Post by Deleted on Jan 25, 2015 17:44:35 GMT
“Battle is the most magnificent competition in which a human being can indulge. It brings out all that is best; it removes all that is base. All men are afraid in battle. The coward is the one who lets his fear overcome his sense of duty. Duty is the essence of manhood.”
As Nighthawk picks up his gear bag from the floor of his closet as he gets ready to prepare for his Triangle ladder match against Warren Kidd and Death for the now-vacated Invictus Championship one cannot help but notice the pure excitement permeating off of his very pores at the idea that he is one step away from finally finishing the first half of his quest to win a championship for his father, a task which has been made all the more complicated by the idea that he will not be able to attain victory by pinfall or submission but instead by something as luck-oriented as who can climb up a ladder the quickest. But while some in his position would be so consumed by the idea of achieving their goal that preparations for the match might take a backseat the Chicago native’s stoic nature, and deep interest in staying as sharp and skilled as he possibly can, would seem to prevent him from ever being overmatched or unprepared no matter the circumstances.
Despite the well-understood knowledge that he is fighting not just for himself, but for the idea of defending his father’s legacy and even adding one more victory to it, there are those who wonder if the “Wrestling Machine” has finally found himself in one battle that he not just can’t win, but will get seriously hurt even in the attempt to do so.
But as the “Man of 1000 Holds” packs up his gear bag and heads off for one last visit to his father’s grave before going to stay out of town to get his mind and soul ready for what he, and all of his friends and supporters, knows will be an absolutely intense battle he slowly rubs the fingers of his right hand across a weathered-looking silver crucifix around his neck.
Later….
As Nighthawk goes to sit next to his father’s headstone, having left the bottle of Irish whiskey in its usual spot, we can see a certain contentment in the way that he carries himself, something akin to how a gunfighter in the Old West might have looked before heading off to a battle that he knows he is going to win.
Nighthawk: “It’s real, Dad. After all of the time that we’ve spent talking to each other, all of the times I’ve come here to get your counsel and advice on what I should do next and how I should handle a problem, it’s real. It’s tangible. In a few short days, I’m going to walk to the ring and I’m going to try and finish the quest that we started all those months ago. The most important thing about what I’m going to try and do for you is that when I bring the championship back to you, is that it’s not going to be over then. I’m not going to stop seeing you until this is all done, and we both know that winning the championship isn’t the end of the line, but just the 1st step. I’ll see you soon, Dad. I just want you to know I’m ready, and I want you to be proud of me. But I have something to tell you, and it’s as shocking for me to tell you this as it might be for you to hear it. This used to be just about you, you know. I was doing this, putting myself through all of the pain that getting to this point requires, and I was just doing it for you. That’s not true anymore. I’m doing this for me too. I need to know I can be a champion, and a champion that I can be proud of as much as you. I’ll see you next week, and Dad, I have a hunch you’re going to like what I bring with me then.”
Leaving the bottle of Irish Whiskey by his father’s graveside, Nighthawk nods his head in respect as he walks to his car.
The next morning…..
As Nighthawk pulls his car into the dirt driveway of a log cabin in a wooded national park in the Chicago suburbs, his USA Wrestling gear bag taking up space over his left shoulder, he looks around at the view before taking a deep calming breath and closing his eyes. Clad in a black preacherman’s-style leather duster, a black long-sleeved Bad Company t-shirt, black leather pants with blue and orange piping up and down each leg, and black cowboy-style boots, the “Wrestling Machine” finally opens his eyes and walks into the log cabin, sitting down on a couch as he removes his boots.
Nighthawk, his booming baritone voice ringing throughout the log cabin: “For most of us, we travel the world for a few years, bang around some arenas and maybe make some money if we’re lucky, and then that’s it. We’re gone. But every so often, every generation, there are some of us who become bigger than that, more vital and more successful. They become the guys their peers talk about worshipfully, who get stories told about them and their exploits, and have entire generations proclaiming to anyone who will listen that they were the best, and that everyone else was and are rank amateurs. My father should have been one of these men but he was not, and that is a shame I am trying my hardest to rectify. This week, I will.
