[FADE IN. It’s late at night, a nearby city lighting the sky with an orange glow]
Karl: [out of shot It’s a shame. During the day a city is a wonder to behold, a testament to humanity’s progress. Even the poor and homeless of modern Western society is better off than they would have been one, two hundred years ago. Proper sewer systems, machines to make our lives easier, foods we could never have dreamed of – and of course, entertainment to fill the free-time we have now we don’t have to till the soil ourselves or go to bed when night time hits. But at night? Well, look up and see for yourself.
[The camera PANS UP and we see a great haze. There are some stars visible, but very few. We PAN DOWN again, this time showing “The Dragon” in his typical casual attire]
Karl: Only some of the brightest and closest stars get seen, and even then their glory and splendour is shrouded. I remember one time, out camping with some friends, they were amazed at just how many stars you can see when you’re far enough away from people. Billions of stars, an entire galaxy in one line from horizon to sky, that they’d never seen because of city lights.
It’s kind of like this business. Before I decided to come back, I used to go watch some live shows in the UK. Most of the people there were great, but you just knew outside of the couple of hundred people in the audience, most of them family and friends of the people in the ring, that nobody would hear of them. Maybe one or two would make it to TV. Maybe one in every few thousand would become a champion, and even fewer would become a household name. Maybe three or four a generation would become true legends.
Millions, hundreds, dozens, and finally only four.
Are you saying, Mister Entertainment, that you’re going to be one of those elite few?
[Karl smiles]
Karl: It has been a while, hasn’t it? And you haven’t actually changed since then. Four years older, but still just as arrogant and obnoxious. It’s what makes you, you. And the need to match your own hype makes you one hell of a competitor in the ring.
But… come on, you want revenge for me countering one of your signature moves back in two thousand and six? That one match has eaten at you for this long? I could understand in the Dupree Cup you wanting a rematch to settle the score, but to hear you going on about it four years on does make me wonder about you. You sound like… now I think on it, a lot of people. I don’t know what it is with people holding grudges for so long. It’s pathetic if you ask me, but hey, each to one’s own.
So now you’ve got me. Well done. Does it mean you’re going to beat me?
Not if your recent history is anything to go by, no, you’re not. Sure I’ll have wrestled Fusenhoff by then and chances are I’ll be banged up, but you seem to have gotten into a rut of underestimating people in New ERA. First you underestimated Cameron Cruise, and since then you’ve let Jeff Jorgenson get under your skin so much that it’s stopped being even mildly amusing. What makes you think you’re not going to make the same mistake against me? You were talking a few weeks ago about taking Jeff out of the business, avenging your elimination from the Christmas Tree Lot brawl, and you made so many mistakes in your one-on-one match that there was only going to be one winner. You let a quest for… you let your need to stroke your own ego get in the way of winning the match. It wasn’t vengeance. Your blustering before that match showed that you needed to re-establish your own self-image after Jeff tarnished it.
Why do I bring that up? Because it seems like you’re doing the same thing with this match. You’re trying to beat me to even the score. This match should be about Empire Pro and New ERA, but you’re more concerned with your own pride and ego. If you don’t beat me and wipe away that damn’d spot, your self-image is going to be permanently stained and we can’t have that, can we?
Then, let me ask you something. What will you do if you don’t beat me? I’m not perfect so I probably won’t capitalise on every mistake you make, but I only need one mistake from you. And if you don’t win the triple threat match at Destrucity, your hunger to re-establish your identity as the best of the best is going to be that much greater, your thoughts more clouded, and your mistakes more frequent.
And to think people used to compare us as equals. I remember before we met the first time people saying we were both destined for greatness, and that only increased as time went by. We both held titles for extraordinary amounts of time. We both held wins over people who had held or went on to hold World Championships. We both won inaugural TEAM tournaments. When we met in the semi-finals we’d both come up as the dark-horse with people expecting the likes of Promo or Hida Yakamo to stroll through.
I doubt people are going to be drawing parallels between our careers after Sin City Showdown. You see, Mister Entertainment, you are like so many people. Driven by an image of yourself as great. That’s fine when you’re winning. Look at the champions at the moment – each and every one of them has the same general image of themselves as you and they’ve been able to reinforce it by winning and getting the points on their own particular scoring system. But you’ve had a bit of bad luck and started to go to pieces. You actually need this win, because you need the peace of mind that you are great. That you are a winner. That your brand of Entertainment is supreme.
Me? I’ve already beaten you once, so I don’t need to prove I can do it. I’m not worried about people seeing me as a force to be reckoned with or as a world champion calibre wrestler or whatever, and I’m certainly not worried about what people say about me in the locker-room. What I hunger for is my own sense of self-worth, which means giving it everything I have in everything I do. If I do that and win, great. If I do that and lose, at least I’ve done my best.
I probably shouldn’t offer you any advice, but if you want to beat me, you’ll have to come at me with a calm mind. Right now you’re like most of the stars in the heavens – hidden from view, going about your life unseen and unknown. I know you’ve got some incredible skills in the ring, but unless you use them and stop worrying about avenging some years-hold defeat you’re going to stay that way.
And I do much prefer to see all the stars, not just the brightest.
[FADE OUT]
