The Texas Debut
Houston, Texas[/b]
The sun beat down hard against the cracked parking lot asphalt outside the small independent arena. The air shimmered with heat, the faint smell of gasoline and hot metal lingering. Alex stood beside the rental SUV, one hand resting against the door, his other clutching a bottle of water he hadn’t even opened. He stared ahead at the warehouse-style building with a bright red banner reading
LONE STAR WRESTLING LIVE TONIGHT!
The sound of laughter and chatter drifted from nearby, fans already lining up for the show, wrestlers smoking and talking trash behind the venue. The kind of atmosphere that took him back twenty years.
Back to when he was reckless.
Back to when he thought he was invincible.
Back to when he made the same mistake his son was making now.
He felt the weight of that memory like a chain around his chest. Dylan hopped out of the passenger seat, gym bag slung over his shoulder, his face bright and excited. The orange Wolfslair logo across his hoodie almost seemed to glow in the sunlight. Alex finally opened the water, took a sip, and exhaled. “You nervous?”
“Should I be?” Dylan grinned, walking a few steps ahead before turning back. “It’s just another ring, right? I’ve been training for years. I’ve done this in the gym a hundred times.”
“A ring is a ring, sure. But a crowd changes everything.”
Dylan shrugged, that same stubborn smirk Alex knew too well spreading across his son’s face. “Guess we’ll find out.” Alex watched him start toward the door. Every instinct told him to grab Dylan by the shoulder and stop him, tell him they weren’t doing this, that he wasn’t ready, that there was still time to turn back. But this wasn’t about readiness anymore. This was about pride. About letting go. He followed him inside. The building’s interior was small but alive. Folding chairs surrounded a makeshift ring in the center, and a crowd of maybe two hundred filled the air with anticipation. Posters plastered the walls—local heroes, old names, and a few who had gone on to bigger things.
Alex couldn’t help but glance at one in particular. A name he recognized. Someone who’d been there when his brother Dylan was still alive. The past always found a way to sneak in. Backstage, the locker room smelled of sweat, oil, and the faint chemical sting of mat cleaner. Dylan found a spot on the bench and started taping his wrists, humming under his breath. Alex stood nearby, watching in silence. “You gonna stand there and stare the whole time?” Dylan asked, not looking up.
“Just making sure you don’t forget anything.”
“Like what? My boots?”
“Your head.”
Dylan smirked. “Relax, Dad. I’ve got this.”
Alex ran a hand over his jaw and sighed. “You’ve got confidence. That’s good. Just… don’t let it turn into arrogance. You go out there, you respect that ring, respect your opponent, and—”
“—and I’ll learn something.” Dylan finished the sentence for him, grinning. “Yeah, I’ve heard it all before.”
“Then maybe it’ll finally sink in.”
For a long moment, they stood there in silence—father and son, both too proud to say what they actually felt. Alex wanted to tell him how proud he was. Dylan wanted to tell him how much this meant. But neither of them said a word. When showtime hit, the lights dimmed, and the crowd roared. Alex stood in the back corner of the curtain, arms folded across his chest, watching as his son made his entrance. Dylan’s name echoed through the sound system—“Dylan Jones!”—and the kid came out in simple black tights, Wolfslair logo stitched on one knee pad. He moved with energy, slapping hands, smiling wide, but there was a nervous shake in his right hand that only Alex noticed.
The opponent, a veteran named Ricky Vega, already waited in the ring. Mid-thirties, broad shoulders, the kind of guy who knew how to make a young rookie look good… or make him look like a fool. Alex had wrestled Vega years ago. He remembered that smirk, that cocky strut.
The bell rang.
For the first few minutes, Dylan held his own. Basic chain wrestling, lockups, arm drags, headlocks. Smooth. Crisp. Just like they’d drilled. Alex found himself nodding slightly. Then Dylan got cocky. He hit the ropes and went for a running dropkick—a move they hadn’t even practiced—and Vega caught him mid-air, slamming him down hard with a spinebuster. The crowd ooohed. Dylan arched his back in pain. Alex’s jaw tightened. “Keep your head, kid,” he muttered under his breath. Vega taunted, pulling Dylan up and clubbing him across the shoulders. Dylan fired back, instincts taking over. A sharp forearm to the jaw, then another, the crowd coming alive. Dylan hit the ropes again—another rookie mistake—and ran right into a lariat that nearly turned him inside out.
Alex swore under his breath. He could almost hear his own father’s voice from years ago—the same frustration, the same helplessness. The match wore on. Dylan showed heart. He refused to stay down, even after a brutal backbreaker and a running knee to the ribs. Every time Vega covered, Dylan kicked out at two. The crowd started chanting his name.
“Dylan! Dylan! Dylan!”
Alex felt his chest tighten, pride and fear colliding. Then it happened—Vega went for a suplex, but Dylan countered midair, twisting out and landing behind him. He hit the ropes one last time and nailed Vega with a running knee strike. The crowd exploded. Dylan dropped into the cover.
One! Two! Three!
The bell rang. The crowd cheered. Dylan’s music hit. Alex exhaled for what felt like the first time in ten minutes. Backstage, Dylan was practically glowing, drenched in sweat but grinning ear to ear. He dropped onto the bench, gulping down water. “Did you see that counter? He didn’t even see it coming!”
