Earning It.

[Nova]

Some folks are born into a good life,
Other folks get it anyway, anyhow,
I lost my money and I lost my wife,
Them things don't seem to matter much to me now.

Tonight I'll be on that hill 'cause I can't stop,
I'll be on that hill with everything I got,
Lives on the line where dreams are found and lost,
I'll be there on time and I'll pay the cost,
For wanting things that can only be found
In the darkness on the edge of town.

- Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band, “Darkness on the Edge of Town”

THE NEXT CHAPTER:
“Return of the Starchild,” or “The New Wild West”​

(FADEIN: A runway at Charleston International Airport. Blinking lights from a landing plane bathe the runway in bright flashes, illuminating a lawn chair and its occupier, former NFW Heavyweight Champion and recent Hall of Fame inductee, the Frontier’s own EagleSTAR…NOVA. He’s seated next to a small tent and Weber grill, which is still smoking from some recent grubbin’s. Clad in jeans and a sleeveless grey t-shirt emblazoned with a red and white Revolution star, he rests his head against the back of his chair, taking a long drag of his cigarette as his eyes follow the plane’s trajectory. A long jagged scar weaves its way around from the back of his clean-shaven head almost to his right temple. His beard has grown out into a woolly brown mass distinguished by bright white streaks running down from the base of his chin to the beard’s frazzled edge near the center of his chest.)

NOVA: “I remember when SHANE SOUTHERN was announced as the first inductee into the NFW Hall of Fame. It was Wrestlebowl II Night One. I was in the building but not on the card. Lots of drugs then, and everyone – I mean EVERYONE – was on them, but regardless, I can recall the moment it was announced at the outset of the Showstoppers/Cruise Project tag match.

(Taking a drag) “Wouldn’t y’know it, I was one night away from the biggest match of my life, competing against YORI YAKAMO JR. for the ULTRATITLE in a culmination of years of work and the fate of the Frontier on the line…and in that moment, I wanted to be Shane Southern. Because that recognition, that formal understanding of Southern’s importance to the company and his legacy…that was everything that I wanted from NFW.”

(NOVA reaches behind his lawn chair and drags the now-infamous modified Cojones Mercado steel chair into the picture.)

NOVA: “With that kind of inspiration, that idea of what such an accomplishment means…understandably I have mixed emotions about my own induction at SUPERCRASH 3. I know what it’s about. I see it for what it is. It’s EDDIE MAYFIELD getting a jab in at DAN RYAN by elevating me over him and reminding the Ego-Buster that he got schooled repeatedly by a dirty hippie.”

(Setting the steel chair down, he wraps a white rag around one of its legs.)

NOVA: (Taking a drag) “That’s fine. I’ve delivered the goods in this house in ways even Southern could not. And most importantly, I’m back, now, to live into this recent accolade…to EARN it. EDDIE, you may have put my name back out there in order to further your agenda, but you got more than you bargained for, bub. ‘Cuz now I have to show the world why I deserve a place in the pantheon. This…”

(NOVA holds the steel chair aloft, rotating it.)

NOVA: “This is the instrument of my fall from grace….the chair you used, EDDIE, to enact my unceremonious departure from NFW, from TEAM…from the face of the business I love and have sacrificed everything for. It wasn’t enough that I lost my grip on the World Heavyweight Championship at SUPERCRASH II. It wasn’t enough for me to lose the crown, you had to crown me with Mercado’s implement. You needed to punctuate the Dawn of your Revolution with the Chairshot Heard ‘Round the World.”

(He rests the edge of the chair against the grass and hoists a fifth of Jim Beam from under his seat. He takes a pull and wipes his lips.) “And I swear, on everything I still hold sacred, that before all is said and done, I WILL crack this motherf*cker over your skull and pay you back for what you did. As for ‘TEAM NFW’…” (He snorts) “…know this. Anyone who does the bidding of ‘El Presidente,’ whether they recognize it or not…they aren’t fighting for the Frontier. EDDIE MAYFIELD’s vision of NFW is a fake, a phony, a farce...”

(Taking a drag) “…a PLASTIC CACTUS.”

