“Broken Tooth (Broken Hearted Vampire)”

::::SCENE: “Big Jim’s Salvage” just outside of Chicago, Illinois, a stone’s throw from the Best Arena (if that stone was being thrown by a high powered catapult). Big Jim, owner and proprietor of the salvage yard is neither Big nor is he a Jim. His name is Kit Fredricksen, a slender man in his fifties with shoulder length black hair with purple streaks. He has a tattoo of lips with a tongue sticking out on his neck. Simon Sparrow assumes Kit was a fan of those Twizzlers commercials in the eighties.

Simon Sparrow is sporting an electric blue and black checkered suit with matching waistcoat, his (now familiar) black and tan fringe suede jacket, a black Stetson on his head, a holster on his right hip containing a six shooter paint gun, and the LSD Championship around his waist.

For the past twenty minutes, Kit has been “entertaining” the Professor of Sparrowdynamics with stories about his cat, Charles. Apparently Charles is an alleged vegan cat who may or may not meow in Morse code causing Kit to think he is a feline spy for the record industry out to steal his songs, such as “Broken Tooth (Broken Hearted Vampire)” and “I’ll Be Your Penis Teddy Bear” (he more than happily sang the latter to Simon Sparrow as they were exiting the office).

It was not good. However, Simon finds himself humming the irritatingly catchy chorus of the rockabilly tune “I’ll be your Peeeeenis, Penis, Peeeeeeenis Teddy Bear”.

Kit, droning on and on, leads Simon Sparrow to an open area within the salvage yard with a large tarp covering something in the center.::::

KIT: …and so I tell Wolf that if he don’t like the solo, he can quit the band so he did. The bastard started a band of his own: “Wolf, Wolf, Goose”.

::::Kit, rocking pale blue pinstriped overalls and work boots, stops and turns towards Simon.:::

KIT: And here we are! Everything is all set as per your specifications. Felt a little weird putting the underwear on the CPR dummy. No judgments, my drummer has a fascination with cookie scented perfume.

SIMON SPARROW: Let’s get this movin’ along there, cowpoke.

::::Kit approaches the covered item in the clearing. He picks up the tarp as Simon Sparrow looks on with the stoic expression of Lee Van Cleef at high noon.:::;

KIT: TA-DAH!

::::Kit pulls the tarp away with a dramatic flourish. Unfortunately for Kit, he only pulls off a fifth of the tarp. The item is still blanketed under the tarp. As Simon Sparrow shakes his head in disgust like a man walking into a gas station’s public restroom with a busted toiled, Kit proceeds to pick up the tarp and pulls it off. Simon Sparrow’s jaw drops.

There it is. The jalopy in the clearing is a rusted golf cart missing it’s front wheels. The paint job has faded, where it once read “STARRLIITE EXPRESS” it now reads “STAR ITE EX R S”. How long has it been since he has seen it? Eight? Ten years?

Simon Sparrow pulls the brim of his hat down and waves Kit away from the golf cart. Simon Sparrow, still feeling a twinge in his neck, saunters with a swagger towards the once “Starrlite Express”. He looks inside and finds a CPR dummy wearing “King of Everything” tights. From his pocket, the Rembrandt of Wrestling pulls out a mask he cobbled together with a photograph, the talents of Marco, a street caricature artist, and elastic. He places the artistic exaggerated expression of fear on the face of Jace Parker Davidson on the dummy’s expressionless head.::::

SIMON SPARROW: Ya got everything else?

KIT: I’ll have it in a jiff.

:::Kit heads over to a decrepit Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme and opens the trunk. Meanwhile, the HOW Hall of Famer proceeds to take twenty paces away from the golf cart. With each crinkle of the dirt beneath his ostrich boots, Simon thinks about Jace. How Jace was duped during the Lethal Lottery and he allowed Scott Stevens to get the better of him. How Jace had a microphone unceremoniously shoved down his throat courtesy of Eli Dresden. And how the Best Alliance turned on him and allowed Darin Zion to score a victory over the so-called King of Everything. With all of those humiliations, Simon would have thought that Jace Parked Davidson would have shown signs of changing.

Alas, he has not.

King of Everything?

More like King of Shit.

In a certain way, Jace Parker Davidson and Jatt Starr are (or were) kindred spirits with massive egos preventing them from working together in any successful capacity. Jace would have most certainly been, at the time, threatened of the Jatt Starr legacy and Jatt Starr was threatened by the Jace’s potential to be even better than he.

There was a hierarchy when Jace debuted. Mike Best, Max Kael, Jace Parker Davidson, and then the Ruler of Jattlantis. Such as it is when you step away from the business for any extended period of time. Of course, Jace came in with his wife, Tara. Simon wonders if Mike Best had not joined the HOW and found out his pops was the degenerate fuckface, Lee Best, would Jace have managed to usurp the top spot.

