RP 3 of 3 vs Peter Vaughn for the Supercontinental title

“The only rule is there's only one rule: no rules.” - Dana Snyder



Well Pete, you kinda missed the point on me and my ranch. When I first bought that place, there was nothing there but trees. I had sold it several months back to someone that I shouldn’t have. Now we are in the process of rebuilding what was destroyed by the previous owner. You were right about one thing, I’ll give you credit for that. It does take longer for me to heal these days. Not that it matters much, I’ve been working hurt for most of my career, so it’s not anything new. The real question is will you take advantage of that? Do you know what my current injuries are? You said it yourself, you’re still young in your career. Do you know what to look for? Maybe, and I guess we’ll see how that goes for you. As for the match itself? Yeah, I’m well aware of the rules in a ladder match, there really aren’t any. Over my career, I’ve fought in many of them. I know what it takes to survive them, probably better than most. Here’s something that I think might help you to understand exactly who and what you’re stepping into the ring with.

The first time I ever fought for a world title, was against one of the men in this business that even then I had labeled an icon. His name for reference is Bob Pooler. Our match was three stages of hell. Not the typical variety mind you. Phase one was a doomsday massacre match. To win, you had to put your opponent through a table that was wrapped in barbed wire and set on fire. Phase two was a scaffold match, the traditional one, throw your opponent off the scaffold to the floor or ring below. Dealers choice. The final stage was a ladder match and by the time we got to the third stage, we were both a bloody mess. I won that match, and I’m going to win this one too. Not because I think I’m better than you, it’s because I know that to be true. There are other factors driving me as well. You mistakenly believe that they don’t think you belong here? Outside of Chris, no one wants me here, the folks that make predictions, none of them believe I stand a chance. People believe I’m too angry to focus right now because of the loss to Knox. Thing is, my focus is homed in and I’m more than ready for this, Peter.

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Life is funny sometimes, when Pete had asked about a good foreman, my own foreman came into the house. “Hey Mac, got a second?” I looked up and smiled at Josh, “Sure thing, what’s on your mind?” I scratched his head for a moment, “You remember my little brother, Neil?” I smiled and nodded, remembering him fondly, the guy could work circles around most ranch hands. “Yeah, damn hard worker.” He nodded, “He resigned as a foreman at the Clinton place.” I was shocked at this, to say the least, and it must have shown on my face. “What the hell for? That was a damn good paying job.” “Yeah, he said that ranch hands started coming up missing and it worried him.” There was a joke in there somewhere but I decided to leave it alone. “Well, I know a guy who’s currently looking for a foreman, he’s in the process of building his place and needs someone to help him run it.” He nodded, “Okay, can we call him?” I hit the speed dial option for Neil and he picked up on the first ring. “Hey Mac, long time man.” “yeah, it has been too long my friend. Are you okay with me giving your contact info to a guy I know? He’s looking for a good foreman for his place.” “Yeah, is he local?” I chuckled, “Local to Texas, yes. I think his place is out near Lubbock. One thing you should know, Peter is just starting to build his place out. It’ll be a lot of hard work but he’s a good man.”

“His name is Peter Vaughn,” I said finally. “That sounds like a lot of fun, I haven’t built anything from the ground up since your place all those years ago.” I chuckled, “Yeah, I think your idea of fun and mine may differ.” we all laughed a bit about that. “In all seriousness though, it’s always worth the struggle,” I said to them. “Okay my man, I’ll shoot your information over to him with my personal recommendation.” There was a pause, “Thanks Mac, I hope he’s as good a guy as you say he is. This last one was a fucking doozy.”

