Bryan Payne

What Dreams May Come

The tag match proved a brutal affair with half the participants being carried out on stretchers and was broken up with the two surviving members of the Cult Robb McBride and Randy Rotten facing off against Bryan Payne. It was declared a no contest and took the combined efforts of security, staff, and tech crew to separate the combatants before careers were ended.**

*set for the Pride 3 show.*

The camera shot zooms out slowly as the crowd at Underground gets an eyeful of Bryan Payne walking down the ramp towards the ring. He pauses several times to shake hands, sign a few autograph even to snap a quick picture with someone leaning halfway over the guardrail before continuing down towards the ring. He’s dressed in street cloths, his baseball jersey unbutton hanging open down the middle and his jeans pulled down over heavy work boots. In his right fist is still clenched the barbed wire baseball bat he’d used at Pride 2 to take out Ricky Riot and fend off Randy and Robb coming for him with steel chairs; dark red stains on the wood and the metal show clearly on the camera that he hasn’t so much as washed it.

Killer: Oh boy, not this guy again…

Cruz: Well, he’s certainly not slated to appear here at Underground tonight.

The Wolfman rolls underneath the bottom rope and then climbs slowly to his feet making a slow steady march around the ring before pausing to step up on the bottom rope, his left hand gripping the top to steady himself as he shoves the bat up into the air over his head to the cheering crowd as his music blares over the arena sound system. After several minutes of this the crowd begins to die down just a bit as Bryan retrieves a mic from ringside and takes a position in the center of the ring laying the bat down before he begins talking.

“At the second in the Pride series you people saw something that doesn’t happen very often, even in this business. You saw six men say to hell with the rules, to hell with the refs, to hell with the match I’m going to kick your ass! And that’s just what happened.” He paused for a moment letting the mixed reaction of the crowd tremble down over the arena as people try to work out where he’s going with this.

Cruz: Is he.. actually happy about how that match turned out? His partners and Ricky Riot were carried off in stretchers!

Killer: I wouldn’t be surprised. We see more and more of this guy being a loose cannon; I’m starting to think he’s a danger to the talent in the locker room. Did you SEE what he did with that bat? And now he’s carrying it around like a trophy..

“Raw passion, raw emotion my friends. You saw the fact that the six men in that ring really didn’t like each other very much. It wasn’t about a pin fall, it wasn’t about a submission, it was about ending the other man! You see, the Cult has missed the point here when they identified me with Lee Harvey Oswald and Robb with those who arrested him. A point that has confounded authorities the world over concerning every successful assassination in history. You might, catch me, you might kill me, you might even make me look bad in the process, but all of that doesn’t do a damn thing for the guy in the pine box does it?”

Pausing for a moment he waits for people to digest that for a few minutes pacing back and forth, his hand wiping down the sides of his mouth almost as if he’s frothing a the bit with impatience. Energy pours off him in almost visible waves that slowly seem to be catching on with the crowd drawing them into his talk, mesmerizing them slowly.

“The point is, Oswald was successful, he achieved what he set out to do, and so will I. If it means the end of my career so be it, but that won’t do any of you three a damn bit of good, because I’m taking all three of you with me.”

“So if Ricky and Rotten have the stones to come out here right now, we’ll get this started right now.. oh.. oh wait.. Ricky can’t come down can he? My bad.. Guess we’ll just wait for Pride then won’t we?”

Cruz: Partner, and I don’t say this very often.. I think you might be right! As much as I’ve come to respect this guy, I’m starting to wonder if the rumors about him are true.

Killer: Well he is called the Wolfman for a reason.

Bryan lifts his free hand almost shaking at himself in admonishment.

“I busted him wide open with a barbed wire bat until they had to haul him off on a stretcher! And that’s nothing compared to what I’m going to do when I get my wish. I’m here tonight to request a match.. once Ricky is done putting himself back together one stitch at a time. I want both of you jokers in the ring with me. I’m here tonight to demand a hardcore handicap match against Ricky Riot and Randy Rotten. Now I’m not just blowing smoke here, no I haven’t lost my mind.. see if they win I’m willing to sign any match stipulation they choose for a match against me for this Silverweight Title. That’s what they said they wanted right? But when I beat both these men, when I introduce them to a whole new level of Payne…” the paused them a sly little smirk touching his lips, “….well Robb, that just leaves you all alone now doesn’t it? Be careful… alone that is. You never know when the thing that goes bump in the night, might be me.”

Killer: Close your mouth Cruz, you’ll swallow a fly..

Cruz: I, don’t.. that.. that’s INSANE! No one demands a hardcore handicap match, that’s career suicide!

Killer: His funeral. But personally with the way he’s been acting you couldn’t pay me enough to step in that ring when you’re giving the man a weapon. Little known fact, he was a scholarship baseball player with ten games with multiple homeruns.. do not let this guy get ahold of a bat folks.

“… and that brings me to the second of my would be opponents tomorrow night: Tommy Hart “Don’t forget the hyphen” Jones..”
Bryan took a deep breath gathering himself, and the crowd seemed to take a collective breath with him waiting for whatever the hell was going to come out of his mouth as he passed back and forth across the ring.

