but it wasn’t him anymore. It was my daughter. She was fading, disappearing into the shadows, and I was choking, drowning in regret. Every breath felt harder to take. The weight of her death was a leaden ball in my gut, pulling me deeper, pulling me down into that pit I couldn’t escape. A hellish abyss of my own making.

I stepped back into the ring, but I didn’t want to. My body wasn’t listening to me: it was obeying only her commands now. The chair felt like it was made of concrete, and the shadows were everywhere, choking me, mocking me.

Scoops dropped to his knees, and I raised the chair high... but it wasn't Scoops kneeling before me. It was her. My daughter, staring up at me with wide, innocent eyes—pleading eyes. The chair trembled in my grip, my arms going weak as her face replaced Scoops’ in my fucked up head.

"No... not you…”

I muttered, the constant drumbeat pounding louder and louder in my head. The shadows closed in, whispering, taunting.

Do it.

Do it, Charlie.


FUCKING DO IT!


I froze. Time stood still. Her face flickered in quick succession. First it was Scoops, then my daughter again, and just as quickly, Scoops’ body crumbled backward, head... gone. Just a stump, blood pouring out where her head used to be, staining the ring. A scream lodged in my throat as the chair slipped from my hands, clattering to the floor. I pushed Scoops down, panic rising in my chest.

"No, no... I didn't mean it. I didn't mean it!"

The drumbeat was deafening now, drowning everything else out as I backed away, breathless, confused, broken. I blinked, the shadows receding as I felt the rush of reality hit me all at once. The world snapped back into focus, and for the briefest of moments, I was no longer staring into the lifeless husk of my daughter. I was just staring at the ring, at the lights, at the fans screaming.

I won.

But I didn't feel victorious. I didn’t feel anything but the gnawing emptiness inside me. My body was battered, but that didn’t matter. What mattered was what I couldn’t fix, what I couldn’t undo. And Scoops McGee wasn’t the one I had to answer to. Not anymore.

I stumbled to my feet, my head pounding, but my mind was still trapped in the fog. As I looked down at the man I had just brutalized, I couldn’t escape the thought:

Was it always going to be like this?

I turned and walked away, ignoring the crowd’s cheers, the sound of victory that felt so hollow in my ears.

Because somewhere in the distance, I could still hear her.

The scene opens with the dim glow of a crescent moon struggling to break through thick, rolling clouds. The wind howls as it whips through the tall, dead trees of a desolate cemetery, their skeletal branches clawing at the air. The graveyard is cloaked in a thick mist, swirling in unnatural ways. In the dead of night there are no stars, no comfort. Only a silence that feels suffocating, like the earth itself is holding its breath.

Charlie Nickles stumbles through the cemetery gates, his breath shallow, his body unsteady. His steps falter, and his hand clutches the rusted iron fence for support as he enters, eyes darting around, searching for something unseen.

“She won’t leave me alone…she’s calling me here...”

His voice trembles, a ghost of the man he used to be. He’s disheveled, his face bruised, and his clothes still torn from his battle with Scoops. He is half-delirious, his body betraying him, his mind twisted by the Cerebral Torment Enslaving him.

As he walks deeper into the fog the shadows move unnaturally, bending in ways that defy logic. He pauses for a moment, his breath ragged as his hand presses against his temple.

“They’re not real…I know they’re not real..."

The world around him seems to pulse, the shadows stretching and receding, whispering his daughter’s name.

“Robyn…”

He stumbles again, catching himself on a gravestone, and his vision blurs. When it clears, a faint silhouette looms at the edge of his sight.

It’s her.

He knows it’s her.

Her headless corpse stands silently, but her aura echoes through the fog. The daughter he failed. The daughter he betrayed.

Charlie’s breath catches in his throat as the shadows deepen, and a voice, soft, broken, but unmistakable, echoes through the fog.

“Me mataste…”

Charlie recoils, his legs giving way beneath him as he collapses to his knees, clutching at his head as a wave of pain crashes over him. His eyes flicker with terror, and his hands tremble as he tries to steady himself.

The voices swirl around him- distant, cold, accusing. He looks up and sees a familiar tombstone, his daughter’s grave, bathed in an eerie light that cuts through the fog. Her name is etched in stone: “ROBYN GONZALEZ.”

He shakes his head violently, trying to clear his thoughts, but it’s no use. The shadows twist and writhe, mocking him.