(He wraps another white rag around the base of the chair.)

NOVA: “It’s still MAYFIELD at the end of the day, y’see? But me? I fight for the REAL Frontier. I speak for it. If I were gone ten years and came back, I would still know this place, understand it.” (Closing his eyes) “I can feel it breathing. I can hear its pulse.”

(NOVA grabs at the neckline of his t-shirt and yanks it down, ripping it and revealing the eagle brand on his chest.)

NOVA: “It’s literally branded over my heart. It’s home. And I will fight, bleed, and die for home. That brings me to the WINDHAM CLAN.”

(He flicks away his cigarette and raises a middle finger to the camera.)

NOVA: “This is for you.”

(He sets the chair down and raises his other one.)

NOVA: “This one too. You’ll pardon the cliché, but this is MY house. This is the WILD WEST. Not some decrepit husk of a stomping ground desperately willing to entertain TROY WINDHAM’s delusions of grandeur because he’s the Only Game in Town. Your ‘ownership?’” (Spits) “It’s a legal fiction, a construct, something man-made, whereas my place at the table in this Oddballs’ Wonderland was seemingly set for me before I ever arrived…like fate.”

(Another pull from the bottle) “You can fill the ring with Windhams. Troy, Mark, Timmy, Tommy, Peter, Bobby Jack, Lucy Mae, Phineas T. Knobgobbler, doesn’t matter. I’m HOME. You f*ckers’ll never belong. This will never be your home. You’re an invasive species, like the kudzu vine or the Asian longhorn beetle.”

(NOVA holds up his arms in a shrug.)

NOVA: “And the Frontier will ride you out, or find a way to kick you out.”

(NOVA takes a pull off the bourbon and then focuses on some scribblings on his wrist. Gripping a Sharpie deliberately, he marks through several lines of rudimentary text on his hand and then stares into the camera.)

NOVA: “So, I have to cover this. JOE THE PLUMBER. My re-emergence, after two-and-a-half years. Joe, I’m gonna get right to it. I respect the HELL out of you. You beat it out of me. You’re a disgusting, disease-ridden degenerate. You’re a true competitor. You’re a TRUE FRONTIERSMAN.” (Shaking his head) “Joe, I can’t say I was the best World Heavyweight Champion this company has ever seen – you earned that accolade.”

(He lights another cigarette.) “But I LIVED that belt, Joe. You know that. I breathed it. It was everything. It was all I cared about. I was the Champion of the Frontier, and when you took it from me, you had to beat me within an inch of my life. That was the thing. You had to TAKE it. And spitting blood through my teeth, gasping for air, I could live with that. What I couldn’t live with…”

(NOVA shakes his head, taking a pull and then taking a drag from his cigarette.)

NOVA: “…was your DISAPPEARING ACT after DAN RYAN and DORCHESTER STRATTON wore you and your resolve down to a knub. You abandoned EVERYTHING, Joe. Everything we bled and snot and killed ourselves for. You gave it up, and now two men fight for a belt they never had to hold your shoulders down in order to get. They didn’t have to do what everyone said couldn’t be done. Joe, YOU ABANDONED THE FRONTIER AND YOU DESERVE EVERY IOTA OF STEEL I GAVE YA!”

(He holds the fifth up, and several large bubbles pop over the up-ended bottom of the bottle before he turns it back down. He shakes his head vociferously and wraps another length of white cloth around the base of the steel chair he’s re-possessed.)

NOVA: “Shouldn’t’a done that, Joe. No, no. Shouldn’t’a left that Championship behind, to be bid on by lesser men. They called me outta the shadows, I didn’t ask for this. I didn’t ask for you or anybody else.” (Grinning) “But they’ve entered the Hellmouth now. And you and I both know the only place that leads is down…”

“…down...”

“…down…”

“…down…”

(FADETOBLACK.)

 

[User Poets]

Oh, they've earned it.

"Her voice cuts through the walls
Rings through everything that's hollow.
These bitter words recall
All that's left and hard to swallow."

"Just another reason, looking for the next 'because.'
Just another has-been, wishing that she never was."