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My relationship with Whisper is one that I don’t think I have time or the crayons to explain to you, Peter. You almost seem like you’re going for cheap heat in our last little talk. I certainly hope not. I’ll answer your question though, no she won’t feel anything from our match, to be honest. Since you are obviously aware of my history by now. You already that I am one of the hardest strikers in the game today. So, while Whisper won't feel anything you do to me, I’m going to hit you hard enough that your ancestors feel that shit. As for the rescue, I knew about that, and I’m glad you were able to get her free from the prison that the lesser raven had put her in. I know it wasn’t a real prison, but it probably felt that way to her. I mean, I could claim the moral high ground and just bash you for all you were worth, but I always remember this one thing. This is a cutthroat business, we all know it. Nothing any of us do should surprise anyone. I mean, I certainly wasn’t surprised by the visitor at the Rabbit. I’d have been more disappointed if he didn’t try some stupid shit like that. It’s just his nature, and ours too if we’re honest. Like you, I hope we’ll still respect each other after this match. I’ll be glad to shake your hand before and after this match. I’ll even buy the first round.

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I sat in front of my laptop, wearing sweatpants and nothing else. I had tied my hair back in a ponytail, just to rip the rubber band out again. I had watched and rewatched the last promo back, and I noticed a gap in the promo. The video had cut to static when I started talking to the group about my time in Afghanistan. That got my brain churning in an almost conspiracy theorist kind of way, but I shut that down internally. “I know what you’re thinking Mac, don’t go there, it’s bad for the soul.” I looked down at my coffee cup and noticed it was empty, I sighed heavily, and began walking to the kitchen. I refilled my cup, I preferred my coffee black these days, I think mostly due to the redhead I was married to. Lactose intolerance is a thing in our house and I find it easier to not have anything dairy-based in the house at all. Then my mind went back to the interruption in the video feed again. “Maybe I should call Jeff,” I mused out loud, he was leading national security these days, maybe he could shine a light on this. Maybe Krator would know if something was up, but that guy was nuts. The fact that he knew where Spatharos lived was scary. Last I heard, Francis had gotten his own command. It was a bit concerning that the command he got was where I had been stationed in Puerto Rico.

This of course conflicted with the information the Krator had on him. He was under the impression that the asshole had retired. Maybe I should ask him for that information on Spaz. It might be worth looking into. Now that I had my coffee, I started making my way to the back door. I paused only long enough to pick up the pack of cigarettes on my way out of the house. It was still early morning in Vegas, and fairly cool, but I didn’t mind that. I sat down with coffee and cigarettes when my phone buzzed. It was an incoming text from Krator…

The address is as follows…

Then nothing came through, it was just a blank text message after that. “Now that is fucking strange.” I sent him a text back, letting him know that nothing came through. I lit a cigarette and leaned back into the chair. Taking a long drag and exhaling slowly, “Krator, you’re playing a dangerous game, I hope you know what you’re doing.” He was known for having outbursts that made no sense, and they would eventually get bad enough that his family would have to take him to the hospital. I hoped that this wasn’t the man’s medication cycling on him again. Another part of me thought that it had to be that and not the truth. He couldn’t possibly know where Spatharos was living or even if he was still alive. That asshole made a lot of enemies over the years. The fact that he’d lived as long as he did was a miracle in itself. Another sip of coffee was followed by another drag from my cigarette. My phone buzzed again, the address did come through this time but the address was Krator’s. “That’s weird,” I thought to myself. I sent a text back to him about what was going on. The answer I got was, “An experiment of sorts.” I got what he was talking about immediately. He figured someone was monitoring him and blocking certain things, so it was information that they didn’t want him to share.

MEET ME AT THE USUAL PLACE

ONE HOUR

Was the text that came through next, using all caps was a way of letting me know he was in trouble or danger of some kind. It was something I had worked out with the group a long time ago. “Fuck,” was all I could say as I put the cigarette out and made my way back into the house. I quickly dressed and made my way to the garage. The usual place was a dive bar on the edge of town, the name was “Jim’s Place” and was frequented by a very diverse clientele. The folks that went in there varied from bikers to strippers to businessmen. It was truly all over the board. I’d known Jim for a while now and he was all about being inclusive, he would not deny access to his place to anyone. He was one of those old Navy guys that didn’t care who you were or your past and whether it was shady or not. I just liked for people to have a good time. There was also a rumor that the traveling exhibit of the wall would be on display there this weekend. I grabbed my jacket from the barstool that was near my vrod and slipped it on. I zipped up the jacket and prepared to jet.

