It has to be 100 degrees outside, even at night. Hot, muggy. Sweltering. Mosquitos rule the roost, and bugs the size of silverware made it a horror movie come-to-life outside, like something out of the Mist by Stephen King. I swear I’ve swatted away more creatures than the Kardashian sisters.

Fucking Florida.

The lights are on in the trailer, but it’s hard to see detail inside due to the dirtiness of the window. Two old cars sat out front, one on blocks with the wheels missing and one that looked as though it hadn’t been driven, or even started, in decades. But I know it has, I can still smell the gas.

Fucking Florida.

There is music coming from inside, a muffle hum of a portable bass speaker and the unmistakable odor of marijuana. There were voices as well, male and female, and they were louder than should have been necessary for the music volume. Not yelling loud, but annoying, intoxicated and talking at a higher than necessary volume loud. Sprinkle in a few cigarette-cracked laughs. The driveway and front yard are littered with nonsense, tributes to a life of not-giving-a-fuck and being too lazy to even if they wanted to. This is really the job they want? This person was really that high of an interest to them? This person wasn’t even of a high interest to themselves, based on their living standard. But, drugs pay, and a body pays more.

Fucking Florida.

My breathing comes to almost a halt, I have to be as quiet as possible. One thing about Florida rednecks, they always have guns and plenty of them.

“Dey took er’ jerbs!” came to my head and I had to stifle a giggle.

”Really? What the fuck is this? Are you serious?”

Using Doc’s gauntlet, I touch him on his shoulder. Forcing him to watch.

”Keep watching,” I instruct him.

I was standing outside, waiting. I was always far too patient.

‘Just kick in the door and start blasting’ I heard me tell myself, but that wouldn’t be very practical. I shook my head.

”GET OUT OF MY HEAD!”

There is noise in the garage, I think the door leading into the house opened. Maybe someone is coming out to get beer? Maybe they know? Honestly….why was I just standing there?

IDIOT!

But I froze.

”I really don’t need to see…..”

“KEEP WATCHING!” I shout at him, my voice was almost a growl now, the gauntlet? Perhaps. Again, I grab Chaos by his shoulder.

The garage door opened, and I took a deep breath. I took a few steps forward and hid in the shadows of the overgrown shrubs by the garage. The target had been located. I reached into my pocket and I felt the cold steel. I could see the dollar signs in my eyes. I could see my mother tied up, the bruises on her face…..this would be easy. I have done this hundreds of times before.

Literally hundreds.

Some referred to me as “the best”.

As the target stepped out into the open air, I pulled my hand out of my pocket. I felt the coldness on my flesh as I whipped my hand upwards and…..

Froze.

He was holding his infant daughter in his arms. She was smiling and giggling, but instantly began to cry as she saw me. My eyes met his……..and my cold soul……..

I couldn’t do it. I couldn’t get the job done………

Suddenly the image cracked and blurred, it became like watching a blender grind up ingredients and I even felt the pinch.

I was suddenly staring at the lights.

I was on my back.

”What the hell is this?

“FOCUS,” I order, and by using the gauntlet, force Chaos against his will to watch his failures.

Jim Caedus stood above me. He was sweaty and gross, as usual. Grunting like a caveman, eyes wide like a caveman on meth.
He grinned, his yellow teeth barely visible through the scruff on his face.

I felt the weight on my body. I felt my leg lift. I heard the slaps on the mat.

Once.


Twice.


Three Times.

I heard the bell ring.

I tried to get up and I couldn’t get up.

I blinked, and I opened my eyes again.

Robert Main was standing above me.

Robby Bourbon.

Caedus and Main again. The smell wasn’t pleasant this time around either.

I blinked again.

Doctor D’Ville.

THADDEUS DUKE!

ALIAS!

”Stop! Just stop. I get it.”

A force grabbed my hair, shoved me forward. Holding my head in place.

“You don’t. You don’t get it Chris. You were the best in the world. You were the cream of the crop. You were the saving grace. The voice of an era. The face of a company...

“I mean, at least in your own mind.

“The reality cuts a little different though. You were the top dog once… I told you then, I meant it then, and I mean it now… You were a minnow in the shallows, and the sharks had not yet come to feast.

“They came Chris, like I told you they would. They ate you alive, like I told you they would.

“...and now…..you’re this.

“Chris….you want to point fingers. Woe is me, woe is Chris. You fail to see that through all of this that your talent is still there. Your abilities have not wavered in the five years you’ve been here. Your passion and fire is still there. Your biggest problem, Chris….is HERE.”

A sharp pain stabbed me in the chest.

“Here…...and…….here.”

My head was pounding, as if an elephant was charging into the front of my skull.

“What happened Chris, is YOU. Your conscience. You were so worried about being liked, getting along, and being respected that you lost what made you... you.”