"Every back turned to her."
- The Birthday Massacre, Shallow Grave​

(Music goes down. Well, you played us an old man from the Jersey Shore to kick things off, Mr. Nova, the least I could do is respond in kind, only exactly the opposite.

Of course, the truth is that the least I could do is to ignore you, but I'm in a fighting mood. RK is still in his forty days and forty nights media blackout before he unleashes on Vivian, so it's my turn now.

I'm at the bar. Of course I'm at the bar. But it's late at night, everyone is gone, and I'm taking a break from counting the till. You can still hear the music, it's just a lot quieter.

Everyone should listen to the Birthday Massacre.)

"Hi Nova!"

"You don't know me. Maybe you do, my name is Rosalyn Callasantos, everyone calls me Rose or Cally. I'm RK's girlfriend which, in this stupid business means I'm Impulse's manager."

Or valet. I don't actually manage anything when it comes to his wrestling career, I'm there to look pretty and sell tickets. And based on the comments my customers at the bar have told me, I've sold at least nine tickets just by being there. Go me!

"We were introduced once, but you were getting ready to win the New Frontier World Title, and RK was still losing most of his matches under a mask, so I'm not going to be offended if you say you don't remember."

When you say you don't remember.

"Well... first of all, you said everyone was on drugs here when the Ultratitle stuff ended."

Miss Ivy disagrees with you, and says to tell you she can name at least two people who weren't.

"I don't know the particulars of why you were fired from this company, Mr. Nova. I don't pay much attention to the power games that take place, mainly because RK doesn't involve himself in them. If you were unfairly fired then yeah, you have every right to be angry about it and get yourself some answers."

"I mean, you did admit that you were on drugs, and it was about the time you got fired that they started testing for everything - you had plenty of time. Joe was World Champion and he didn't get to slide. Felix Red was World Champion and he didn't get to slide."

"But I really need to ask you not to talk down to the rest of us like we're children who don't know what Eddie Mayfield is capable of. I got banned from this company for testing positive for marijuana despite my prescription being on file with the front office from the day they started paying me to come to the matches."

It was all part of a power game between Eddie Mayfield and RK, one that RK didn't want to get involved in. Sound familiar?

"So I'm living proof of what Mr. Mayfield can do when he doesn't like you. I know how far he'll go, on a personal level, to screw around with you when he doesn't like you."

Or someone you're associated with.

"And I think JJ DeVille saw how far Mr. Mayfield will go on a professional level for the same reasons. I heard JJ has to go back to his old job in the alley behind 7-11 for twenty five bucks a pop to pay off his debts."

That's right, I've got it on good authority that JJ is the catcher.

"But there's something I don't understand, Mr. Nova."

"Why are you coming back to fight for the New Frontier now?"

"Eli Flair and Miss Ivy talked about you regularly after Eli retired, they both said you were one of the good ones. Class act, gentleman despite the spaciness, and so forth, and while that may be well and good... if you fight for the 'real' Frontier, if you speak for it... if you can close your eyes and feel its pulse... where have you been for the past two years?"

You were chairshotted and fired? Please.

"RK broke his neck against Castor Vivian Strife and was held off the cards for six months, the last four quite against his will, because Mr. Mayfield was holding a grudge. He found a way to come back. You were the Ultratitle Champion, you were the World Champion, you survived an hour and a half real time in Mike Randalls' locker room... do you really expect us to believe that you couldn't find a way back?"

"Something happened since you left, however."

"The New Frontier? It survived without you. It thrived without you. It evolved while you were here and continued to evolve after you left to the state it's in now. And yes, there's a cancer attached to the ass of the company named Troy Windham."

Funny, I thought Troy Windham was the ass of the company. But seriously, folks...

"But the Windham Clan aside, this company is - far and away - the single most envied wrestling company in existence today."

How do I know this? RK and my rock and roll friends watch the show, whether we're on it or not. And none of them give a flying monkey's butt about professional wrestling.

"And we did it without you."