But Jatt Starr is dead.

And Jatt Starr needs to stay dead.

There can be no ReStarrection.

Simon Sparrow spins, draws his six shooter….

POP!

Two teal shots to the Jace Parker Davidson dummy’s head, one tea blot on the driver side headlight. Simon Sparrow smirks and nods with satisfaction before pulling off a nifty trick of spinning the paint gun in his finger and holstering it.::::

KIT: Nice shooting, Tex!

::::Simon Sparrow tugs on his hat in the general direction of Kit, who has a gas canister and is in the process of dousing the golf cart in gasoline. Kit is earning his three hundred and fifty dollar payday. A gust of wind blows the scent of gasoline towards the Professor of Sparrowdynamics and there is an ever so slight twinge of worry that the world will go ablaze when he accomplishes his task here. Kit tosses the empty ninety-seven red plastic gasoline container off to the side and jogs towards Simon Sparrow.::::

KIT: We’re ready when you are.

::::Simon Sparrow nods affirmatively.::::

KIT: But, just, curious and shit. Why you wanna set that thing on fire?

SIMON SPARROW: Well there, bronco, you’re a-gonna witness the Rembrandt of Wrasslin’ create a work of art. The dummy represents the man who encapsulates all of the qualities I have turned my back on: Greed, Lust, Avarice, Blind Ambition, Misogyny, Degradation in the name of those in Power, Brown-nosedness. The Bootlickin’ Baron of Bitchassery, Jace Parker Davidson.

KIT: And the mobile golfing transport unit?

SIMON SPARROW: The representation of the excess and-and-and massive ego that Jatt Starr possessed. The fact that he would travel to the ring in such a manner, his name emblazoned on the vehicle. A man whose entire career had been built on grandstanding, self-absorption, an inflated sense of self-importance, and self-promotion. A man who felt he was bigger than he was yet followed the orders of a-a-a mad, sadistic dictator whose idea of was stabbing people in the eye and having a sex crazed cow sexually violate his enemies.

KIT: Not exactly Andy Warhol, is it?

SIMON SPARROW: The guy from “NewsRadio”?

KIT: That’s Andy Dick.

SIMON SPARROW: You don’t need to have a potty mouth.

KIT: No, I’m…forget it.

SIMON SPARROW: I’m ready.

KIT: No offense, but I would much rather wait for the fire department to arrive.

SIMON SPARROW: But I am ready now.

KIT: What if the—-

SIMON SPARROW: Art isn’t built on “”What if’s”, hombre. It is built on passion and heart.

KIT: I really think—

SIMON SPARROW: When you the idea for your magnum opus “I’ll Be Your Penis Teddy Bear” came a-sproutin’ in your mind, did wait to for your bandmates or the fire department before you created it?

KIT: Well, no….

SIMON SPARROW: NO! Of course not! When the muses come a-ridin’ into town, artists must create! Now, give it here.

KIT: Alriiiiiiiiight…..

::::The musician/salvage yard owner reaches into the right pocket of his coveralls and pulls out a bright orange flare gun and from his left pocket he retrieves a single flare. He hands them both to Simon Sparrow, who promptly “tests” the sights of the short muzzled gun primarily used for emergencies as if he knows what he is doing. He does not, but he has seen people do it on television, usually procedural crime dramas. Simon proceeds to attempt to open the flare gun, he begins grunting as he struggles to get it open. Kit starts to reluctantly point at the gun.::::

KIT: You need to, uh, unlatch the, uh, thing at the top….

:::Simon Sparrow is finally able to open the chamber. He slides the flare into place and closes the gun. Simon Sparrow closes his eyes, centering himself. The last thing he wants to do is miss and somehow cause a wildfire in the outskirts of Chicago. In his mind, he recalls every sordid action he has taken and every humiliation or tragedy he has ever endured at the hands of the Best Family while calling himself the Ruler of Jattlantis, the Jattlantic City Idol, the Sultan of SeaJattle, the Starrlite Sexpress Jatt Starr. A sneer crosses Simon Sparrow’s lips. Anger, disgust, regret are just a few of the emotions that Simon Sparrow is experiencing.

He opens his eyes. Instead of a dummy in “King of Everything” trunks, he sees Jatt Starr wearing a black baseball jersey with gold lettering that reads “Jatt Starr” in script on the front. He sees Jatt Starr smugly smiling, looking down on the fans, burying his insecurity with delusions of grandeur (which he had succeeded in making a reality winning championship after championship, thus replacing delusions with equating championships with relevance, love, and acceptance).

Simon shakes the image from his mind. He unholsters his six shooter paint gun.::::

SIMON SPARROW: Hold this.

KIT: I got a bad feeling about this.

SIMON SPARROW: Duly noted.