”I hate you so much.”

“Feeling's mutual. Anyway, not nearly as much as you hate you.”

I felt my lip curl into a snarl.

“You lost what you loved about you, and you lost what THEY loved about you. You had no conscience, no soul, no qualms with doing and saying whatever the hell you wanted, regardless of whose feathers you ruffled. You had no qualms coming out telling us you were the best….and you damn sure proved it… at least for a little while…

“This isn’t Thad’s fault, Doc’s fault, Jim’s fault, Engy’s fault, Corey’s fault… Alias… no Chris… you killed the chaos.

“…you quit.”

Staring at Chris, I see the anger inside of him, begging to be let out. Reminding him of his failures is pleasing to me and I can’t help but smile. He tugs at the sides of his hair, his jaw clenches. And with the snap of the gauntlet fingers… nothing happens.

Chaos looks at me for a second.

”What the fuck, Doc!”

With another snap of the fingers…

Poooof!

”What’s up Dawk… you ain’t Dawk. What’s up Thad?”

Another snap.

Nothing.

”Shut the fuck up Cadryn, I’m busy.”

Another snap, another nothing. Finally, I backhand Cadryn into the nether-realm and my intended scenery appears before us. It takes a moment for Chris to take in what he’s seeing.

Warfare.

December 23rd, 2020.

Incensed with rage as the images of me and him from that night live again in front of us. Smiling at him, almost from ear to ear, he steps face to face to me.

”This is for your own fucking ego!”

I chuckle a moment.

”My ego doesn’t need anymore filling,” I say to him. ”And it’s not about me Chris, this was never about me and always about you.”

”I know what fucking happened, Thad!” he calls back, pacing the ring in front of me. He looks at me, then looks at us fighting over seven months ago. Then back to me. ”I damn near had you!”

”You were never getting me to quit Chris,” I inform him. ”Do you know why I chose an I Quit match?”

”To fucking embarrass me!” he shouts and stands face to face with me again.

”No, I did it to prove a point...”


In the “live action replay:” ”I Quit!”


”To prove to you… that you quit...”

”I fucking remember!” he shouts, biting his fist as he tries hard not to what to take me out here and now.

”No,” I interject. ”I don’t mean the match… I mean you quit on yourself a long time ago and I made you quit on live television in front of millions to make you say it out loud.”

”I fucking...”

”You fucking what… Chris?” I ask him, stepping to him. ”Does this piss you off? Does this make you so fucking mad that you want to rip my head off my shoulders right now?”

”You’re god damn right it does!”

”Good,” I say to him and head for the ropes.

”What the hell do you mean good!?” he asks, grabbing my shoulder.

”If I wanted the sad sack pushover you’ve been the last few years… then I’d have never drafted you to begin with,” I begin to explain as I step through the ropes. ”What I want, Chris… is for you to be angry. To be pissed. To be ready to go out there at War Games and not completely suck.”

Exiting the ring, I leave Chaos there to stew in his own anger as the past me and him fade away. He stands in the ring alone.

"You may be right, Alias, my own team captain may think I am a doofus. He may look down on me, and he may think that I can't and will never again beat him......

But those opinions now matter as much as Donald Trump's do. He is on my team, and I no longer have to go through him to get to the promised land. To be completely honest, I would rather have him have low expectations and be pleasantly surprised when I come out and ravish Woodstock Sunday night than have to constantly look over my shoulder for him.....

Oh yes, that's right. You are the UNIVERSAL CHAMPION, and not even the captain of your own team. In fact, your team captain wants what you have the pleasure of holding, and has made that very well known. He has also been known to cash in a time or two………

But who am I to say? I have nothing you want and damn sure nothing you need. My team needs nothing from me other than for me to come out and do what I do best, throw bodies around with reckless abandon. My team wants nothing more from me than to bring the old Chris Chaos back. But for you…...you’re a target, Alias. You’re the flavor of the week, they know it and you know it. You’re hot shit now but they’ll go right back to not caring again once that belt is off your shoulder. I know, I’ve been there. The biggest dog in the yard doesn’t always have the strongest bite.

You may think I am some washed up scrub. You may think that Chris Chaos is more of a threat to himself than to anyone else here. You may think that I will continue to fuck up everything I touch and continue to be the running joke that even Jimmy Fallon wouldn’t laugh it (why was he always laughing during skits on SNL?!!! STOP THAT!), but the fact of the matter is……I am sitting pretty. I have two of the best to ever do this on my team, and I can help them build into something amazing and win this whole shindig. You have a team that secretly wants YOU to fail, but them to win. When you’re the champ, you have no allies. They’ll never admit it. They’ll keep stroking your balls and massaging your massive ego but Alias, facts are facts. You are nothing but an opportunity to them. Vulchers. Snakes. Sharks. And since Morbid decided to throw up a middle finger with one hand and jerk off Jesus with the other, you're given Centurion. You think this makes your chances higher? How does it feel to be the third best on your team, and the one with the only thing anyone who is anyone in this business truly wants? You see how this is coming together now? You and I are both surrounded by legends whose accomplishments are far outshadowed by our own teammates. How does it feel to be a paper champion whose own team makes your belt look like the crown in a Burger King meal?