"I think you're being back is a good thing, Mr. Nova, because you're a good person. I just wish you wouldn't paint with such broad strokes. Yes, you hate Mr. Mayfield. Yes, you have good reason to do so. But the one thing that you seem to refuse to see is that despite the fact that he's got this irritating superiority complex, and despite the fact that he lets personal feelings get in the way on occasion... everything he does, he does because he believes it will make the New Frontier stronger and more successful."

Besides, he and Mr. Miles started the company, how can his vision for it... not be correct?

"He wants this company to thrive. Sometimes his means get in the way of the greater good, so sometimes you have to make your own revolution."

That's a good idea. Playing Sirsy now.

"But all that means is that you defend the New Frontier in your own way."

"Also, Mr. Nova?"

"RK didn't beat Joe, but that doesn't mean he hasn't earned this World Title shot. Imply that he didn't earn it once more and you're going to have to deal with me."

Big threat, I know - I might have strong words for you again. But they make August De La Rossi cry.

Heck, long distance phone commercials make August cry, he's such a weepy little woman.

And I need to get back to work, I'm tired and I want to go home.

 

[Nova]

You think you know, but you have no idea.

(FADEIN: The warm glow of a Weber grill illuminates the crouched figure of NFW’s most recent Hall of Fame inductee. NOVA rests on his haunches, a lit cigarette hanging between two fingers and the other hand gripping a fifth a’ Jimbo. He grins at the camera as smoke shoots out of his nostrils in little spurts.)

NOVA: “Hi, Rose. Don’t worry, I remember you. I’m actually less concerned about my memory than I am about yours. Since you’ve apparently been a company cornerstone for the last couple of years, I’m surprised you would surmise the circumstances of my untimely exit as the product of something as watery and weak-assed as a drug suspension.”

(Taking a pull from the bottle) “Let ME tell YOU about what DENNIS EDWARD MAYFIELD ‘can do when he doesn’t like you.’ Put your iPhone on silent and pull up a chair. I was NFW World Heavyweight Champion. You know that belt your boyfriend’s been obsessing about for a while? It was mine…and I basically forfeited my sanity in order to get it. So now picture the initial moments after JOE THE PLUMBER has beaten the last bit of fight outta me and taken my strap. All is lost.”

(NOVA takes a drag of his cigarette and stares off into space, running a hand over the scar on his head.)

NOVA: “I didn’t fit with Eddie’s vision for the company, see? I didn’t fit with the PROFESSIONAL vision of the company. So the PROFESSIONALS came down to the ring as I’m fighting for air, summoning every iota of willpower left in me with the knowledge that I’d just been truly and utterly defeated.” (Taking a swig) “Now stay with me, girl – we’re getting to the important part. CRAIG MILES walks me out of the corner – I would say we’d had an interesting relationship up to that point in my time with the Frontier – and he leaned in, his arm around me, and he said…”

(Long dramatic pause)

“(whispering)…‘drink more Ovaltine.’ And then Eddie blindfolded me, and the last thing I remember is Craig lighting a cigarette in my mouth.” (Drag of the cigarette and a smirk) “Good thing we record all this sh*t! So, unlike the escapades which led to my untimely ouster from the Playboy Mansion 2004 Arbor Day party, I could actually reconstruct these events later through the use of film. And I saw COJONES MERCADO, Eddie’s premiere foot soldier, LAY WASTE to the side of my head with his steel chair. I saw myself on TV curled over on my side in the middle of the ring, bleeding out of my head into a pile of TOILET PAPER which had been thrown into the ring in the wake of Joe’s victory. Tough image, as I’m sure you can imagine.”

(He sets down the bottle in order to scratch his beard, taking a last drag from his cigarette before snuffing it in an ashtray at his feet.)

NOVA: “But it gets better. I woke up in a hospital bed, and management from my OTHER promotion paid me a visit, to tell me that because of my injury they were stripping me of their equivalent of a World Championship, which I had defended against the best in the biz for the better part of the previous two years.”

(Leaning in to the camera) “And you know what, Rosie? I BEGGED them not to. Six-foot-three, 245 pounds…I was a man used to lifting guys like DAN RYAN and ELI FLAIR over my head. And there I was in a nightgown in a hospital bed, barely able to clench my fists, and I BEGGED them with tears in my eyes not to take from me the only thing I had left to fight for. But they did.”

