I Remember

[Ghost Spike]

Fairness.

Don’t make me fucking laugh.

Ever since I stepped foot in this company I’ve had roadblock after roadblock thrown in front of me. Anything to prevent me from becoming the Imperial Champion, as it was once known. Remember that first ever Heir to the Throne? No former nCw World Champion was allowed to enter. Meaning that no matter what happened, I could never be the first ever Imperial Champion. Might not seem like a bummer, right?

WRONG!

I am sick to fucking death of being second. Always the bridesmaid, never the bride!

I was the second ever nCw World Champion, I was the second ever nCw Hall of Famer, even when I was the first man to be inducted into the IWF Hall of Fame, I was still the second person to be inducted. I have come runner up in the Roulette TWICE! Do you have any idea how frustrating that is? Do any of you worthless maggots know what it feels like to be within reach of that dream, that goal, only to have it snatched away at the last second? Don’t bother answering, it was rhetorical, I know the answer is no, because none of you are good enough to be that close. None of you are great enough to have that feeling, to know what it’s like....

Yet you’re all so qualified to talk about me, right?

Let’s all talk about old man Spike. Someone who should have hung up the boots a long time ago, and let his withering career die. Right? That seems to be the sentiment of the peasants who make up this piss poor roster. Are they blind as well as deaf? I might be getting on in my years, yeah I can see the end of my career coming …..but not for one second is it because of any of you. Not for the briefest moment in time is it because I can’t keep up with any of you, or I’m not athletic enough, not strong enough, not fast enough. Who the fuck do you see when you look at me? Because it sure isn’t the same guy who has been murdering people in that ring for TWO FUCKING DECADES!

I am Spike Kane. The God of Xtreme. The Blood God. I am the ONLY man in this company to have won every active title, and I’m the only one who treats them with the fucking respect they deserve. You want to fault me because of my age? What is this? Playground bullshit like [Redacted] and [Redacted] used to pull when I’d “got fat” huh?

I have had one hundred and twenty nine matches in IWF alone.

Let that sink in for one moment….ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY NINE! Seventy nine singles matches, and forty tag team matches.

I’ve had time off for injuries, fuck, I had time off for what was diagnosed as terminal cancer….but I’ve still had more matches than anybody else in this company. You know what else? I reckon if you went and checked, I’ve competed in the main event more than anybody else on this roster. You know what’s funny though? All these people who try to downplay my accolades, down play the threat I posses…..play up the old man Spike?

I’ve had more title matches than you’ve had matches.

Even now, when you’re all declaring I shouldn’t be here - I’m the Invictus Champion. In my so-called “twilight” of my career, I’m out here breaking my back, stealing the show, and defending the championship like a true champion should. Which in turn brings me back to my original point….fairness, and roadblocks…

How many of you have had to wrestle twice in one night?

How many of you have had to defend your title twice in one night?

How many of you have had to compete against three other men in a handicapped match - that didn’t belong to some curtain jerking union?

Face the facts, you’re all a bunch of snowflake princesses who think far too highly of themselves. Not a single one of you even comes close to me. None of you can measure up to the things I’ve done here in IWF, let alone my career. You all keep talking about how I’m passed it, about how I should have left, hell even as stupid enough to lump me in with the likes of Mike Laszlo and Devlin Raine who only pull their heads out of obscurity at certain times of the year…

You don’t get it.

I thought I’d made my point pretty clear when Angel and I stood in the middle of that ring….

You’re not ready for Spike to leave.

So instead, you worthless sacks of shit are going to have to nut up, or shut up. I’m walking into that Roulette with the biggest target out of everyone else, on my back. All it takes is one jumped up jackass to sneak a pinfall or a submission and they take my gold. Oh, I know what some of you are thinking….why don’t I just eliminate myself and save me the pain of going through with the match? One word, a word that’s helped me carve the most decorated, celebrated, bloody legacy in this business….

Pride.

Invictus Champion or not….I’m not coming runner up this year, I am going to win the Roulette. I don’t care who I have to run through, I don’t care how many of you try and make your name by taking me out. I’ll take each and every single one of you….because in my eyes? You’re all the villains, trying to put a hard working father out of a job, trying to take his championship and dust him off. When the truth of the matter is? None of you can surpass me until I’m gone, because anytime you step up, I step up too. So I’m going to fight, I’m going to war, and I’m going to defy the odds.

Because that’s what heroes do.

---

“I remember….”

I remember being happy, that’s the thing that sticks in my mind the most. For some reason I don’t remember rain, or snow, or gusts of wind, I just remember sunny days out the front playing football with my brother. It’s hard to think back that far, I feel like in my life I’ve repressed an awful lot of my past, but of what I do remember from that time? I remember our cottage, I remember the coast, and I remember playing out the front with my brother. The only thing I really remember about -that day- was a blood curdling scream, and a lot of people I didn’t recognize, or know, coming to the house. That scream has haunted me my entire life, I didn’t know what it was at the time, all I know is it chilled me to the bone. In some ways I think it was my mother, I think the news of my old man’s death drew out that wail, but in other ways? It reminds me so much of the Banshee’s Wail.

I’ll never forget it.

For a lot of people it would have been the worst day of their lives. I guess it says a lot about me that I can’t even place which day of mine was the worst. Not long after that scream, I headed into the house, to just go and find out what was going on. I couldn’t find my mom, I couldn’t find my mom. I could hear my baby sister crying, like seriously crying her heart out. I can remember my stomach lurching, like, why was nobody looking after her? Why were they letting her cry so much? I went to go and check on her in her room and she was sat in her cot sobbing her eyes out….and…..and my mom, she was laying on the floor. There was blood everywhere. I don’t really remember if it was just her wrists, or if it was her throat too, morbid I know but it was extreme, I remember that. I was glued to the spot, I couldn’t moved. I wanted to, I know I wanted to, christ, I wanted to run to the hills, just turn and get the hell out of there, never look back….and all the while, all I could hear was Freya crying.

That was the day my parents died.

Or so I thought.

Things moved really quick after that, everything's almost a blur. It’s hard to really place when and where everything happened, and how people decided on things. Bradley and I were young, but Freya was a baby. My Aunt and Uncle had moved to the United States of America a long time ago, they’d apparently been trying for a child but were unable to conceive. The authorities wanted them to take us all, or at the very least take both Brad and me, but they only wanted one….and for whatever reason they chose Brad. Story of my life right? He went off to America, Freya was sent somewhere I don’t even know, and for reasons I still don’t know I was sent to an orphanage in Birmingham, England.

That was the day the Kane siblings were split up.

In such a short space of time we’d gone from being a happy close knit family, to losing everything. I’d lost my Dad, my Mom, my brother, and my sister. As far as I knew? I was alone in the world, and things….man, things were about to get a whole lot worse. Being Irish in todays day and age? It isn’t a big thing, people tend to love the Irish. They’re regarded as a happy people “Irish eyes are smiling” and all that bullshit. But back then? Fuck, it wasn’t as bad as in my old man’s time, or in my grandad’s time, but we were still treated like dirt. We were treated like dirty people. Immigrants that nobody wanted, and when grown ass men were treated like that, can you imagine how it was like for an orphan? I’ve never really spoken about it. I’ve never really complained about my upbringing, or how the world treated me. I’ve spoken at great length about how the wrestling world has treated me….but I guess there’s a reason why I’ve always had a chip on my shoulder. There’s a reason why I’ve always had a point to prove, and it started all the way back then, all the way back in Birmingham.

Back when those pricks wanted to put me in my place...