February 4th, 2021

Ned stared off into space as he sat in the office of Dr. Urias Pheelanruff. The loss of the Hart Title was fresh on his mind, yet… there was something strange internally with him. No damage or anything, but a lack of a familiar feeling he hadn’t yet come to process. He decided he’d better try and fight the idea off before he got hung up on it. All that considered, Kaye wasn’t sure if Urias branding today’s session as “Feelings Day” was going to be constructive or the opposite. The doctor walked into the room pushing a table with a blanket over it to hide whatever props Pheelanruff had planned to incorporate into this session today.

“I know you’ve had a rough time since all that business with Bell, so I thought we’d go ahead and slow down the pace and do something a little more down to Earth for a change! Just a real easy session where you can open up.”

Urias was sounding reasonable in his methods which reassured Ned for all but a passing second as he convinced himself that this would be a lead into something totally nonsensical. Pheelanruff pulled back the blanket.

“Hand puppets! They’re a sure fire way to get through any rough exterior, even yours, buddy!”

Glaring at the assorted XWF hand puppets on the table, Ned’s head began to sink into his hands, obscuring his sight long enough for Urias to don the Noah Jackson puppet, it’s hair concerning in its accuracy.

“Talk about your feelings, cuck!” Urias clumsily moved its mouth which synced up with the words about as well as a 1960s Godzilla dub.

“Doc, I-“

“You’re not talking to me, you’re talking to Puppet Noah!”

Ned paused, doing his best to stay composed.

“Urias. I don’t want to speak to Puppet Noah. I want to speak with you.”

The doctor’s eyes lit up as he lifted his other hand to reveal a Puppet Urias already prepared.

“Sure, Ned! What do you want to talk about?”

Feeling his patience wane, Ned established a strong point of eye contact in hopes that it would clue Urias into his desires for some degree of normalcy, although it really just made the doc lift the hand with his puppet doppelganger in front of his face. Swallowing his pride somewhat, Ned decided he would play Urias’s game for a moment if only to approach a more standard therapy experience.

“Puppet Urias, I am not interested in talking with you right now. I’d like to speak with my regular, non-puppet psychiatrist.”

“That’s a shame! Do you think Puppet Ned would wanna talk to little ol’ me?”

“I categorically think that he wouldn’t.”

“Why don’t you ask him?”

Finally becoming a bit fed up, Ned grabbed the puppet resembling him and placed it over his hand.

“I don’t want to talk.” Ned made his puppet self say in a monotone declaration.

“Why not? It obviously means a lot to you.”

“Because I’m a puppet and the real person with a problem is Ned. Right, Ned?” He pointed the puppet’s head towards his own without glancing at it.

“Right.”

“See, now you’re getting it!”

“No! There’s nothing to get! It’s just me talking to myself that doesn’t mean anything! I can bounce this thing around all day but it’s just me!”

“Then why's this the closest you've come to talking about the megachurch incident?”

Ned didn’t answer immediately.

-----

Stood in front of a wall in The Notorious Gym, Ned took a deep breath, clearly a little uncertain about his words. With a loud exhale, he rubbed his hands together and nodded as if to confirm something to himself.

“I wish it was easier to come out here and talk to you all. I really do. I wish there could be a class that taught this unique feeling so I could be more prepared when addressing it. It’s tempting to dwell on this sensation after the elation I felt being your Hart Champion and that honor now being claimed by R.L. Edgar, but one thing I was taught was that, contrary to what organizations like BOB might tell you, your losses do not define you. Your handling of them does.”

“But if they did define people and groups, what would that say about BOB’s relationship with me? Despite reaching every low, attempting to find new rock bottoms they can proudly excavate, BOB has not once beaten me. Hell, after they formed, not a member of Chaotic Inc has beaten me? You know why that is? I don’t wrestle your groups the same way I wrestle honest athletes. I’ve seen a million dime a dozen opportunists in my career and all of them frustrate me to my core. And I think some of it is knowing that the people drawn to these groups aren’t typically lacking talent, but patience. You don’t go to BOB because you can never win a title, but because you it makes it easier to win that title faster. Even Chris Page is now guilty of this and I just want to sit down with him and those who have walked that path and try and let them know how much poison they inject into their legacies for a temporary feeling of glory. But they’ll never listen to me that way, so I speak to them in a language I’m even more fluent in. One where rebuttals leave a stinging in your ribs and not just your ego. BOB wants to send Herschel Kiss my way? I can make a very convincing argument. Size be damned. Interference be damned. I’ll take on your soldiers and generals alike and the result will be the same every time. Like clockwork.”

“It’s time to get back on track. No better way to do that than to start changing some minds through actions. And based on BOB’s own marketing lately, it seems a lot of people could use a good superhero story nowadays.”

"You can't run from yourself."