OFF CAMERA
Summer 2011, Los Angeles
“Alistair Mangold is setting him up for a Powerbomb… Stryker slides out! Lariat!”
“And he’s taking his spot in the corner… Is this the time, Eddie?”
“Indeed it is! Here he comes… The Stryke! One… two… and three!”
The people in the arena were all on their feet. They applauded him… or so he heard. For that moment which seemed like eternity, he was just laying there on the canvas, with one hand draped over the chest of his friend, mentor and many times also rival Al Mangold. He would raise his arm in victory, but he felt absolutely numb until he felt the cold piece of metal on the championship belt on his back as the referee just laid it there. First thing he heard was Tony Allen announcing his name. Right after the moniker “new LAWA Heavyweight Champion of the World”… Adam found some energy to get up to one knee and drape the belt over his shoulder. People were chanting his name and for the first time in his career, he was on the top of the world. He closed his eyes, still breathing heavily, just to enjoy the moment.
As he opened them, he was already sitting on a bench backstage. He must have gotten there on pure instinct.
“What the fuck?” was the only thing he was able to say. Looking up towards the door, he saw one of the veterans, “The Cult” Garth Lannister standing there, already in jeans and a hoodie. With his long hair tied in a ponytail and a wide smile on his face, Garth definitely didn’t look like a demonic villain.
“Congrats on the belt, champ,” he said to Stryker.
“Thanks.”
“First World title, right?”
“Yeah.”
Adam really wanted to give more elaborate answers, but he was just too exhausted and completely lost to talk more.
“I remember winning my first World title,” Lannister said, looking up and skimming through his memory, “Philly, ’96 or ’98, I’d have to check the poster I have at home, I don’t remember it really that well. You know what I remember the most about that night?”
“What Garth?” Adam asked.
“Your dad,” Lannister said, pointing at Adam for a second, “yeah, really, it was awesome that I beat Joey Armero for the belt, but… I remember sitting backstage like you do and looking at the belt like it’s my newest really expensive toy mommy bought me… and your dad, good old Doug, came to me and extended his hand to me. And he wasn’t a regular in the promotion, he was a guest for one night, this was the first time I actually got to talk with him… and he just came and shook my hand and said – Remember this moment, kid. It will not be the last. You will go far.”
Lannister nodded his head in nostalgia, then took few steps towards Adam.
“Guess it’s my time now,” he said, extending his hand to the new young champion, “keep this moment in your mind, Adam. I’m sure that my words will be as true as your father’s words and you really will go far.”
“Thanks, Garth. I really, really appreciate this,” he said, shaking Lannister’s hand and slowly getting on the vertical base. Suddenly his feet felt week and he almost collapsed on Garth. The veteran held onto him and sat him safely on the bench again.
“I guess you better have some rest before you celebrate, though, champ. You look like a beat up dog,” Garth stated with care. Adam just nodded and slowly closed his eyes as he saw Lannister leaving. An hour later, he woke up to an empty, silent room.
OFF CAMERA
August 15th, 2014
“I just want to thank you for that match, Adam. Best forty minutes of my career.”
“I thank you, Derrick. That was one for the ages.”
Adam Stryker and Derrick Wiland smiled at each other. It was just minutes after their amazing main event at SPITFIRE’s “American Strong Style Story” event, where Adam retained his belt over Derrick. The two hugged and suddenly, the SPITFIRE Championship fell from Stryker’s shoulder to the floor. And Stryker followed it shortly.
Minutes after, he opened his eyes. Seated on a chair, he saw Garth Lannister, now the manager of SPITFIRE’s own Two Men Army, in front of him. It was one big deja vu.
“Slept well, champ?” he asked. He was smiling, yet he looked concerned.
“I don’t know what the fuck happened, man,” Stryker said, burying his head in the palms of his hands.
“You blacked out. Like your body wanted a restart. The paramedics took care of you and said you need to rest… so I sent the rest of the kids home and stayed here with you.”
“Thanks a lot, Garth… I really appreciate it,” Stryker said, looking into the eyes of the retired wrestler.
Lannister scratched his chin. He wanted to ask Stryker something, but knowing Adam’s temper, he wasn’t sure if he should do that. But in the end he convinced himself to ask the question.
“Adam… you know I’m really concerned about you. I gotta ask you… did you ever think of taking a break? Because a situation like this could very well repeat and end up even worse.”
“No. I have the Iron Man with Ricky, I have matches with Aries, Cole…”
“So you want… what? Die in that ring?”
“Where else?” Adam asked with a smile.
Garth approached him and slapped him.
“I hope you meant it as a joke, Adam. You got kids on the way, a beautiful wife… don’t leave them here on their own. You’re still young, for Christ’s sake. Keep this moment in your mind, remember how shitty you feel and give yourself a break, get okay.”
Adam listened to every single one of those words, and each word struck him hard right in his ego. He got up and faced Lannister.