(NOVA lights another cigarette and takes several long drags in silence.)

NOVA: “So you’ll pardon me if I’m not sold on you ‘making your bones’ on Eddie’s hit-list by a temporary ban – which, by the way, in some parts of the world they call a suspension – ‘cuz you puffed some grass. Way to Make Your Own Revolution. That must’ve really sucked not getting to, y’know, support the person actually working in the ring. Not getting to hang out…’n stuff. No, you TOTALLY get the picture on Eddie’s brutality. Sorry I said anything.”

(Sip from the bottle) “No, you don’t get it. Everything Eddie does is because he’s a crafty motherf*cker who sees something for himself at the end of it. Not for the Frontier. So you can save that sermon for the half-drunk band of Australian Teresa Q. fans waiting after the next show to swap obscure East Coast alt rock bootlegs and talk about all things Next Gen. But it’s okay that you don’t get it. Eddie, you, Impulse, whatever…it’s one piece of the puzzle.”

(He rubs his palm against his forehead.)

NOVA: “And I’m back to put the whole thing together. I’m back because Eddie indirectly issued me a challenge by invoking my name to get at Dan Ryan. I’m back because Troy & Co. don’t get to annex the Frontier like some bawdy addition to the Sweetwater Ranch. I’m back because a great champion chose to walk, and it didn’t sit well with me. My quarrel isn’t with your boy. Impulse is a hard-working little sh*t, I know that. But the movie rights to your Revolution have already been bought by Walmart. You’ve become pawns, and you’re irreparably deaf to the quickening pulse of the New Wild West.”

(He reaches over and grips the grill lid, yanking it off and releasing a cloud of smoke. Moonlight glints off aluminum foil wrapped around two ears of corn, and a large steak sizzles over the coals in the center of the grill.)

NOVA: (Closing his eyes and sniffing the air) “Not me. I have my strength back. There’s much to be done.”

(Grinning) “And there’s no place like home.”

(FADETOBLACK.)

 

[User Poets]

Re: You think you know, but you have no idea.

Right, Mr. Nova.

Right.

You lost your job because the people in charge had a vendetta.

I lost mine because the people in charge had a vendetta.

But there's nothing at all similar. You're the only one that's ever been persecuted, and they weren't even considerate enough to give you a cross to climb on.

You're not the only one who's had problems with the penthouse, Mr. Nova, you're just the only one whining about it.

 

[GreggG]

(CUT TO: Dorchester Stratton, his hair combed and styled in Don Draper-style perfection, is wearing a pressed white dress shirt with gold cufflinks.)

DORCHESTER: "Allow me to be one of the latest to welcome you back to your return, Nova. And I also caught wind that you mentioned my name in your first oh-so eloquent promo back here in NFW. You're one of the first people to publicly admit what I and everyone deep down inside knows. I am the man responsible for taking Joe The Plumber's title. I am the man responsible for blinding him. I am the man responsible for destroying his ankle. I am the man responsible for him turning from everyone's hero to a shamed COWARD who would rather walk out on a promotion than get in the face of the man who was the only person alive man enough to not bow to the legend but instead sought to destroy it."

(Dorchester smirks.)

DORCHESTER: "Now, Nova, I'm not sure you know of the rest of my resume. I put the woman I once loved in a hospital after I humiliated her and destroyed her in the middle of a wrestling ring. I sent my ex-tag team partner Tsunami fleeing back to Japan suffering from his umpteenth concussion. I destroyed my mentor WildStar and then spat right in his wife's face after I ended his career. There is no one -- repeat, NO ONE -- willing to stoop to the levels that I have done to get ahead in this business. And there's also no one -- repeat, NO ONE -- who has the balls to admit in public when they made a mistake. A slight difference in the poker hand would have resulted, right now, in me being the NFW World Champion. The only reason that Castor and Captain Sanctimony are in that match instead of me is because Joe The Plumber cowardly backjumped me. When I blinded him, I stood in his face and did so. When I took out his ankle, it was in the middle of a wrestling ring. Without his actions, I would have beaten Castor -- there's no doubt in my or any right-thinking individual's mind. And then if I took on Impulse? He'd be the latest scalp to go up on top of my mantle, the latest to see that there was nobody more ruthless than I was... and that he was completely incapable of stopping me."