This week, I do what I have promised I will do since I got here. This week, I set the wrong things right. And when I take the Invictus Championship home, and I give it to my father and show him all the respect that he has earned in death that he never got in life, I will feel accomplished. I will feel the joy and glory that comes with knowing that all of my life’s work means something. And Warren Kidd and Death, I make this vow to you with all the seriousness that such a vow deserves: I will DIE winning this, if I have to, and I will feel comfortable knowing that my last breath acquired me the title my father’s legacy deserves. You will not beat me. You cannot.
Let me start with you, Death, because you’re the most physically impressive out of all of us, and thus, the guy most people probably think is going to walk all over me. But let me make this clear to you, because I want this to sink in through every single motivational word that Jebediah Crowe has laid on your head. You can’t beat me, Death, and the sooner you come to grips with that, the quicker the disappointment of losing to me will fade. You see, Death, you might be a colossus made flesh and you might be big, strong, and powerful. All of these things might be true, but you have been put into a situation where none of those things matter all that much. Weight, Death, only matters if it knows where it’s going. And this week, I will keep you on the backfoot until I climb up the ladder and win the match. I will outsmart you, and I will make you pay for every mistake you make.
And do not confuse yourself because this week, Death, you are going to make many. Because this is your 1st ladder match, isn’t it? I can’t even count how many I’ve been in, so I know exactly how to play this. There’s nothing that you can do to me in that ring, with a ladder or without, that I won’t be prepared for. Be ready to lose, Death, because I don’t plan on it.
And then, rather seamlessly as it turns out, that brings me to you, Warren Kidd. The first time that we faced each other, Mr. Kidd, I begged and pleaded for a clean, classy, and clever contest with you because I wanted to see what you could do. The truth of it is that I didn’t get what I wanted then. And this week, I’m not going to get that clean, classy, and clever match either. But I’m going to get something better, bigger. I’m going to get the title that your mentor thought he bequeathed to you.
I did not enter this sport, Mr. Kidd, to have championships that I fought and bled to have a fair chance at be just handed to someone because someone else thought that’s how it should go. There are other sports in this world where that’s how it works, but as long as I have breath in my lungs to fight it off, this will not turn into one of them. You many envision yourself the next king, and this your coronation, but I have rough news for you, Mr. Kidd. This week, the king never gets to his throne. This week, you don’t get what you want. I do.
Goodnight gentlemen. May sleep give you the courage to go on.”
As Nighthawk picks up his gear bag from the floor of his closet as he gets ready to prepare for his Triangle ladder match against Warren Kidd and Death for the now-vacated Invictus Championship one cannot help but notice the pure excitement permeating off of his very pores at the idea that he is one step away from finally finishing the first half of his quest to win a championship for his father, a task which has been made all the more complicated by the idea that he will not be able to attain victory by pinfall or submission but instead by something as luck-oriented as who can climb up a ladder the quickest. But while some in his position would be so consumed by the idea of achieving their goal that preparations for the match might take a backseat the Chicago native’s stoic nature, and deep interest in staying as sharp and skilled as he possibly can, would seem to prevent him from ever being overmatched or unprepared no matter the circumstances.
Despite the well-understood knowledge that he is fighting not just for himself, but for the idea of defending his father’s legacy and even adding one more victory to it, there are those who wonder if the “Wrestling Machine” has finally found himself in one battle that he not just can’t win, but will get seriously hurt even in the attempt to do so.
But as the “Man of 1000 Holds” packs up his gear bag and heads off for one last visit to his father’s grave before going to stay out of town to get his mind and soul ready for what he, and all of his friends and supporters, knows will be an absolutely intense battle he slowly rubs the fingers of his right hand across a weathered-looking silver crucifix around his neck.
Later….
As Nighthawk goes to sit next to his father’s headstone, having left the bottle of Irish whiskey in its usual spot, we can see a certain contentment in the way that he carries himself, something akin to how a gunfighter in the Old West might have looked before heading off to a battle that he knows he is going to win.
