Major Copy, Minor Copy
A backstage promo.
The term meant exactly what it said — a promo performed behind the stage, away from the entrance ramp.
Backstage promos were used on a regular basis to advance pro wrestling's storylines, little self-contained scenes of drama like episodes of a TV show.
My face appeared on the giant screen above the entrance way. The crowd showered me in boos, but I ignored them and held up my t-shirt for the cameras.
On the front: MAJOR COPY.
On the back: MINOR COPY.
Just then, the announcer sidled up beside me and asked me a question.
["Sin, you have a match prepared against Russell tonight..."]
["Shh, shh. I've got something to say, so keep it down when you open your mouth."]
The announcer's face crumpled at that. I angled my chest toward the camera so the lettering caught the light just right.
["This shirt is a portrait of how Russell Hart looks at me."]
["Excuse me? What do you mean by that?"]
["When that guy looks at me like this, what he's seeing is his Major Copy. Ah — of course, I'm a far greater man than his decrepit old uncle, but still."]
Then I turned my back to the camera.
["And when he's flat on the mat, he'll be looking at my turned back. The Minor Copy you see there — that's him. That's what he is. Russell Hart will never get past me. Understood?"]
["I— I see."]
["You pathetic nobodies probably won't have a use for the shirt, though. You're all just someone else's Minor Copy anyway. Shame, really — it's a great shirt. Nice feel, breathes well. And it's a fresh new arrival that just went on sale in the shop today."]
["...You're not doing this just to sell t-shirts, are you?"]
I held my silence for a beat at the announcer's question, then simply turned and backed away from the camera.
The crowd burst out laughing at the promo, ended on a light comedic note.
Not bad.
From Gorilla Position, I checked the atmosphere inside the arena and nodded to myself. Anyone who'd watched that promo was going to buy the merchandise just for the chance to wave it in my face and mock me.
Think we'll get a Minor Copy chant?
I was still chuckling at the thought when I felt a hand land on my shoulder, and I turned my head.
It was Russell.
"Great promo."
"Thanks."
"Good luck out there tonight."
"Yeah. Let's give them another one that drives the crowd insane, just like always."
We were both professionals. No matter how viciously we tore into each other on camera, as long as the crowd reacted, there was never any bad blood behind the curtain.
And so the show began.
Wyatt, freshly crowned GCW Champion, came out and cut a promo in the ring, and the crowd reacted with pure euphoria.
Several more matches followed. Nothing spectacular in quality, but the audience responded with real heat.
It was a kind of virtuous cycle.
Good performers — and beyond them, good rivalries and good matches — help the crowd invest deeper into the show and cheer louder. And that energy bleeds through the television screen to the viewers at home, making even an ordinary show look magnificent.
Thus, amid the crowd's feverish roars, the main event arrived.
Russell made his entrance first, to a thunderous ovation. I watched his reactions on the VTR feed right up until the last moment.
His face was grim and focused.
He's the real deal, no question.
He hadn't regressed across time like I had, and yet his acting was already this sharp.
Can't afford to lose to him.
"Sin! You're up!"
At the crew member's signal, I finished my deep breath and heard my music hit.
My theme song — perfected with the talent of a man who had rewired the very paradigm of music.
As I stepped out to its beat, I could see the crowd grinning.
Every last one of them had bought my t-shirt on the spot during the commercial break and put it on.
Shoulders squared, I peeled off my jacket to reveal the shirt underneath.
"You're my Minor Copy!"
The crowd hurled abuse at me with everything they had.
That's what, six bucks a head in the register?
Thinking that, I soaked up their jeers with a relaxed smile and climbed into the ring.
The announcer introduced me, the bell rang, and the match began.
I sauntered up to Russell and displayed the shirt for him.
"Russell, what do you think? Pretty sharp, huh?"
He merely glared at me without so much as twitching. I patted my knee right in front of his face.
"And this — the knee that kissed your skull. You think you can take me down?"