::::Kit reluctantly takes the paint gun by the barrel. Once he does so, the HOW Hall of Famer holsters the flare gun. While not as perfect a fit, it will do for his purposes. Simon Sparrow squints his eyes, managing to make out the teal blotted painted mask of Jace Parker Davidson. Simon feels his lip twitch ever so slightly. Kit looks nervously on, probably hoping he has not made a poor decision and hopes he is up to date with his fire insurance should Simon miss (no matter how many times he has previously claimed that he will not).::::

SIMON SPARROW: Hey Jace, you gotta ask yourself one question, ‘Do I feel lucky?’ Well, do ya?

KIT: Isn’t that “Dirty—-

::::In a split second, Simon Sparrow draws the flare gun and pulls the trigger. The flare is launched leaving a trail of smoke and sails into the rusted heap in the middle of the clearing, igniting the rustbucket and the CPR dummy inside.::::

KIT: Oh shit!

:::The Rembrandt of Wrestling stares at his fiery masterpiece as a pyromaniac would gaze at an inferno they would have started. Simon Sparrow can feel the heat of the flames as he looks on, a feeling of calmness and a twinge of grief, believing that he has killed a piece of the Jatt Starr persona buried inside of him. A slight smile creeps on his face as the scene ends.::::

**********************

I reckon you thought I was a-gonna be addressin’ Jace Parker Davidson, didn’t ya?

Lee, I gotta question, how many lives do you gotta ruin to heal that messed up of yours, huh?

Tell you what, I’m hopin’ that at “Dead or Alive”, Kostoff finally fuckin’ destroys you. I wanna see his giant meaty hands around that scrawny little neck of yours. I wanna see those eyes of yours bulge outta your head like a Looney Tunes character as you struggle for one gasp of air. And I wanna know that as Kostoff is on top of you, squeezin’ the life outta you, that you expel your bowels and Kostoff feels the warmth of your piss as the light goes outta your eyes and you’re deader than Jace Parker Davidson’s penis after four lines of cocaine and a gallon of whiskey.

But first….

There’s this little business with Jace Parker Davison, isn’t there?

You’ve been a-cagier than a maximum security chicken coop when it comes to the stipulation for this upcomin’ match for my LSD Championship.

I figure you or one of your Board cronies mayhaps have spilled the beans to ol’ Jace in hopes that he can prioritize and strategize for this match while you keep me a-guessin’.

I wanna tell you straight up, man-to-bottomfeeder, it ain’t gonna matter. There ain’t many matches that I’ve been in that I can’t win.

I’ve already taken your biggest and thickest in Stronk. I’m supposin’ you might not wanna go back the Ladder Match so soon after you saw what I did. But if’n you do, I’m ready for it. I will climb that ladder like I did a week and a half ago and hold on to what is mine.

Lumberjack Match? You and I both know no one will give a rat’s rectum about a Lumberjack match.

First Blood? No problem. I’m the Rembrandt of Wrasslin’ and I will paint that ring in Jace’s blood.

Falls Count Anywhere. Nothin’ could be better than an old fashioned, a-rootin’ tootin’ barnbustin’ brawl. I will toss that little fopdoodle off balconies, into the french fry fryer, into the fuckin incinerator is I have to.

No Disqualification? Yeah, I could see you doin’ this and I say bring it the fuck on. I will beat on him with chairs, sledgehammers, ball peen hammers….I will quickdraw and shoot that prick in the face with the big iron on my hip. Anything and everything, I will do what it takes.

What else is there? Scaffold match? I’m undefeated in scaffold matches. You think Jace is prepared for that level of violence and potential permanent physical harm?

See, Lee, it does not matter what you do, what match you choose. It took THREE men…well, two and half men to take me down last week. You think I’m sittin’ here a-quakin’ in my ostrich leather boots?

I can’t….

And I repeat, I CAN’T lose the LSD Championship to Jace Parker Davidson.

You and I both know what that would mean. And I know you’re bankin’ on it.

I ain’t naive, old man. I know you got some nefarious schemes rattling around that demented brain of yours. Maybe you’ll send in Stronk or Tyler or Mike or Cecilworth Fucking Farthington or Narcotic or Lynx or any other Hall of Famer your extorting or overpaying to defeat me. The second you feel that Jace is shittin’ the haystacks, and he most certainly will, you’ll put your plan in motion. Because out of everyone in the Board or in the history of the Best Alliance, he’s always been a fuckin’ disappointment to you. He’s no Mike, he’s no Sektor, he’s certainly no Max Kael.

But that’s what you do….you fuck people over to hide the fact that your weaker soldiers are just that….soldiers. King of Everything? Jace is a fucking pawn and you both know it. As long as the checks get signed.

You fuck people over, Lee. Some people can live it. I was one of those people. Not anymore.

You want Jatt Starr?

Go fuck yourself. You, the Board, Tyler….the whole rotten lot of you.