The Devil Signs His Name
Not every wrestler carried a single gimmick consistently from the night of their debut to the end of their career.
But people wanted them to.
They hated it when the story we told looked fake.
The babyface who kept taking the same beating over and over. The heel who did nothing but repeat the same dirty tricks, stacking heat upon heat.
All of it was the equivalent of a story's stock clichés — which meant it was meant to be used like seasoning, nothing more.
A heel with conviction.
A babyface who showed his rage.
People roared for the wrestlers who embodied the full, complicated spectrum of what a human being could be.
Rock Cold was the same way.
He started as a villain, famous for stunnering anyone and everyone who rubbed him the wrong way.
Even after he turned face, that attitude never changed. He stunnered women too, for that matter.
People loved Rock Cold precisely because of that consistency and conviction.
So did I.
When the furious me spun around and signed the contract, the crowd's divided reaction hit its fever pitch.
The conviction to become the best.
A villain willing to do anything for that goal. That was me.
Russell took the microphone in hand.
"So that's your little scheme — justifying the vile things you've done."
He was no different.
"You crossed the line. You never trusted the man standing beside you."
He spat the words at me — rage and bitterness tangled together — and finished signing.
"I'm going to fight for the people who believed in me, Sin."
He had lost a friend, and gained an enemy. The crowd sent their cheers and their admiration to the lone babyface.
All that remained now was the match itself.
Never Escape was held in Boston, Massachusetts.
The show was scheduled for Sunday evening.
Having arrived in Boston ahead of time, I sat in the quiet of my hotel room and placed a call to Atlanta, Georgia.
The other end picked up right away.
"Hello?"
"How have you been?"
[Sin? It's been a while. Oh, I've been just fine. How about you?]
The warmth in her voice was unmistakable — but it quickly sharpened into a question that pricked at me like a needle.
[What is going on with Burning Kong?]
"...I'm sorry?"
[That — that 'Bra and Panties' match last week? I was watching it with my daughter and I nearly died of embarrassment.]
"Ah. I... see."
[Look, GCW had its share of that stuff too, I'll admit — but it was innuendo, not outright stripping!]
Poor Ebony sounded genuinely tortured.
[At this rate I'm starting to wonder if it's even okay to keep watching, Burning Kong...]
"And yet you'll keep watching, won't you?"
I asked with a laugh. After a brief silence, Ebony dodged the question in a way that was subtly, unmistakably direct.
[If my daughter wants to watch, then watch we must.]
"Haha, well then please keep supervising her viewing habits. ...So, anyway."
I cleared my throat for a moment.
"Are you free this Sunday?"
[Hm? I am, I think...?]
"I was wondering if I could invite the two of you to Never Escape."
[Jessie and me? I'd be honored! Haha, but isn't this too much of a privilege? Getting free tickets just because I'm friends with a pro wrestler.]
"Please don't feel burdened by it."
[Well then, shamelessly, I accept! Jessie's been begging me to take her somewhere fun lately. Thank you, truly.]
"It's my pleasure."
I wanted to repay a debt.
Meeting Ebony had been a tremendous help in setting my heart on this path.
Besides, I wanted to show her — the woman whose family had been so deeply tied to Willie — the ending of the story I had been building in that ring all this time.
"You can look forward to it."
I answered with a small smile.
Well, of course she could. Our match was the main event of Never Escape, after all.
Surrounding the squared circle stood a steel cage three meters high.
The setup crew was in the middle of rehearsal ahead of Never Escape.
I came down to the ring and watched them raise the cage and tear it down, raise it and tear it down.
A solid steel cage was the perfect place for wrestlers to end a long, bitter feud.
Because here — true to the pay-per-view's name, Never Escape — there was no way out.
In other words, you had to come prepared.
Since it was the final match, we'd planned a long list of brutal bumps. We fully intended to drive the crowd out of their minds.
As I always say — if someone watches this match and dies of a heart attack, there could be no greater compliment.
Not that anyone actually will.
It was a figure of speech, of course.
But still — my heart had been pounding uncontrollably since earlier, and I couldn't make it stop.
My first main-roster pay-per-view match, and it was the main event!
In my past life, I hadn't even dared to dream of it.
I had always been looked down on.
Race was a big part of it, and I'd never put in the effort to overcome it, either.