Nighthawk: “It’s real, Dad. After all of the time that we’ve spent talking to each other, all of the times I’ve come here to get your counsel and advice on what I should do next and how I should handle a problem, it’s real. It’s tangible. In a few short days, I’m going to walk to the ring and I’m going to try and finish the quest that we started all those months ago. The most important thing about what I’m going to try and do for you is that when I bring the championship back to you, is that it’s not going to be over then. I’m not going to stop seeing you until this is all done, and we both know that winning the championship isn’t the end of the line, but just the 1st step. I’ll see you soon, Dad. I just want you to know I’m ready, and I want you to be proud of me. But I have something to tell you, and it’s as shocking for me to tell you this as it might be for you to hear it. This used to be just about you, you know. I was doing this, putting myself through all of the pain that getting to this point requires, and I was just doing it for you. That’s not true anymore. I’m doing this for me too. I need to know I can be a champion, and a champion that I can be proud of as much as you. I’ll see you next week, and Dad, I have a hunch you’re going to like what I bring with me then.”
Leaving the bottle of Irish Whiskey by his father’s graveside, Nighthawk nods his head in respect as he walks to his car.
The next morning…..
As Nighthawk pulls his car into the dirt driveway of a log cabin in a wooded national park in the Chicago suburbs, his USA Wrestling gear bag taking up space over his left shoulder, he looks around at the view before taking a deep calming breath and closing his eyes. Clad in a black preacherman’s-style leather duster, a black long-sleeved Bad Company t-shirt, black leather pants with blue and orange piping up and down each leg, and black cowboy-style boots, the “Wrestling Machine” finally opens his eyes and walks into the log cabin, sitting down on a couch as he removes his boots.
Nighthawk, his booming baritone voice ringing throughout the log cabin: “For most of us, we travel the world for a few years, bang around some arenas and maybe make some money if we’re lucky, and then that’s it. We’re gone. But every so often, every generation, there are some of us who become bigger than that, more vital and more successful. They become the guys their peers talk about worshipfully, who get stories told about them and their exploits, and have entire generations proclaiming to anyone who will listen that they were the best, and that everyone else was and are rank amateurs. My father should have been one of these men but he was not, and that is a shame I am trying my hardest to rectify. This week, I will.
This week, I do what I have promised I will do since I got here. This week, I set the wrong things right. And when I take the Invictus Championship home, and I give it to my father and show him all the respect that he has earned in death that he never got in life, I will feel accomplished. I will feel the joy and glory that comes with knowing that all of my life’s work means something. And Warren Kidd and Death, I make this vow to you with all the seriousness that such a vow deserves: I will DIE winning this, if I have to, and I will feel comfortable knowing that my last breath acquired me the title my father’s legacy deserves. You will not beat me. You cannot.
Let me start with you, Death, because you’re the most physically impressive out of all of us, and thus, the guy most people probably think is going to walk all over me. But let me make this clear to you, because I want this to sink in through every single motivational word that Jebediah Crowe has laid on your head. You can’t beat me, Death, and the sooner you come to grips with that, the quicker the disappointment of losing to me will fade. You see, Death, you might be a colossus made flesh and you might be big, strong, and powerful. All of these things might be true, but you have been put into a situation where none of those things matter all that much. Weight, Death, only matters if it knows where it’s going. And this week, I will keep you on the backfoot until I climb up the ladder and win the match. I will outsmart you, and I will make you pay for every mistake you make.
And do not confuse yourself because this week, Death, you are going to make many. Because this is your 1st ladder match, isn’t it? I can’t even count how many I’ve been in, so I know exactly how to play this. There’s nothing that you can do to me in that ring, with a ladder or without, that I won’t be prepared for. Be ready to lose, Death, because I don’t plan on it.
And then, rather seamlessly as it turns out, that brings me to you, Warren Kidd. The first time that we faced each other, Mr. Kidd, I begged and pleaded for a clean, classy, and clever contest with you because I wanted to see what you could do. The truth of it is that I didn’t get what I wanted then. And this week, I’m not going to get that clean, classy, and clever match either. But I’m going to get something better, bigger. I’m going to get the title that your mentor thought he bequeathed to you.
I did not enter this sport, Mr. Kidd, to have championships that I fought and bled to have a fair chance at be just handed to someone because someone else thought that’s how it should go. There are other sports in this world where that’s how it works, but as long as I have breath in my lungs to fight it off, this will not turn into one of them. You many envision yourself the next king, and this your coronation, but I have rough news for you, Mr. Kidd. This week, the king never gets to his throne. This week, you don’t get what you want. I do.
Goodnight gentlemen. May sleep give you the courage to go on.”
Well howdy there pardner.