I bet it's not so good.

I hope so.

So Kim Jung is a little bothered by my insults? Typical. Those people have never been keen to being made fun of. You lost the war once, Sunday will be no different. Your entire people’s history is based on not being able to fully get the job done. Your team is expecting you to be eliminated first. You’re out of shape, Kim Jong-Un..limited servings. You look like an Albino Ninja Turtle. You walk with legends….the Universal Champion, a former multi-time champion whose won everything (seriously, he’s like 85 now) and the name who keeps winning in different bodies and expects us to keep up with 2021 social trends to address him properly. You? Your body type is melted sidewalk ice cream. I am going to make sure that you do your part, and early on. But your promos, such fire! But your talent level? You’re a weird combo. It’s like loading the guns for your own execution and then mooning the shooters while screaming "No Balls!" at them. I am going to put you down like the dog you are.

I bet you just got hungry, huh?

Corey…..Corey, Corey, Corey. It seems like our paths have been crossing quite a bit lately, haven’t they? You’ve had quite a bit to say about me in recent months. I get it. You think I suck. You don’t respect me. You think I’ve reduced myself from one of the sharpest tongues here to making adrogenous sexual orientation jokes and frat-house poop humor. I get it. You think Chris Chaos is the one who doesn’t pay attention, who doesn’t ever know what is going on, and roll your eyes when I say--like many other people here feel but are too afraid to say--that this company is out to get them……..

Weren’t these draft picks RANDOM? Weren’t they taken out of a hat, or bowl, or second hole of a Dick Powers fleshlight? So when you told Andre that he was the “one Ms. Fury DIDN’T pick…..” wouldn’t that scream set up? Scream fraud. Scream…..uh…..deception?!

JUDAS!

But wouldn’t it also say that despite everything that everyone seems to think that my teammates think about me, that they picked me to go on this journey with them? Wouldn’t it say that YOU picked Morbid Angel….a perpetual flake (and not the same way you are, yours has snow in front of it), and North Korean War Criminal, someone who is a step higher than Bilbo and a step lower than Game Girl? Wouldn’t that say that you surrounded yourself with people that wouldn’t out-shine you to better feed your ego and make the XWF world do the one thing you so desperately long for them to do? Talk about Corey Smith. Why else would you THANK Centurion for becoming a member of the team? Well, it makes your team look stronger, for one. But at this point, Cent is just here to show up a few times a month and earn his pension. He isn't here to be in the limelight anymore....but his name, his name holds more weight than a metric ton. So of course, Corey looks good. So Kim Jung and Cent fall to the wayside, and it is just you and Alias…….and that is when you strike. Of course…..everyone is talking about Corey. Just how you “planned” it, right? “I will face Alias once he is the Uni Champ for record time”. Corey, you, or some version of “you” have been around this business long enough to know that the champ can lose at any time, to anyone, and then your whole plan goes to shit. I said before, you’re the smartest little pole smoker in the game…...and the sleaziest.

Am I wrong? Oh yeah, that is right, whatever Corey says is gold. You can't turn his words around, right? Only Chris Chaos says things that aren't true, and only Chris Chaos has his words spun on him. How silly of me to think otherwise.

If that isn't a testament to your ego, I don't know what is.

I see you Corey, we all see you. If you aren't Universal Champion after War Games.....well....then I will publicly admit my wrong on the next show.

I just called your hand. I just put a wrench in your ‘plan’. I just proved to everyone that not only am I better than you....I am....*gasp* SMARTER....

Who'd have thunk it?”

Sitting on the Warfare stage watching on as Chaos finishes his promo, Doc D’Ville appears beside me.

”What do you think?”

I shrug for a moment… exactly as long as Shawn Warstein because fuck you, that’s why…

”He’s pretty pissed off,” I point out the obvious.

”Pissed off enough?”

”We only need him to not be his usual self,” I remind him. ”This is entirely experimental.”

”And if nothing changes?” Doc asks of me. ”If War Games comes and goes and Chris Chaos is still just Chris Kind of Obnoxious?”

”Then I stand by what I told you privately,” I say, looking over at him. ”I’d rather lose with you, than win with anyone else.

“Regardless, he’ll be serviceable enough. And I don’t much plan on losin’.

“Anyway, how’s our other project coming along?”