But things were different now.
I stood here as myself, and I made the people lose their minds.
To quote the very people who had sneered at me in my past life — the 'Chinaman who does kung fu' now stood towering over them all.
Let's put on a show.
To repay the support of all the people who believed in me and given me this chance.
As I was turning that thought over, someone standing beside me spoke up.
It was Russell.
"Sin."
"What?"
"I'm counting on you tomorrow."
"...Same here."
He was the one scheduled to receive the belt, so he had volunteered to take the lion's share of the dangerous bumps.
And I would be the one catching him. Tomorrow, we had to work in perfect unison, like a single body.
One misstep and either of us could suffer a catastrophic injury. But there were moments when bearing that exact risk was what made the result all the greater.
This was one of those moments.
If tomorrow's match drew a great reaction from the crowd, then every one of us would come out a winner.
We stared at each other for a beat, then lightly bumped our fists together.
Never Escape.
A massive show with fifty thousand in total attendance.
While the staff bustled about running the event, most of the wrestlers were doing their best to hide their nerves.
It couldn't be helped.
No matter how long your career, standing before a crowd this enormous was a hard thing to do.
Everyone was on edge at the deafening roar bleeding through the walls. On nights like this, nobody even watched the monitors backstage.
...But I was a little different.
Maybe it was the effect of the self-brainwashing I'd been repeating without end since my regression.
'I am the best.' That was the mantra.
Of course, I didn't actually believe it. The world was full of brilliant wrestlers besides me.
For now, anyway.
One day I intended to surpass every last one of them and become the best, without question.
And to do that, you first had to carry yourself with the conviction that you already were — that was the mindset, at least.
Every time the champion changed, the crowd sent a thunderous wave of support to the wrestlers, heels and faces alike.
Match after match played out, and at last the World Championship — the semi-main event — reached its final stretch.
The Revolution members, fresh off winning the Tag Team Championships earlier in the night, came out and did their part to pull the referee's gaze.
The textbook formula for a heel victory.
It was a thoroughly forgettable match.
Some things never change, do they.
Hunter was a man of old-school thinking. He'd changed somewhat after marrying Tiffany McMahon and becoming an executive.
Either way, deciding there was nothing left worth watching, I rose from my seat.
I followed a staffer who had come to fetch me and moved to Gorilla Position.
Amid the main-show staff busily running the event, one familiar face caught my eye.
Baku.
"You made it, champ."
"What's that supposed to mean? You've been nowhere to be found all week."
"Ah, been run off my feet checking on a few things."
"On what?"
"On being useful to you."
Baku held something out.
A map of the arena seating. One section of it was circled in pen.
"I checked where the families and kids who came to see you are sitting. If you want to draw a reaction, use this side."
"...Baku."
"Ain't gonna have many more chances to work alongside you, after all. This is about all this old man's got left to give."
"Thank you."
I checked the seating section, then gave Baku a light shoulder bump.
He had been with me for nearly all of my GCW days, and had always been an enormous help.
"Go out there with no regrets."
"Yes, Baku."
Hearing my answer, he walked off toward Russell, who stood on the far side.
I deliberately ignored Russell.
He did the same to me.
With a match this important, we both wanted to walk out with our emotions locked down tight.
So without a word exchanged between us, the semi-main ended before long.
Hunter raised the belt overhead in the ring, and Booker-Lee was the first to leave, stepping into Gorilla Position.
"Whew... wheew..."
People applauded him for the twenty-minute war he'd just survived — but to my ear it felt perfunctory.
Maybe he sensed it too, because Booker-Lee gave a half-hearted wave and promptly vanished backstage.
The problem was what came after.
"Hunter!"
"That was incredible!"
The moment Triple H and the Revolution members walked in, the staff erupted as if greeting a president-elect.
They're going to eat me alive. Eat me alive, huh.
I clicked my tongue inwardly.
Most of the staff here belonged to Hunter's faction. That was the whole reason for the difference in reception.
Hunter was being worshipped like a returning king.
Belt slung over his shoulder, he eventually made his way over to me. His expression was sour — the main event had been taken from him, after all.
"...It's your turn."
"So it is."
"You'd better show them something."
"I'll do my best."
I gave him a suitably noncommittal answer.
I had no intention of openly declaring war. But if he chose to bare his fangs, I'd fight back — that was all.