The jeering was loud enough to nearly drown out my voice. The atmosphere had boiled to its very limit.
Russell stepped forward, seized me by the collar, and tore the t-shirt off me with raw force.
With a sharp rriiip, the fabric split and the crowd roared its approval.
I staggered back in genuine surprise for a split second — then lunged at Russell. He dropped flat to dodge my attack and immediately hammered my knee.
It was the chop block — the move where you kick out an opponent's leg from the front or behind with your forearm.
"Kugh?!"
I deliberately launched myself high into a full forward rotation, sailing clean over Russell as he charged in, and crashed to the mat.
Perfect timing. Flawless sync.
The crowd cheered with visceral satisfaction at the sight of Russell going straight for the knee from the opening bell.
The next ten minutes of the match unfolded from there.
With my knee under relentless assault, I could barely stand. Even when I occasionally tried to mount a comeback, my leg gave out and I collapsed to the canvas in a heap.
...All of it, of course, was theater.
In truth, Russell — trained in wrestling his entire life, with ring time to spare — executed every technique to perfection.
And in the end, battered into a wreck, I couldn't escape the sharpshooter he locked in for the finish.
"I give up! I GIVE UP!!"
Bang-bang-bang!
As I slapped the mat in theatrical surrender, the crowd erupted in a furious ovation.
The ring bell tolled, and I rolled out of the ring, tumbling to the floor to leave the spotlight to Russell.
A piercing guitar riff rang out as the winner's theme filled the arena — Russell's music.
Basking in the crowd's cheers, drinking in the joy of victory, he was, in every sense of the word, the face of the era.
Immediately after exiting the ring, Russell came straight to me and thanked me.
"Thank you, Sin."
"Don't mention it."
"How did it look out there?"
"Your execution was clean."
For some reason, he always sought reassurance after a match that he'd done well.
He'd been performing so superbly that I rarely had anything to critique anyway.
The problem is that guy, though.
I turned to look at Baku, who stood further back watching us.
Protecting and supervising our wrestlers was entirely his job. Which meant Russell leaning on me like this was not a good look.
"What did you think of it?"
"Hm? You're asking the obvious."
Baku flashed a grin, played it cool all the same, and tossed a towel at me.
"A hell of a reversal, that."
The crowd had spent all week wondering whether Russell would resort to the cowardly tactic of attacking my knee.
But Russell had shredded my leg from the opening bell, bold and unapologetic.
...All of it was my idea, and because of that I understood why Russell trusted and relied on me.
Still, you were the one who won tonight, pal.
I looked at Russell and decided he had every right to hold his head higher.
"The crowd heat was killer."
"That's because you carried me."
He immediately redirected the credit. I grinned, then checked the clock — the commercial block after our match was winding down.
Which meant it was almost time for my second backstage promo.
"Going live!"
"Three, two, one!"
The VTR cut to black, then the screen came back to show the backstage area.
Limping on my bad knee, I stepped into frame and immediately pounded on a door marked GCW GENERAL MANAGER.
The man who emerged was Harley Racy, who as part of the storyline served as the on-air general manager of GCW.
["What do you want, Sin?"]
["...Give me a rematch."]
["Eh? What's that supposed to mean?"]
["I'm going to completely demolish Russell Hart — so book the match again!"]
That was the gist of the promo.
I glared at Harley in fury. He staggered back a step, then quickly composed his face into stern authority.
["Then you'll have to put something on the line yourself."]
["If I lose... I'll wrestle in the exact same ring gear as Russell Hart."]
["...What?"]
["I'll put on that homoerotic outfit of his and dance in front of the whole crowd if you want."]
["W-well, then..."]
Harley nodded along slowly.
The somewhat anticlimactic finish to tonight's match had been deliberate — everything was in service of this second encounter.
We'd end that one in a draw, then settle the score in the final match on pay-per-view. That was the plan.
Pay-per-view was a special broadcast that viewers could only watch by purchasing it separately.
Matches that concluded a rivalry almost always took place on pay-per-view.