“I didn’t… I didn’t mean for it to happen. I was lost. I was lost, Robyn!”

The wind howls louder now, drowning out his words, pushing him back. The fog thickens, curling around him like a vise. His hands press to his forehead, and his breath becomes shallow again, the weight of his mental torment growing unbearable. He sees her headless corpse, a reflection in the fog, somehow staring at him from every direction. The whispers intensify.

"Se suponía que debías protegerme, padre. Se suponía que debías ser fuerte. Pero no lo fuiste, ¿verdad?"

Charlie looks down at the ground, his chest tight with guilt. His vision swims in and out, his body aching from the strain, but there’s something else here, a deeper pain. Charlie stumbles back, his body fighting against him. His hands tremble as he reaches for the gravestone, the stone cold under his touch.

“I made a mistake! But it’s not too late….I can still save you! I’ll make it right. I swear I will!”

The shadows pulse as the wind picks up, and the fog seems to close in tighter. Charlie’s breath quickens as the pain in his head intensifies, the mental anguish pushing him to the edge of insanity. But there’s something in his heart now: an urgency, a desire to make things right, to finally face the consequences of his failures.

The camera pulls back, revealing the gravestone, the nightmarish reflection of his headless daughter, and Charlie kneeling in the fog. The whispers crescendo, louder, accusing, taunting.

Then, a voice cuts through the chaos. The cold, callous voice of James Shark, echoing from the depths of Charlie’s tortured mind.

“You’re not fit to be a champion, Nickles. You’re not even fit to be a father!”

Charlie’s head snaps up at the sound, his eyes wild, filled with both rage and fear. He clenches his fists as the fog begins to part, revealing the cold, unfeeling tombstone. The reflection of his daughter fades.

The camera zooms in on Charlie’s face, his expression hardened by the pain, the guilt, and the desperation. He stands, shakily at first, but then with a renewed sense of purpose. His voice is quiet, but it’s the voice of a man who’s seen the darkest parts of himself and is finally ready to make amends.

“I’ll make things right, no matter the cost...”

The camera slowly pulls away, the mist rising again, as Charlie Nickles walks away from his daughter’s grave. His silhouette disappears into the fog, leaving behind only the cold whisper of the night, the echoes of past mistakes, and the heavy weight of a man determined to redeem himself in the only way he knows how.

Last night I dreamt of salvation.

A blinding sea of light pouring through those pearly gates, so pure and peaceful.

Too pure and peaceful for a bastard like me.

I can never be saved, not after what I’ve done….

But I can still save you, James.

You rise and fall like the tide, Shark, but will you come back to these shores once your ocean of success recedes? Or will you be gone, back into the abyss, never to return?

This is your chance for redemption, Shark.

And I’m the only one who can beat it into you.

I see so much of myself in you, you know? The good, the bad… It’s like looking in a mirror. You’d do anything for your kids, and you’d do anything to keep that TV title. But what happens when those paths finally collide?

I know what I did… and I won’t let you make the same mistake.

I’m telling you, James: you can’t be both a father and a champion. Not in this business. And right now, you’re at a crossroads—one you won’t even see until I take that title from you. Only I can save you, Shark. Only I can make you see what you're doing to your family, what you're doing to yourself. You think that belt makes you who you are, but it’s just a cage. A cage that’ll lock you away from the people who need you most.

And I’ll be the one to tear it down, for your own good. I'm the only one who can set you free.

That TV championship isn’t your legacy. It’s your curse. And I’m the man who’s gonna break it. I’ll spill your blood, James. I’ll make it rain red in that ring, and you’ll understand what true sacrifice is. You think you’re fighting for your family by holding onto that title, but you’re just digging them deeper into the hole you’ve put them in. Every second you hold onto that fucking belt, you’re pushing them further away, and I’m gonna be the one to show you the destruction you’re creating.

It’s gonna hurt, James. It’s gonna hurt like hell, but you need it. You need to feel the pain. You need to see the blood pour from your own veins, so you can understand what’s at stake. I’m doing this for you, whether you like it or not. I’m gonna drag your demons out into the light, and if that means spilling your blood in the process, so be it. That championship is nothing compared to the people you will lose when you keep putting this wrestling shit above the people who really matter!

I’ll be the one to save you, James. I’ll be the one to show you what really matters. And it starts with your blood, spilling on the mat, for the whole world to see.