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A short time later I was cruising into the parking lot of Jim’s Place, he had motorcycle parking available and so I cruised into one of the open spots. I could see off to the right, his memorial day display.



I walked up to the mock-up of the wall, finding the name of my uncle and my father’s cousins, I simply just closed my eyes and paid respect to the men who had fallen in combat. So many lives were lost in conflicts on foreign soil. An older gentleman, wearing a Vietnam ball cap stopped by where I was at. “The brothers' cole,” he mentioned, some of the bravest and absolutely crazy bunch of bastards I’ve ever known. I served with them in ‘nam.” I looked up at the man who was talking, “Where at?” I asked him in a polite and respectful tone. He smiled, “you one of their kin? You look a lot like Allison Cole, mean bastard that one.” I smiled and nodded my head, “I’ve heard that before.” He smiled, “Retired Captain, John Henrich,” he said as a way of introduction. “I was the flight officer aboard the corral sea.” We shook hands and he wandered off. I didn’t stay at the memorial long, as I heard the rumbling of an older vehicle. Krator’s sixty-seven mustang loped into the parking lot and he parked not far from me.

I could hear the mechanical noise of the parking brake as it was set and the lovely sound of the motor die as he cut it off. He exited the car, carefully looking around to make sure his environment was safe. I approached him and we shook hands, “Thanks for meeting me here boss. I think that his people are blocking comm’s.” I studied him for a moment, “Well, I agree that it was a bit strange, but are you certain it was him?” His gaze hardened as he spoke to me. “Mac, I’m the only one that knows he hasn’t retired. He lives here in Vegas now and I have to wonder why that is.” I shrugged, “You know the saying Krator, our black ops have black ops, it could be virtually anything.” He shook his head vehemently, “Nah, son, they don’t spend this kind of cash on a nothing op. He’s here specifically for someone or someone. There are only a few people still alive who know what he did Mac.” I considered that possibility for a moment, “Trust me Krator, I’m not blowing off what you’re saying but it’s just hard to believe that he would go to this much trouble to silence a few people.” He looked kind of hopeless at me, “Are you familiar with the phrase famous last words of a fool?”

Something in the distance caught my eye, sunlight flashing against the glass of a scope most likely. Instinct took over and I threw him to the ground and we rolled around the corner for cover. There was no sound but the clouds exploding in the dirt and gravel told me everything I needed to know. Then it subsided, “God damnit!” I said it loud enough that it may have sounded like a shout. Moments later I could hear a helicopter, it flew over the parking lot and headed straight for the horizon where I’d seen the flash.

Fade.

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Well, philosophy is all fine and good, something that could be debated for generations. We both know why we are here and what we’re fighting for. It’s easy to say that you want this more than I do. It’s quite another to prove it. It’s funny too, a lot of kids believe as you do. That my age and physical conditioning may be going downhill. Oh, it’s worth talking about for sure. Yeah, I’m forty-six years old. I’ve had surgery on many things over the years. Most of those surgeries happened long before you ever entered this business. By the time I was thirty I had already won seven world titles and countless world tag team titles. I do love your confidence though, however, thinking you're going to bury me? I’m not that easy to kill, kid. Men twice to three times as mean as you are have been trying for almost two decades. As to whether either of us can walk away from the ring of our own power? Probably not, but who’s to say, really?

Pete, something you need to understand, I don’t give a fuck if you want to bring in old stablemates to help take me down. You could call SuMa tonight and he’d probably make the trip to help you. Thing is, it simply doesn’t matter to me how many you’re going to use. Probably none would be my guess but who knows. I mean you are a man with a proven track record, not that you needed to involve others in your matches but it’s certainly more fun that way, right? Giving friends the opportunity to share that spotlight is fun and sometimes funny. Allowing them to bask in your greatness, shit, peter, you don’t have to justify your actions to me. You’re not a bad guy, I’m a terrible human being and there are plenty of people who would tell you that. Usually the ones I beat for titles, but hell, even my wife admits that I’m awful. If you can’t take her word for it, you can’t trust anyone.

