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Ned Kaye · (12-24-2023)

The Haunting II:

Christmas, Ghosts & Other Clichés

Isaiah gazes up at the towering New York City skyscraper. A green strip of light indicated the central elevator shaft, carrying unaware souls into the devil’s den.

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This ragtag team had tracked every known head-dealer to this very location over the last week. Enough rats returning to the cheese-factory confirmed their hypothesis.

Here lay the source of evil.

After their little warehouse explosion, and the months of Isaiah being a thorn in the Kingpin’s side… Jeremiah was about to poison Harlem’s cocaine supply to finally crush his opponents.

“It’s time to exorcize our demons.” Isaiah keeps his eyes glued to the top of the tower.

“I have a great therapist recommendation?” Ned quips, leaning against Ezekiel’s Challenger.

No response.

“A man can hope. I still don’t think this is a good idea.” Ned gives the skyscraper one more look… Seventy… no, eighty floors?

“Ned, you don’t think ANYTHING is a good idea, lord knows how you get out of bed in the morning.” Amelia threw in her two cents.

Ezekiel let out an affirming grunt.

“If we don’t cut em’ down now, half my borough dies in the morning… And he’ll only take up more space in our heads. Ghosts gotta be exorcised once you find em’ or they follow you home.” Isaiah checked the wraps on his fists, adjusting the gold knuckledusters covering them.

Ezekiel gave his night-sticks a swing before sliding them into their holsters on his thighs.

“Amy…”

“Enough Ned, I’d rather die here than wake up tomorrow terrified.”

Ned rubbed the bridge of his nose in resignation.

“Time to call em’.” Isaiah reached through the window and wrapped his fingers around the collar of his guide.

Jeremiah’s worthless drug-dealer, Toothless Dave, attempted to comment through a gag.

Isaiah yanked the sock out of Toothless’ mouth and handed him his cellphone.

Toothless averted his gaze as he entered his employer’s number.

“Y-y-yeah, Cheeks, payment, I’m h-h-here.” He barely forced out.

Isaiah grabbed the phone off him and slammed it into the tarmac, crushing it under his booth. Ezekiel slams a fist into the side of Toothless’ head, knocking the dealer out cold.

“It’s time to shine some light on this demon.”

A hushed agreement fell over the four as they walked towards the foot of the building, its sheer mass looming above. Begging to crumble.

A stone seat carved with the familiar faces of previous kings. The visage of every Universal Champion in recent history within sight, including Bobby and Flynn.

On it sits the current champion, Isaiah King, intermittently lit up by flickering flames that flank him.

He leans onto his palm and looks straight into the camera.

“Haunting.

A persistent and disturbing presence of a thing unwanted.

Ghosts, ex-girlfriends, trauma and… Pests.

Haunting.

The feeling you get what you just can’t get rid of something…

Haunting.

What you two are doing to this business… This company.

You loom over it disgustingly, like an irremovable shadow.

You mask your malevolence with quip-py humor, back-and-forth idiocy.

Skirts and schemes, 1800s and Monty Python ripoffs.

Haunting.

Cos once you sat on this throne yourselves…

…But now…

…Now, you hold this company hostage by deceiving the masses and those in the locker room with bullshit about your superiority, your “championing” of the space.

You want us to think you’re on top, so that nobody else ever feels like they can get there.

So that nobody thinks it gets any better.

… And we’ve let you get away with it because your oppression is paired with some pretty convincing ring work. Some impressive fights.

But really when it comes down to it…

You’re just hasbeens struggling to keep things fresh, hm?

Once the kings of the castle, now dancing in skirts and chucking bits.

Bitching about not getting shots at gold while being literal cockroaches with briefcases.

One squandered, the other hidden… Why?

Scared you’ll actually have to face reality… Accept that your careers might be over?.

So instead, you jerk each other off, better to dance with another devil than come and face the light… Right?

You can spray as much Axe on a corpse, but it won’t start dancing. You can run through as many tag-team partners as you want Bobby but they’re all going to go the same way.

Charlie, TK… Dolly, oh and whatever happened to Crash?

You can keep trying to keep things fresh… But we’re sick and tired of your shit.

And FLYNN! The fuck are you doing?

You were THE hot shit when I first came to the XWF.

Now you’re digging up your dead boyfriend to stay relevant?

Anybody even remember’s that guys name?

One dying tag-partner for another? What, did you realize being a decent human being wouldn’t win you any glory? That you’d rather swim in Bobby’s piss than be forgotten?

From Universal Champion to holding championships to an empty division.

Hot tip Flynn, if you want them to cheer your name, come for the King.

Drop the deadweight.

Fuck. Your. Titles.

Fuck. Your. Careers.

WE’RE actually doing something.

Actually moving ahead.

Building a kingdom.

Inspiring relevance.

Iron sharpening Iron.

But YOU - You’re haunted by your own delusions.

Mark, dearest, you’ll never get your head outta ya own ass…

And that’s why it’s you that needs us.

You need an exorcism.

Because my dear friend…

Without us, you’ll never find your way.

Without us, you’ll fade away, sputtering nonsense like Bobby.

I’m trying to save you, friend.

Save you from your own irrelevance.”

Isaiah slams a fist into the stone throne, smirking into the camera. A crack cuts right through the carvings of Flynn and Bourbon as the screen cuts to black.