“Now it’s been pointed out on several occasions that I’ve got a big mouth, that I like to talk a little, that I have a lot of words for, well everything. So I came out here tonight ready to spend a minute or twenty talking your ear off about Tommy and the way he’s been strutting around here, ‘oh I’m such a bad boy won’t somebody spank me.’ But I realized it’s hard to say too much about a guy who says so few of them. In fact I’ve noticed that when he’s on camera his first thought seems to be finding a way to get off as quickly as he can.. “

He paused shrugging a bit and then leaned over the rope pointing to a fan in the front row.

“You there, with the Adonis t-shirt, do you know why he’s afraid of the camera?.. No?”

Bryan’s lips began to twist upwards slowly into a smile as he straightened up and then he removed his shades making a great show of huffing on them and wiping them while the audience waited. He looked up out of the corner of one eye, where his hair had fallen down low over his forehead and the smile broadened just a bit as he tucked his shades into the neckline of his shirt.

“Well it just so happens that I do. You see Tommy is afraid someone is going to recognize him you see, he doesn’t tell this a lot, but he’s worried someone is going to recognize him from a TV spot he did a number of years ago.” He nodded scratching the side of his nose and pointed up to the monitor. “Why don’t we roll the tape. I mean I feel for the guy I’d have flashbacks of this too…”

Killer: What is he talking about, I don’t remember… oh no..

Cruz: He didn’t… oh my dear god he did.

“Sir, will you please step out of the bush?”

“GO to hell..”

The film opens with two cops cautiously approaching a large series of scrubs that shake and rattle as the person hiding inside them speaks. You can just now and then see a bare limb sticking out. The two cops look at each other and sigh spreading out just a bit to cut off any chance he might run off.

“Sir, we’ve received a call about a naked man exposing himself in public.. you wouldn’t know anything about that would you?”

“Would I know anything about that!? I’m Tommy Hart-Jones bitch!”

One of the cops just lowers his head into his hand shaking it slowly, while the other picks up his walkie and calls in the name hoping to get a report back on him. After another minute or two the static clicks over and the cops sighs just a bit.

“Mr Jones, could you please step out of the bushes.”

“No….”

“Why not?”

“I like it here…”

One of the two cops motions to the other and he pulls out a bottle of pepper spray and they circle around to either side of the bush the first one keeps talking.

“And.. it has nothing to do with the fact that your…” the cop squints a little trying to read something that’s hanging from the top of the bush. “tickle my elmo boxers… are hanging from the top of the bush?”

“Those…. Uh.. aren’t mine..”

The second cop sprays the pepper spray into the push and after the second or third spray a yell is let out from the bush and a naked Tommy bursts from the bushing yelling and screaming, his hands over his face and running like a madman towards the street with a blur dancing over his privates. The cops start scrambling to head him of.

“Stop.. get down on the ground.. get down on the ground or we will hit you again..”

“Mother f#*@# you B*#$@@s.. oh shit.. my happy place is on fire!!”

The first cop grabs Tommy by the arm and flings him into the yard on his belly and the second jumps on his back holding him down. Together they start to force his arms behind his backs and into the cuffs.

“I’m going to sue your asses! This is profiling!”

“Yes sir, it is. We’re arresting every naked man peeping into windows on this street.”

As they start to haul the man to his feet it can be told that the man is a resemblance of Tommy, but it’s not actually him, but an actor. As he’s brought to his feet he starts kicking his legs into the air sending the blur dancing around again and the cops cussing slam him down on the hood of the car as in the background dozens of people are gathering in house coats watching what’s going on.

“Come on! Tell me you wouldn’t do the same thing.. the girls’ fine as hell!”

“Call it in Pete…” the first cop just shakes his head and holds Tommy down while the first cop ducks into the car and talks on the microphone.

“Yes, we’ve apprehended the suspect.. we found one pair boxers.. one bottle ky jelly.. one box tissues.. one wallet with condom impression.. card board x-ray glasses.. and a naked picture of Janet Reno…”

*shot fades out and goes back to the ring where the audience is laughing and cheering hysterically*

Cruz: I’m getting to old for this S$&@!

Killer:…..

Cruz: Your face will stick that way!

“And there you have it folks, the truth is revealed. You see that’s why he picks on young girls he kidnaps off the street. Because anyone he can’t exert power over takes him back to the little boy going to town in the bushes!”

Bryan paused then walking a quick circle around the ring, and then picks up the barbed wire wrapped bat from the six man tag match the other night, still stained with blood and holds it over his head for a minute before resuming his walk, gripping the handle so tightly his knuckles turn bone white.

“You see, Tommy has these delusions, this illusion his grandstanding has brought him to a level where he can accomplish anything. He’s become a legend in his own mind. And in this belief, he thinks he’s ready to face me, when he can’t even beat the opponent that is put in front of him with a title shot on the line. To put it simple, he cracks under pressure. So I have a new name for you Tommy. Tommy “the Dreamer”, Jones.

Because if you think you’re ready to get in this ring with me. If you think you’re ready to try to take what’s mine, or even what’s Robb, that’s exactly what you’re doing, dreaming. And tomorrow night at Pride, I’m going to have the pleasure of giving you a wake up call courtesy of the Payne of Death.”

Bryan’s music kicks up again and with one more lifting of the bat he ducks under the ropes and walks back up the ramp. There are no hugs and hand shakes this time, his face is hard as granite with focus.