I will make you so much more than you are.

You’re caught in a war with Geppetto, desperately flailing around on your strings trying to prove your freedom. But every time you proclaim yourself free, your nose grows longer and your reign grows shorter.

You are their puppet, their minstrel, pretending to be a bad, bad man. You’re their next big thing, Thaddeus said so himself on Warfare. Thad’s whipping boys don’t hate you; they love you: you dance just like they want you to.

Just like I told you last time.

But me? I’m truly free from Geppetto’s strings. He can’t control me, he can’t even face me: he is of complete and utter inconsequence to me. But you can’t say the same, can you? Geppetto has your belt in his grasp, and all you can do is languish in that truth.

For the first time in my life, I am truly free of the strings, marching to my own beat, carving my own
path.

A future, carved in your flesh.

Your salvation.

Charlie sits in the corner of his locker room, preparing for tonight’s battle. His boots, worn out from countless wars, sit before him. His hands shake slightly as he pulls the laces tight, each tug on the leather pulling him deeper into the tension that fills the air. The sound of his breath is the only noise in the room, shallow and uneven.

He reaches for his hand wraps next, unwinding them with deliberate care, each loop methodical, each pull a reminder of the fight that’s about to unfold. The pressure builds, but it’s not just the TV title at stake. His thoughts are tangled in something darker.

Charlie stares at his reflection in the locker room mirror, eyes glazed, his face pale under the stark light. The mirror is blurry at first, his own image distorting. As his hands work to wrap his fists, the reflection shifts. It isn’t his face looking back at him anymore. It’s James Shark, smug as ever, holding the TV title with that cocky grin plastered across his face. The image flickers, then shifts again. Now it’s Tatiana Jolee, standing over his daughter’s bloodied, broken body, victorious and cold.

The reflection of Jolee smiles in triumph as Charlie’s stomach churns.

"No," he whispers to himself, taking a deep breath as he steps back from the mirror. "This isn’t real. They aren’t real."

But the figures in the mirror don’t fade, they only shift. Shark’s grin stays frozen, Jolee’s smirk still there, as though mocking him. The images of the two flash in quick succession as Charlie's heart races. A drumbeat echoes in his skull, getting louder, matching the rhythm of his pulse. Suddenly, his reflection shifts again. This time, it’s not Shark or Jolee. It’s his daughter: her pale face staring back at him, her hollow eyes locked onto his.

Her lips move, but the words are too soft to hear.

Charlie’s breath catches, his throat tightening, and for a moment, the cold panic rises in his chest. But then, something shifts—something clicks—and the weight of her presence in the mirror is no longer suffocating. It becomes soothing, comforting even. He feels a wave of twisted relief wash over him.

This is her.

She’s here.

"Please," he whispers, a grin creeping onto his face, a smile that feels wrong but all too familiar. "Please, don't go... don’t leave me."

She doesn’t speak, doesn’t move. She just stares at him, her gaze hollow, but to Charlie, it’s the sweetest thing in the world. The world is chaos, but here, in this moment, he feels whole. He feels right.

"I failed you," he murmurs, his voice soft, almost affectionate. "But I’ll make it right. I’ll fix everything."

His hands tremble as he runs them through his hair, the drumbeat still echoing in his skull, but the noise now fades into the background. The shadows in the room seem to dance in time with his heartbeat, in perfect harmony with the twisted sense of calm that fills his mind. This is his chance—this is it. His moment of redemption.

"I can save you," he says, his voice growing stronger, more assured. "I can save us. We’ll be together again, just like we were always meant to be."

He leans closer to the mirror, his smile widening as he stares into her eyes, and for the first time in what feels like forever, he feels a surge of twisted hope.

“I’m still here,” Charlie whispers to the reflection, his eyes shining with an eerie joy. “And I’ll never let you go again.”

His reflection shifts again, and this time, it stays fixed: Charlie, standing tall and resolute, his eyes hard with purpose. He knows what he has to do tonight.

The drumbeat finally fades, replaced by the steady, calm rhythm of his own heartbeat as he steps away from the mirror. He moves toward the door, eyes steely, body tense. His mind is clear. The images are fading, the grip of the shadows loosening, but he’s still not free yet.

This fight, this match—it’s not just about the title. It’s about redemption. For his daughter. For himself.