You built anticipation on the weekly show and drove up the pay-per-view buyrate. For the company, it was the obvious choice.
GCW held a pay-per-view once every three months, and my rivalry with Russell was set to conclude at one of them.
But as with all things, nothing ever went exactly according to plan.
And so, another week later.
With our bodies in mind, Russell and I had been given the week off from competition.
So tonight's show would feature only an in-ring promo, a brief segment designed to deepen the rivalry between the two of us.
The two of us facing off, trading insults and blows — a staple of any pro wrestling show.
"Russell, don't be nervous!"
With Baku's encouragement ringing in his ears, Russell went out first and took the microphone. The crowd cheered for him, and everyone backstage smiled at the warm reception.
But then came the problem.
["Gay costume! Clap! Clap! Clap-clap-clap! Gay costume!"]
Along with the applause, the crowd began tormenting Russell with their cruel little game.
...Oh, no.
Everyone watching grimaced. It was one of the most common hazards of pro wrestling, but that didn't make it any less ugly.
This is my promo's fault.
The crowd was mocking the amateur wrestling singlet Russell wore, calling it gay — and the ones saying it were the fans who'd found the joke funny in my segment.
Which meant one thing: Russell's character still hadn't carved out a place in the audience's hearts strong enough to stand on its own.
And on top of that, they're just heckling the performer, completely off-script.
I clicked my tongue softly.
"Mm."
Baku groaned under his breath.
Russell raised the microphone to his lips — then fell silent. The crowd kept heckling him, toying with him, laughing.
Granted, it beat dead silence... but it could still inflict serious damage on a wrestler's standing.
Harley and Baku, unable to watch any longer, began talking it over.
"Harley, do something, will ya?"
"What do you want me to do?"
"Cut to a commercial for now. We'll figure it out after."
That was when I stepped between them.
"Harley, give me one minute."
"Sin? What the hell are you planning?"
"Oh, I ran into this all the time on the indies. I can fix it."
I answered lightly.
Everyone stared at me with bewildered faces. I just kept my eyes locked on Harley, waiting for permission.
He held his tongue for a moment, studied my face, then gave a slow nod.
"...Do whatever the hell you want."
"I won't disappoint you."
With a sharp grin, I turned around and called out to the head of the audio team.
"When Russell tries to talk again, hit my music."
"Got it."
"And toss me a mic."
Wireless microphone in hand from a staff member, I readied myself to head out to the ring.
All that was left was to wait for Russell to catch the rhythm of the tango the two of us would improvise together.
Fortunately, the message got through. Before long, as the crowd roared their gay costume chant at him once more, Russell raised the microphone again.
"Get out here!"
My music hit, cutting him off and reverberating through the arena.
Alright. Let's see what you've got.
Having cooked up a suitably outrageous bit of nonsense in my head, I walked out.
Unlike before, the crowd's reaction wasn't outright hostile toward me.
They'd gotten behind the gay costume joke I'd planted, after all.
And it was there that I found the hint I needed to cut through this mess.
"Russell. Russell. Russell."
As I spoke into the microphone, the music died.
Standing at the top of the entrance way, I swaggered side to side and mocked Russell with a sneer.
"Look at your face right now. The people tease you a little and you fall all over yourself. That's you. That's the real you — a pampered little greenhouse flower, a young master who's never known a thing about the world."
Russell simply stared at me.
He's not even trying to play along — he's just completely frozen.
Seeing him like that, I swept my arm wide and pointed at the entire crowd.
"Shocked, Russell? That the people you love are humiliating you? Well, you should be — because the truth is, every single one of these people is on my payroll!"
Russell's eyes went wide.
That's right.
I had just pulled the entire audience into the show itself — made them part of the script.
Two things remained to be seen.
Whether Russell could follow this improvised storyline.
And whether the crowd itself would play along with it too.
"Say it with me! Gay costume!"
At my words, the crowd went wild, screaming along at the top of their lungs.