The warehouse.

All black. Save for a stage light on a table…

On the table. A large cube maze. The side panels of the maze are glass. Figures speed through the maze, blindly ramming into walls. One briefly pauses at a panel and it becomes clear.

A white mouse.

From behind the maze emerges a man.

Mark Flynn. His shredded suit and jacket outfit.

That same sick smile… A little more twisted.

A little more crazy…

“Well.

Well.

Well.

Once again, Mark Flynn being asked to say a few words over a rookie’s grave. It’s an honor and a privilege to bury another one of you talentless rejects who think the fact that you picked out a nifty little nickname and made a friend means you’re here to stay. That the ink on your contract is permanent.

It’s adorable.”

Flynn reaches into his front chest pocket, tattered and worn by gravity, the button on the front having over time only pulled it further down…

And from this pocket he pulls a small piece of paper.

And smiles. He looks up, the paper still in his hand…

Before letting it slip through his fingers.

'Crimson Cobra' it says on it. As if he needed the note to remember who his opponent was this week.

"I have to admit. All of you nobodies are starting to look the same at this point."

“Sorry, if this sounds familiar, but how am I supposed to work with this?”

Flynn sits on the side of the table, his free hand raises to the side of his head. His index finger rests on his temple, slowly tapping…

“Every GM has the same stupid idea. I hate Mark Flynn.”

Tap.

“I want to get rid of Mark Flynn.”

Tap.

“What to do… what to do…”

Tap.

Tap.


TAP.

Flynn full-on smacks the side of his head hard . A large purple bruise on the side of his face now complements the look of inspiration.

“I KNOW! I’ll put him in matches week after week with rookies! One of them is sure to surprise and knock him off!”

Flynn’s eureka slowly fades from a smile…

To apathy…

To bitter disgust.

He admires the rats in the cage, all bouncing of each other, desperate for some end goal that brings them no closer to freedom.

Tragedy.

“I’ve delivered eulogy after eulogy here. And I’ve enjoyed it. It’s not a celebrated job being the XWF’s undertaker.

Brushing the trash on the company floor that is ‘the first match of the night’ into the incinerator of mediocrity to forever wallow in the pit of despair that is ‘the disabled list.’

Yes, my role in the XWF, dismissing the friends you make in the back, making you look over your shoulder at the clock, seconds ticking by, knowing how little time your career has and how it was all building up to an embarrassing loss, revealing just how little talent you have when compared to someone of worth.

To be fair, how good can you actually be in the ring if you’re calling Cassius Stonne champion caliber?

Either way.

It’s a fun job for me. So, I keep doing it.”

A mouse weaves its way past two struggling to get past each other. It’s smaller but it finds its way to a higher level of freedom. Flynn watches this development carefully.

“Some might think that having a loss on my record from last week would sour my mood.

Why would it?

I was working a glorified handicap match, cradling Gilmour’s leaking red skull, trying to keep him from going into shock from the sheer amount of blood he was losing while swinging a chair and demolishing two helpless goons.

Then, a moment of clarity struck me.

Why on Earth would I defend Peter Gilmour? A man I’ve already beaten. A man who’s going to lose his first championship in three days. So, after for the third week in a row out performing Angelus.

I stepped outside the ring.

Said my heartfelt goodbyes to the assembled riff raff.

And left with my belt.

…

Or so I attempted to do…”

The mouse swims up a tunnel, its red beady eyes whirring through paths. He’s now on the top level of the cubic maze, a full two levels above any of his competitors.

“You see, in the past, GMs like Miyoko Kawashima and good ol’ Randy Cross, have at least had the decency to pretend that they didn’t have a problem with me specifically. That when I ended up unconscious and held down by a legion of security officers, that I was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Cross eventually ambushed me in a more overt manner, but had the decency to have no discernible reason, another random event from a man with no plan who didn’t even have the skill to take down Peter Gilmour.

Witastick, on the other hand? Wallace F. Witastick?

…

I really am sincerely not trying to give him the advertising opportunity so I hope you’ll excuse me if I don’t elaborate on what the middle initial in his name stands for…

Witastick has a problem with me.

Witastick doesn’t like me.

To be fair, not many do.

But, it became clear when I tried to leave with my United States championship belt and I saw the fear in his eyes as one of his four little money-making guinea pigs…”

The mouse makes it to the end of the maze! He sprints!

…

And out of the maze! And onto th-

Flynn catches the mouse. It wriggles and squirms in his hand as he examines the rodent.

After a few seconds, he slides the mouse back into the maze.

And the mouse begins again…

Flynn sighs as he looks back to the camera.

“Almost escaped…”

“And that’s when it hit me.”

“That’s when I realized why Witastick was so against Mark Flynn.”

“Because he’s terrified of Mark Flynn.”

“He’s horrified at the idea, the very notion that the King of the Mid-Carders exists on his program…”

“Why? Because he sees me as someone that CAN leave this little cage the rest of you mindless drones exist in.”

