NATALIA RODRIGO: The daughter of Jorge Rodrigo, the man KnightMask defeated in the finals of the ADCC submission-wrestling world championships. A childhood friend of the masked wrestler, who has now sworn to kill him to restore her family honor.



KnightMask was alone in the dojo, applying an unending chain of submissions to the grappling dummy in pursuit of an ever more perfect execution of his technique. That was how Natalia Rodrigo found him, when the Japanese-Brazilian stepped out of the shadows to make herself known to him. The warmth that had once animated the precisely chiseled features of her face was now gone from it. The stream of silken, jet black hair that fell across her shoulders and down her back seemed another shadow in the dimly lit gym, a shadow that had made a temporary break from its kin.

"So, yet another Brazilian jiu jitsu practitioner to battle this Wednesday, hmmm? In spite of all its cost you...you're still waging the war for your dying style."

"I didn't choose Crimson Cobra as an opponent," KnightMask explained as he continued to weave through a chain of submissions on the dummy, "But he's more than a former Brazilian jiu jitsu practitioner. He's just as adept at flying through the air as he is at choking you out from his guard. And he's more than willing to risk--"

"I know all about Cobra, Tyrone." Natalia cut him off. "I was there at the Pan Ams when he was banned for delivering a roundhouse to his opponent's head. He was a purple belt at that time. He's the same as you...an exile from the grappling world."

"Yeah, yeah, I guess you could say that." KnightMask had stood up from the grappling dummy now, to stand and face Natalia, eye to eye, or at least, eyes to visor.

"You two are so alike as to be brothers. And yet, your insane devotion to catch-wrestling makes him your enemy, doesn't it? Just as it made me your enemy."

Suddenly, Natalia whipped out four kicks in the same lightning, fluid motion--a front kick at the midsection, a roundhouse to the temple, a reverse roundhouse to the opposite temple and a side-kick to the chin. The attacks all gelled together in one single, blurring motion. KnightMask evaded the first three. The last one caught his chin.

"Remember, I told you the next time we met...it would be in combat."

"You've got a good way of reminding me," KnightMask replied, rubbing his chin.

"Imagine, if you'd never become hypnotized by Sakuraba, Funaki and all the rest, if you'd spent your time studying philosophy like you were supposed to be instead of stooped over that computer, poring over footage of Japanese professional wrestling as if it held the answer to the secret of life itself. You'd have a Master's Degree now, perhaps a PhD." Natalia said.

"What else would I have had, Natalia?" KnightMask asked.

"Fool!" cried Natalia as she exploded into a spinning crescent kick.

KnightMask caught it, grabbed Natalia's foot, and fell back into an Achilles lock.

"Either finish or stop wasting my time," she said calmly, with full knowledge that KnightMask wouldn't apply pressure to the hold. Suddenly let her foot relax into limpness and then slithered free of the hold. KnightMask kicked to his feet in time to meet a buzz saw of spinning kicks. He moved into one of the kicks, catching a leg and dumping Natalia onto her back. This time, Natalia was ready for the leg-lock, escaping the beginnings of the hold with a swift kick to his wrist from her free leg.

Natalia produced a handful of shurikens, as if from nowhere. The lethal throwing stars whizzed towards him and only KnightMask's agility saved him as he somersaulted aside at the last instant.

Then they came together in blur of motion, attacking and parrying, trapping and escaping. KnightMask made mostly for a defensive fight, but Natalia pulled none of her punches. Fire simmered in her eyes and each strike seemed to have deadly intentions behind it.

"Enough!" Natalia finally cried out and broke away, panting.

"You're right, you know, Natalia. Its not just a match against Crimson Cobra. It is a battle for catch-wrestling. My submission arsenal and Crimson Cobra's are both going to be put on display. This is my chance to spread the art. This is my chance to light the fire...maybe not in the eyes of all the fans...maybe not in most of them...but if I can ignite a spark in at least one kid's eyes...the way Sakuraba did for me...then that's enough."

Natalia shook her head in disgust.

"Then I wish Sakuraba had never been born! Perhaps without that fool....you never would've taken up this fool's errand to champion an ignoble art that had outlived its usefulness. An ugly art that belonged to coal miner's and carnival performers. Jiu jitsu belonged to the samurai! To the nobility! How could you think to bring a peasant's art on par with jiu jitsu? If only you had just stuck to your studies...you never would have faced my father in the finals of ADCC...and maybe then...maybe you and I..."

"Natalia...I don't want to defeat jiu jitsu. One style can never defeat another. Heck, no human being can ever be a pure or perfect expression of a style...because his technique is never going to be perfect and unless he never goes out and trains or competes, he can't help but be influenced and changed by other styles. I promise you, all I want for catch-wrestling...is for it not to be forgotten. I just want people to acknowledge the existence of it...is that too much to ask?"

"Why, why do you care so much about it?"

"Its who I am, Natalia. It always was. Maybe the matches of Kazushi Sakuraba and Masakatsu Funaki didn't contain the secret of life within them...but they contained the secret to my life...or at least, a part of it! You know...after high school...I used to always have nightmares...where I had a second chance at going to the state tournament in wrestling. After I won my first grappling tournament...those nightmares went away."

"Those particular nightmares. What a gift." Natalia replied, dripping sarcasm.

"You know, there's something else. Before I learned the art of leg-locking...I always felt like...I didn't really deserve to be around someone like you. Someone as tough and as strong as you. Part of what I was looking for...was a way to make myself worthy. Of you, Natalia."

"I wish you would've asked me, then. I would've told you to scrap it...and stick to your studies. I mean, your real studies. Anyway, it doesn't matter now."

Natalia dropped a smoke pellet. Clouds of smoke rose up and enveloped her. When they cleared, she was gone. He supposed she still wanted to kill him. It didn't seem as big of a thing as it would've before he entered the XWF. These days, he was looking death in the eye on a weekly basis.

KnightMask walked over to a poster hanging on the wall of the gym. It was a photo of the moment when Kazushi Sakuraba, the catch-wrestler, had broken the arm of Renzo Gracie, the Brazilian jiu jitsu practitioner. It was a moment Renzo Gracie referred to as the proudest of his career, because in spite of his arm being broken by Sakuraba's spinning Kimura, he had not tapped out. He said that in that moment, he had transcended pain. He had found it within himself to go on, regardless of injury.



For catch-wrestling, KnightMask wanted to put on a performance that revealed the beauty and dynamism the art was capable of. For himself...and for Crimson Cobra...he hoped that they could achieve a moment like Renzo and Sakuraba had achieved. A moment where too combatants were able to push one another to a point where, for at least one, brief, shining moment, pain was transcended.

Pain, and perhaps age-old rivalries as well.