(Dorchester adjusts his sleeves.)

DORCHESTER: "Nova, I know of your resume. How could I not? You were the big star in the locker room, the man who put NFW in a new direction. And this is when I was DC Stratton -- the kid nobody took seriously, the lowly backyard tard who was pretending to be one of the big boys. Well, Nova, I'm one of the big boys now. And there's nothing I'd like to do more than make YOU realize what I've known from the first time you stepped foot in that locker room... that I'm better than you are. And, not just that... I'm the person who is going to make you run off like you did the last time."

(Dorchester smiles and waves.)

 

[Nova]

He didn't earn it. But he wants to. See what we're doing here?

(CUTTO: NOVA stuffing his face with a hoagie-load of sausage, peppers and onions by the dimming light of his grill.)

NOVA: “What a couple of days I’ve had. I tell you, I could not have predicted when I walked out onto the stage in North Charleston and brained JOE THE PLUMBER over the head with a chair that the first response from the federation would be me getting reamed out by IMPULSE’s girlfriend and then challenged to a match by DC STRATTON…DORCHESTER…whatever it is.

(Chuckling) “Life is funny. Dorchester, boy, what happened to you, man? This is a change from the last time I saw you. Seems to me like you exchanged the Lead Role in the Steel Cage for a Walk-On Part in Someone Else’s War.”

(He takes a big bite of his sandwich.)

NOVA: “BUT…but even though you went the Way of the Scumbag in order to get ahead, even though like a crack addict digging towards rock-bottom you betrayed everyone who remotely cared about you, you still came up short when all that hate and villainy landed you a shot at a shot at The Big One.

“That’s the thing, man, I can understand selling your soul for success. I abandoned every moral fiber of my being in my obsession over the World Heavyweight Championship. It’ll do that sh*t to you. And honestly a big part of my motivation to come back is my desire to have that feeling again, the feeling I got from holding that belt and being That Guy.

(Another bite) “But f*ckin’ A, when I promised myself and the world I’d do ANYTHING to get that belt, when I stooped down low and I drove myself crazy for it, I made DAMN sure I GOT THE JOB DONE when my shot came around. I can’t imagine how much it must suck to be you right now, having pissed everyone off and done just about enough to earn an honorary degree from the Professional Heel Academy and not actually getting anything for it in the end except trading CASTOR STRIFE for DAN RYAN standing across the ring from you.”

(NOVA puts down his sandwich and begins counting his fingers, then looks up at the camera, cocking an eyebrow.)

NOVA: “I’m no geologist, but somehow that doesn’t seem like a better deal to me. So understandably you’re down right now, putting your Big Boy Face on for the camera but hurting inside, trying to drown out those voices in your head telling you you’ll never be good enough with some new-and-improved country club jams on your iPod Nano. And you’re tossing out challenges in a knee-jerk reaction to your big failure, like a guy who’s just been dumped, drunkenly declaring he’ll f*ck every girl at the bar.

“Well don’t worry, Dorchester. You can’t f*ck me, but I’ll give you the time of day for a match if you’ve got something to prove. I know what you can do without lye in your hand. I know you can fight. And you’ve got a chip on your shoulder that probably has its own zip code by now.”

(He takes the last bite of his sandwich, then wipes his fingers with a napkin before lighting up a cigarette.)

NOVA: (Rolling his shoulders) “That’s why this should be the PERFECT first match back for yours truly. You name the time and the place.”

(FADETOBLACK.)

 

[DBrunkGXW]

Re: He didn't earn it. But he wants to. See what we're doing here?

DAN RYAN: "Hey Nova... I believe I can help. After Reloaded, ol' Dorchester's not gonna have any obligations to attend to for a long.... long time."

"I'll have the bill for my services sent to your room."

"YOU'RE WELCOME."