*Ding!*

The doors of the elevator parted slowly. Floor 65. The guard keeping watch of the hallway had a glazed over expression.

“Uh- who’re you-”

Amelia’s elbow driven into his solar plexus most definitely woke him up.

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Ezekiel gripped onto his mouth to keep him from screaming, maneuvering into position to deliver a lariat to send the guard’s head into the wall behind him to knock him out.

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As the guard watching Jeremiah’s private elevator approached to see the cause of the commotion, Isaiah locked in a chokehold, keeping the second guard at bay.

Just when all seemed safe to proceed, a cocking gun sounded behind King.

Ned flew forward, his hand connecting with his windpipe as his opposite hand grabbed onto the pistol, dismantling it before tossing him back to Ezekiel to knock out. Amelia smirked slightly as the four loaded onto the second elevator.

“Jesus, Ned,” she chuckled as she spoke, admiring the defeated guards as the doors shut.

“Just because I disagree with some of this operation doesn’t mean I can’t handle myself.”

“God, you make being a badass sound so fucking sourpuss.”

The stone throne comes up on your screen once more, this time with Ned Kaye standing behind it and leaning against the carved beauty.

The room is lit brightly, and the throne itself empty.

“The greatest traps are the ones we set for ourselves. An old man lies on a bed and is met with the visage of not just a ghost, but a friend. An ethereal reminder of the sins clawing their way across his skin. The fear isn’t emanating from the eyes staring from beyond the grave, but the ones inside his skull. And on cue for Christmas Eve, I am visited by a specter, however not one from my past.”

“Bobby has already begun resurrecting the old Mark Flynn, the man who viewed friendship as a commodity to toss away. I made it clear that I had no intent of speaking ill of Mark, a fact I made abundantly clear, but he leaped at the chance to try and cut Isaiah and I down. I don’t know what’s worse, the fact that you’re willing to say shit you barely mean or the fact that you feel like you have to. You can keep up the performance with a lot of people, Mark, but you’re gonna have to try a lot harder if you wanna fool me. Where’s the man who stumbled his way through trying to celebrate Darcy and I having a baby? The man who insisted on being a godfather and worked harder to die for a hypothetical infant than he does most matches? What about Bobby pulls this sad, inauthentic person out of you?”

“Is it the bars ripped from a middle schooler’s notebook? Is it the wacky adventures that require you to have a foot out of reality from the get go or is it fear creeping up again? Fear of not being good enough? Playing second fiddle to the third string general? Connection? Wanna know what I think, Mark? I think Bobby’s easy. He’s the kind of person who will bend and flex as he leads you down a mineshaft littered with dead canaries. He’ll humor this part of you because he thinks he knows what you are and he’s certain it will lead him to good places and he knows that a small voice in the back of your head keeps telling you that being a great man is out of the picture, but being a great champion is still possible. The voice that haunts you in your darkest hours.”

“I will be your exorcist.”

The doors opened, the posh velvet interior of Jeremiah’s private lift illuminating the dark office. A chill passed through the air. Despite the desk staring at them from across the office, the throne behind it lay empty. Despite the grandiose exterior, it was as vacuous as the inside of the man who owned it. Isaiah and Ned stepped out first, investigating as Ezekiel and Amelia followed close behind.

Signs of a struggle. Some small stains. Ned knelt down, his fingertips tracing over the floor before lifting his hand up.

Red.

His eyes widened before locking with King’s. Before Kaye could speak, a warning shot flew past their heads, shattering a window on the executive floor.

“Well, well, well,” Jeremiah spoke, limping out from behind a statue. In his right hand was an automatic pistol, his left clutched to his side, blood seeping outward, “look who decided to show.”

“It’s over,” King said, careful not to twitch with a weapon pointed at him, “You, us, this empire - it’s all going to be just another blip in history.”

“You’re done,” Ned added, noticing where Jeremiah’s gaze was heading and trying to absorb that attention.

Jeremiah coughed, wet.

His eyes shifted to Amy and the bright lights of the city revealed a face contorted in anger.

“Nah… nah, nah, I ain’t getting taken down by some punk and his fuckin’ junkie! I’M THE KING, NEW YORK IS MY KINGDOM!”

“You need to believe that, dontcha? That you did something bigger than sell a bunch of drugs and whore out some people. Take it from me, king, you’re high off your own shit.” Amelia spat out.

“Is time I shut you up, bitch.” Jeremiah aimed the barrel at Amy, the tension in the air beginning to boil.

He pulled the trigger.

A flash of light.

“AMY!!”

No answer.

“AMY!!”

Ned looked back, Amelia was crouched low, pinned to the ground by the hulking mass of…

Of Ezekiel.

The big man’s eyes were empty, a bullet hole separating them.

Another flash of light. A raspy, wet laugh from Jeremiah.

“That stupid little…”

A guttural roar broke through Isaiah’s lips as he charged towards Jeremiah, swinging a tight fist against his enemy.

“YOU. FUCKING. PIECE. OF.-”

The head snapped back, blood pouring out from Jeremiah’s mouth, his eyes glistening with glee.

“I’LL FUCKIN’ KILL-”

Another flash of light.

Jeremiah’s swinging head thuds against the carpet floor…

Completely separated from it’s body.

The blood of his oldest… friend, splattered across Isaiah’s face, speechless.

And a cold, stained blade pressed up against his neck, held by a masked man.

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“Well, now now, no need to get your hands that dirty… son.”

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