“I will…”
Lannister smiled.
“…when I’m finished.”
The smile quickly disappeared. Stryker grabbed his sports bag from the ground and walked towards the door. But suddenly, his feet felt weak and he fell to one knee. He kept looking at the floor and breathing heavily, trying his best to hide his exhausted face from Garth, who was standing behind him.
“Want me to drive you to the hotel, Adam?”
“Please.”
ON CAMERA
Now.
The scene opens inside the Stryke Dojo. Camera is set in the very center of one of the training rings and is aimed at Adam Stryker. The Dojo owner is sitting in the corner, leaning on the turnbuckles, dressed in jeans and 2CW’s “Wrestling Redefined” t-shirt.
“I was asked a nice question by fan this past week. He said – Adam, what is 2CW to you? What does it mean to you? And my answer was simple. 2CW means everything to me. 2CW is what PWX was in its prime, and maybe even more. That’s why I treat it the same way I treated PWX. I represent it everywhere I go, I recruit people for tryouts… many of the people you see or are about to see on the 2CW roster were brought in by me. Why do I do that? Why do I, basically, bring in a competition for myself that can dethrone me from the position of the top str of 2CW? That’s simple. I love 2CW. Just like I loved PWX…
BUT!… When I said to myself all these things I’m telling you right now, I realised one simple, yet major fact. There has to be one big difference between the way I fared in PWX and the way I’m faring in 2CW. You know that I was one of the biggest stars in PWX, even named Superstar of the Year in 2013, the year when everybody expected the dominant World Champion Troy Stone to take this trophy home. But there was one thing I never brought home myself and that was the PWX World Championship. I’m not bitter about that, because in the days when Zion and Hollywood finally gave me a chance to wrestle John Ojeda for the gold, PWX was merely a shadow of what it used to be. All I’m saying is… here in 2CW, I’m righting all the wrongs from my 2 year long PWX career. And number one on the list of those wrongs is getting the Heavyweight Championship.”
He nods, as we see a concentrated expression on his face.
“Just like back then, I keep hearing it from left to right that I have beaten everybody there is to beat and I should be in line for the Heavyweight title shot. Thankfully, the owner of 2CW isn’t pushing me back half a year, nor is he trying to comfort me with shots at second tier belts… at Road To Reckoning, I get a clean shot, one on one match with Damian Cole. Road To Reckoning… that’s almost a fitting name for my story. Almost. The thing is, I’ve been walking this road for far too long, in fact, I’ve been walking it eversince the day 2CW was created. I reached the end of the road, guys. THIS… will be my reckoning.
Damian Cole, the 2CW Champion, the man I am facing… is a man I really love watching. He is an old fashioned guy, who doesn’t care too much about his looks and fancy big words, rather he cares about the match he wrestles and he always gives 100 percent in that ring. But guess what? So do I. He won the Cibernetico, and beat the some of the best on the roster like Jason Richards and Troy Stone. I won the SPITFIRE Championship, beat Dakota Smith in his own game of deathmatches, beat former champion Jason Aries… should I continue? I think I don’t have to, because the fact I am trying to point out is pretty obvious – I am a 100 percent even match to Damian Cole.
Damian, my friend… when we collide, it will be the clash of two of the most dominant competitors on the 2CW roster. A match that the whole world will want to see. And I hate to spoil the result to you, and I kinda don’t like to cut your first title reign so short as well, but… the result will be the same as it always is. Adam Stryker walking out with the title raised high above his head.”
Stryker raises an arm up for a second and smiles.
“The reason is very, very simple. As I said, you are a man who gives it all in the ring, all heart… but you get carried away. You snap when you see your ex-wife in attendance. When you hear your son cry. It’s those little things that take your mind out of the ring. My mind?”
He uses the ropes to get up and walks to the very center of the ring.
“My mind’s always right here, bud. Dead center. You know, I am a father too, and a loving husband, but when the show starts… it all goes silent until the final bell rings. Because until that one final bell, I don’t see my family, my friends, all the people in the crowd… I only see what happens inside these ropes. For that long, painful moment, I breathe for pro-wrestling. And for Second City Wrestling. At Road To Reckoning, it will be no different. I may regret it when I return home, here to Los Angeles, and won’t be able to sleep for a week from all the pain all over my body… but when we meet at Road To Reckoning, Damian Cole, be sure as hell that I will leave my heart and soul right in the center of that ring for all the fans in Chicago to see. And may I crawl to the back, I don’t care as long as I’ll crawl as the winner. May they carry me out on the stretcher…
I don’t care as long as I’ll have the 2CW Championship with me.
Damian Cole… I bet that for a few times now, you heard me say Stryker is 2CW….
But this time, those three words that will haunt you long after the second I pin you to the mat will be… Stryker… Is… Wrestling.”
Adam shoots a very confident look towards the camera. We slowly fade to black.
Adam Stryker - professional wrestler 