That’s why I said what I said earlier about the moral high ground in this business. I’ve used it in the past, sure. I won’t in this case though, we are men who can and will do anything to win a match. This time will be no different, I think we can both agree on that. You will bring everything you have in your arsenal and so will I. Burning ladder, chainsaws, knuckle dusters, bring all of it. The big difference is I don’t need weapons to put a man down, and I never have. So bring your kicks and tricks and I’ll bring these soup bones and these size thirteen boots to stick straight up your ass. We are going to steal the show, Pete, that’s what we do, every place we go. This will not be different, it will be better. We’ll leave people wondering how this isn’t the main event.

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I don’t really talk about my past very much but since you brought up my childhood and all. Let me tell you a little story, Pete. How I was forced into the armed forces by a local judge. My father almost killed my mother twice. The second time was when I was about seventeen years old. We had just come back from southwest Louisiana, I was getting stronger by the day and bolder due to that fact. Between the pit fighting and training to become a wrestler, it was a daily confidence boost for me.



Thirty years ago

My father had gone on up to the apartment that we lived in. It was cramped to say the least, him, my mom, my three sisters, and me. It was a typical summer night in Port Arthur, Texas. The humidity was so high it felt like you were swimming in your own sweat. I knew something was wrong when I heard the door to our apartment slam shut. I grabbed my gear and headed up. I found the door was partially off its hinges and I shouldered my way through. I found my mother sprawled on the kitchen floor, bleeding from her nose and mouth. He was standing over her like some wild animal, snarling at her, words that sounded like gibberish. When I dropped the bags he whirled on me and snarled something about staying out of it. All the while I could hear my sisters in the living room sobbing uncontrollably. That’s when I made my decision. “Hey Pop, how about we have a beer and talk on the balcony for a bit.” He laughed at me and said in a voice that was as hard as steel, “I don’t drink with pussies!” That was when I struck, hitting him as hard as I could in the jaw, it dropped him like a sack falling to the floor. I helped my mother back to her feet.

“Never again, mom. I won’t allow him to do this ever again,” I said in the softest way I knew how. He started to come to and so I kicked him in the side of the head as hard as I could. “Mac, baby, no, don’t kill him,” my mother shrieked to me, she was hysterical and I was angrier than I had been ever before in my seventeen years. I was very young and had no control over my anger at that time. I drug him to his feet, yelling at Angie, my oldest sister to open the balcony door. She did so quickly and I hauled the old man out there over my shoulder. I honestly to this day, don’t know what I was thinking at the time but I threw him off the balcony and he landed on the hood of our car with a satisfying crunch of metal and glass. I had done my damndest to kill that mother fucker, but I failed to do so. My mother found out from the paramedics that showed up a short time later that he was paralyzed but not dead. I’ll be honest, that broke my heart a little bit. I was so sure, I could stop him from terrorizing my family that I never stopped once to consider the consequences. I was of course arrested, being a minor, I was placed in a juvie center and awaited trial.

When my court date arrived, I was tried as an adult, much to the chagrin of my court-appointed attorney and my family. The pleas of my mother and the attorney fell on deaf ears. The judge was friends with the old man, played college ball together, or some such bullshit. The judge told me that I had a choice to make. Judge Parker, “Young man, you have two options, join a branch of the military or six years in Huntsville.” Even I knew I didn’t want Huntsville, a maximum-security prison. The odds of me surviving the sentence were lower than a marine in a warzone. So, I chose military service, having already graduated high school at the age of seventeen, no delayed enlistment, was not an option they told me at the courthouse. It’s a story that is as old as civilization I think. Kids get into trouble and some crackpot judge thinks that military life will fix you. It kinda did, after a fashion. My time in the United States Navy taught me many things. How to hate authority even more than I already did, and how to hate people twice as much as that. It also taught me more about defending myself than I already knew. It taught me how to break people, not just their bones, but their spirits.

Present time

There is of course more to that story, but perhaps another time. The whole point in telling you all of this was so you could straighten your facts out. The other thing is that I really hate it when people try to patronize me. It never ends well.