Hunter held my gaze for a long, weighing moment, then turned away. The Revolution members filed out behind him.
While the commercials rolled, the steel cage was assembled around the ringside area.
It wasn't much of a spectacle.
The cage, which had hung suspended from the ceiling in sections, was lowered down, and the waiting crew bolted each panel into place at ringside.
And so the cage was complete.
The watching crowd sent up a huge roar at the sight alone. I confirmed the commercial break was ending.
The camera swept across the arena hosting the pay-per-view.
Fifty thousand spectators, in the flesh.
Amid that overwhelming spectacle, the ring bell tolled three times. And then the arena announcer introduced the main event.
"Russell, you're up."
At my word, Russell stepped forward. Baku, who had lined up behind him, slapped his back and sent him off with encouragement.
With a searing guitar riff, Russell's theme began to play.
He threw back the curtain and climbed into the ring. Then it was my turn — the champion's entrance.
"Sin. Good luck out there."
Baku didn't skimp on the encouragement for me, either. I flashed him a grin and stepped out to the holy thunder of my dubstep.
A single slit in the blackout curtain.
And the instant I stepped through it, the atmosphere flipped a full 180 degrees.
That smell unique to an arena like this — boos and cheers mingling with the heat of fifty thousand bodies.
The crowd's reaction crashed over me like a violent wave.
At the end of the long entrance ramp, Russell stood inside the cage, glaring at me.
I felt the weight of the belt all over again.
Word was the live viewership — the United States and Canada broadcasting in real time, plus Europe — had already topped five million.
Count in the countries that would air the broadcast later — Asia, South America, the Middle East — and the number would swell far beyond that.
The scale itself had changed.
There could be no better stage to close out the story Russell and I had written together.
As I walked forward, I spotted them at ringside — the mother and daughter, cheering at the top of their lungs.
Ebony shouted when she saw me.
"You'd better win, Sin!"
"...You're cheering for the villain?"
Sure enough, Ebony's daughter Jessie was scowling at me with the sourest look imaginable.
Chuckling wryly, I passed right by the pair and climbed into the ring.
Russell, glaring daggers at me.
Before those eyes, I thrust the belt high into the sky — an open provocation.
And so the match began.
From the opening bell, Russell and I traded blows, baring our fangs at each other.
It was closer to a street fight than wrestling. The roughness of the assault forced the referee to jump in and issue warning after warning.
"No closed fists! I said no closed fists!"
"What fist? This isn't a fist!"
I roared my protest and swung at Russell again, who I'd driven back into the ring post.
But the attack was blocked with ease.
Momentum flipped in the blink of an eye. That was how we showed each other our hostility.
Of course, every bit of it was a script we'd plotted out in advance.
Still, once the match began, there was no way to speak except with our bodies.
And on that front, Russell and I had already worked together enough to be in perfect sync.
"Body slam."
I took the bump.
"Kick."
I struck back.
The crowd went wild at the sight of us. An exchange followed in which neither man gave a single inch.
And at last, the first wave of control went to me — the champion.
A short, thunderous Spinebuster, followed by an Elbow Drop.
I hammered Russell's face while sprawled across the mat as he writhed in agony.
The crowd showered me with boos. I pressed on with the merciless assault, then rose to my feet, gasping for breath.
When I suddenly stopped attacking and stood up, the crowd looked baffled.
As I'd said — under cage match rules, escaping the cage counted as a victory.
Without a moment's hesitation, I grabbed hold of the steel mesh and began to climb.
[Boooooooooooooooooo!]
The fans, who had come starving for a brutal war, buried me in a tidal wave of jeers.
It was more than fair. I had spent this entire feud vowing to destroy Russell inside that cage.
But there was nothing I could do about it.
Tonight, Russell was the star of the show.
"Where do you think you're going?"
My tights were yanked from behind, and I turned to find Russell standing there, chest heaving.
My eyes went wide with shock — and before I could react, Russell shoved his head between my legs.
Powerbomb.
My body was hoisted into the air — and then slammed down onto the wide, unforgiving canvas.
CRASH!
The ring thundered from the bump, and the crowd erupted at the glorious sound of it.
[Russell! Russell! Russell!]
Amid the searing pain, I felt a shiver run through me.
But this was only the beginning.