“Angelus has no problem shilling out a new t-shirt with a new insipid slogan every time he does an interview with Steve Sayors.”

“Sebastian Duke may be affiliated with the Illuminati, but that doesn’t mean he won’t make sure to get to an XWF autograph signing five minutes early.”

“Peter Gilmour… I honestly don’t know what Peter Gilmour does… His attorney has to have some skill at sexual favors, otherwise how can someone so untalented have the incredible contract he has?”

“But me? I get by on skill.”

“I’ve never sold out to a GM. I’ve never gotten a talent representative on my side. I’ve never had a tag team partner that didn’t end up turning against me…”

Flynn smiles.

“Or vice versa, I suppose…”

“Point is. I don’t have to get Witastick those extra digits in his bank account to do what I do best.”

“And that’s win wrestling matches.”

“I’m the Best Wrestler in the World. And I have the title reign to prove it.”

Flynn grins as he walks behind the table and reaches behind it…

“You see, Witastick saw one person get the better of me and immediately tried the same trick.”

“As if keeping me from my United States Championship would drive me into a paranoid frenzy… As if having an official loss against Angelus, despite the questionable means of victory, would throw me off the deep end and back into a delusional fantasy world…”

“Like it did last time…”

Flynn finally revolves from around the table…

And returns with a brown burlap sack.

He eyes the mice in the lab suspiciously. As if their actions require investigation…

And punishment.

“Unfortunately for Witastick, I don’t fall for the same trick twice.”

“And just because Angelus has the title belt around his waist.”

“We all know in a one-on-one contest… That I have his number.”

“The United States Champion, belt or not, isn’t changing any time soon.”

Flynn smiles as his arm weaves around the side of the bag. A thin tube…

Moving…

“Sorry. Here I am talking about your eulogy and I haven’t even mentioned you directly yet…”

“Crimson Cobra…”

A hiss from the bag. Flynn smiles as his eyes close.

“Apparently, a kid like you gets a 3 and 1 record against a bunch of nobodies and doesn’t win his first championship opportunity and suddenly thinks he has a chance against me.”

“It used to be people had to go through real matches before they got to take me on. Now, I let Cassius Stonne slip through the door and behead him…”

“And suddenly every talentless rookie, wet behind the ears, wriggling helplessly between my fingers as I twist your appendages out of their sockets…”

“Think maybe…”

“Just maybe…”

“A win over Mark Flynn is their ticket to the big time.”

Flynn’s fingers twirl over the top of the bag… as if to reveal the bag’s contents…

He smiles…

And instead, heaves the bag to the entrance of the maze.

“Sorry. Let me illustrate what’s really happening here.”

He supports the slithering tube in the bag as gravity tries to fight its path into the maze. The support eventually leaves Flynn with an empty sack…

Flynn rushes over to the side of the maze and watches eagerly.... Smiling…

“You consider yourself a hunter. You see your ‘Crimson Crest’ partnership as two new predators in a jungle full of fattened cattle. You have a plan to walk away as two dominant singles’ champions.”

“The world is your oyster…”

The squeaking of mice gets louder in the maze… But the camera stays on Flynn’s face…

“In actuality, you’re the third best Crimson on the XWF roster. And you’re dependent on this pathetic little parasitic relationship you’ve established with your BFF, Deadly.”

“You’re not a cobra. You’re a leech, barely winning matches and riding the actual talent of a superior star while claiming to be a legitimate threat.”

“And just like the snake sheds its skin, after that embarrassing loss on Madness, your mask of mediocre competence has peeled away to reveal that the Crimson Cobra…”

“Is just a green worm.”

All of a sudden, the squeaking stops…

Flynn’s smile disappears.

His hand slides over to the top exit.

His finger taps the side of the plastic tunnel…

And the silent maze now fills with sound…

Flynn waits a moment…

As a snake wraps itself around his arm and slides up his shoulder.

He smiles content as it continues down across his back…

Across the bruise on his temple...

And down into the burlap sack in his opposite hand.

He sets the bag gently on the ground.

And returns to sit on the side of the table.

“And like a worm, Witastick is just using you… Bait at the end of a hook, trying to draw me out, trying to get inside my head so, just like Cross did, he can get me out of his hair…”

“But Witastick’s only tools… are his security force… and that giant numbskull Tyrone…”

“So, let me stop talking to the meal I’m about to devour…”

“And ask the fisherman who put you on the line…”

“Congratulations, Witastick. You’ve wetted my appetite.”

“I’m about to feed.”

“Are you going to let me chew my food in peace?”

Flynn tilts his head to the side.

“Or am I going to have to pull you and your fishing buddies down here with me…”

Flynn grins, rubbing the self-inflicted wound on the side of his head.

“Either way… Light appetizer…” A giggle. “Or a three course meal…”

“I’m feeding tonight…”

The lights go out. Darkness.