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Even though I thought I had left Jack Spawn behind me in Grand Junction, Colorado, I swear I could still feel him staring at me. Like I was being watched, even here in Port Arthur. I didn’t think it was possible as we continued to work on the ranch, trying to repair the harm that had been done when the Del Gado family owned it. I finished ratcheting down the last strand of barbed wire and the tendrils were creeping in my skull again as if he was fishing for information. I quickly put up walls, the way that Maria had taught me to before I left Colorado. After a moment of concentration, the sensation subsided. Josh, “You okay, amigo?” I nodded as I continued to focus on keeping whatever it was out of my head. “Yeah, about time for a break, though.” He nodded vigorously in agreement, “Definitely, was a long day but a good one.” I slapped him on the shoulder, “Yes sir, got a lot done today.” With that we headed to the truck, it was time for a shower and something cold to drink. I dropped him at the ranch house and I went up to my place. I stepped inside and started stripping as I went, I’d pick up clothes later. I wasn’t completely naked yet as I stopped by the wet bar. I grabbed a chilled tumbler and filled it halfway with Laphroaig scotch, and then two ice cubes.

Well, Pedro. We are coming up on the time when the rubber meets the road so to speak. We’ve had such wonderful talks over the last couple of weeks. Where you’ve talked about what you know about me, and quite honestly, ninety percent of it was wrong. That’s okay, I don’t mind, no one will care anyway. It doesn’t matter to the average wrestling fan that what you say about me, bears no resemblance to the truth. All they care about is the fight. We are similar in that regard, we’d rather fight than trade wristlocks. We’d rather bloody each other than exchange pleasantries. We’d rather beat each other senseless than trade ideas about philosophy. That’s how I see it from my perspective. What I’ve noticed in XWF is that people, even though they know my reputation, will doubt me out of habit. Know why? I’m not a homegrown product of this company. It was much the same in Sin City, they didn’t think I could hack it in their company. Well, not until I started dismantling their roster. I became a triple crown champion in the first 8 to 10 months I was there. Your resume is very impressive Pete, I’ll never say anything other than what you deserve. In my opinion, you are a competitor who deserves respect. You’ve accomplished quite a lot since you became a full-time roster member.

Anyone who says anything differently is just trying to create revisionist history to benefit themselves. Yes, I have that level of respect for your ability. But, really, we’ve talked enough about you. I want to talk about myself for a bit. It is after all my all-time favorite subject. While I don’t have a list of names as you do here in XWF to boast about. Considering I’ve lost one match since I signed on. I realize it was Marf, but everyone has an off day from time to time. I’ve beaten everyone else in my path to date. We know that we are both fighters, people who have scratched and clawed to get everything they wanted in this life. What you don’t know is how I fight. I don’t use weapons often, I try not to at all. It’s not about any moral high ground as many would have you believe. It’s because of the satisfying crunch that I hear, whether it’s punching someone in the jaw or dropping them face-first on the ring apron. The sound of their spine popping when I drop them on the mat, or the sound of cartilage giving up as damage someones ankle or shoulder. The sound of someone screaming in pain and slapping their hand on the mat because they want me to stop. I don’t more often than not.

Where you use weapons, I use the environment to my advantage. Make no mistake about it, I’m a hell of a lot more savage than Knox ever thought about being. He kicks people a lot, where I’ll rip up the padding just so I can drop someone on their head. I’ll bust you open with my bare hands just because of calluses and scar tissue. It’s not personal as I told you before. I know you and Lux took exception to my beating him in my debut. I didn’t book the match and to be quite honest, out of respect for him and disdain for Pryce. We didn’t play by his rules, we kept it in the ring and fought like men are supposed to. It goes beyond all of that though. Any time someone tries to make their legacy off of my back, that’s a problem. Not for me, for them and you. From the thinly veiled threats to the age-related barbs. You will find out exactly why promoters started calling me the One-Man Wrecking Crew all those years ago. I earned it. I earned every ounce of it and I’ve been re-earning it ever since. Don’t mistake my kindness and respect for you for weakness. That is a good way to piss me off and get yourself hurt in the process.