“I saw.” Alex crossed his arms. “And I saw you almost get your head taken off two minutes before that.”
“Yeah, but I didn’t, did I? I kept going. That’s what matters.”
Alex sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose. “You got lucky. You made mistakes…”
“Can you just say I did good for once?” That stopped him cold. Dylan stared up, eyes still bright but tired now, the adrenaline fading. “Every time I try to do something right, you find what’s wrong. You think I don’t know I made mistakes out there? I’m not blind. But I went out there and did what you taught me to do—I fought through it. I learned. Isn’t that the whole point?”
Alex opened his mouth to answer, but the words didn’t come. He wanted to say yes. He wanted to say he was proud. But that same old fear clawed at his chest. “You’re too much like me,” he muttered finally.
“Yeah, maybe that’s not such a bad thing.”
Alex stared at him for a long moment before turning away. He walked to the door, paused, and looked back. “You did good out there. Don’t let it go to your head.”
“Thanks… I think.” Dylan grinned faintly.
They left the building late that night. The Texas air had cooled, a faint breeze carrying the distant hum of highway traffic. The lights from the arena flickered out behind them. For a while, neither spoke. The drive was quiet—not tense, just heavy. Finally, Dylan broke the silence. “You ever think about Uncle Dylan when you watch me wrestle?”
Alex’s grip tightened on the steering wheel. He didn’t answer at first. The question hung there between them. “Every damn time,” he admitted softly. “He was fearless. Reckless. Just like you. I thought I could protect him from himself… and I couldn’t. So maybe sometimes I try to protect you too much.”
Dylan looked out the window. “I get it. But you can’t protect me from everything. I don’t need that. I just… need you in my corner.”
Alex glanced over at his son, a small smile finally forming. “Guess that’s something I can do.” The rest of the drive was quiet again, but it wasn’t the same silence as before. It was lighter. Simpler. The kind that comes after a storm when you both realize the world didn’t end. By the time they reached the hotel, Dylan was half-asleep in the passenger seat. Alex sat for a while before shutting off the engine. He looked over at his son—at the resemblance, at the determination, at the reflection of a younger version of himself. He thought about the years he spent running from grief, from the memory of his brother, from the guilt of surviving. And for the first time in a long time, he didn’t feel haunted by the past. He felt anchored by the present.
He reached over and placed a hand on Dylan’s shoulder, giving it a light squeeze.
“You did good, kid,” he whispered.
Dylan stirred but didn’t wake.
Alex leaned back, staring out at the dark Texas night, and smiled faintly. Tomorrow, the road would call again. Tomorrow, the training would start again. Tomorrow, they’d go back to Wolfslair, father and son, student and teacher. But tonight, for the first time in a long time, Alex let himself feel peace.
The mirror didn’t haunt him anymore. It reflected hope.
CAW CAW! BANG! FUCK DEAD
“Is this what you all wanted?”
Silence
“This should be it, right? What you all wanted. Me to lose and Carter to go on being your world champion? It’s what so many of you seemed to champion when asked. It’s what everyone in the crowd wanted when Carter and I went toe to toe. I wanted to become a full-time SCW world champion. I wanted to save the championship from itself and make sure that this company had a world champion it could believe in. A world champion that was worthy of holding that title. A world champion that wasn’t a complete joke and someone who wasn’t a hypocrite. But, in the end, he beat me.”
“Everything I have ever done was for the betterment of this company. I wanted to hold that championship above my head again so I could prove to everyone and show the world that SCW matters. That the world championship matters. I wanted to be a champion that wasn’t a shit-talking hypocrite who hid his true intentions behind a smile. I wanted to be a world champion who was serious, who was a beast in the ring, and who had the weight of a veteran’s voice behind everything that he said. And I failed.”
“I failed miserably…”
“And why is that? Hmm? Why did I fail? Think about it. I have the experience advantage. I have the skill advantage. The power advantage. The technical advantage. I have every advantage conceivable over Carter. But still, he walked out as the champion, and I walked out holding nothing. I beat him when it didn’t matter, but when the bright lights were on, he was able to walk away with the title. And the truth is, the real cold hard truth, that he can’t admit to himself because he doesn’t have that kind of self-awareness, as he shouldn’t have. He shouldn’t have beaten me, and he shouldn’t have walked away with that championship. He didn’t deserve it, he doesn’t deserve it, and now he’s going to get exposed. But unfortunately, not by me. Not my circus, not my monkeys.”
“But just to reiterate, Carter should not be the world champion.”
Alex growled under his breath, trying to hold back all the emotions that were getting ready to explode, the anger and the frustration. All of it.
“You understand that, don’t you, Alexander? After all, you’ve been on the receiving end of the typical bullshit from Carter. He would stand there doubting the fact that he has been the world champion and you haven’t, shitting on every single one of your accomplishments—including the fact that you yourself have been a world champion. You know something I can’t stand in this business? It’s hubris when it comes to thinking your accomplishments outshine others. Sitting there and talking about how you are the SCW world champion and another company’s world title means nothing. I dealt with that when I first came into this company, Raven…”
“Fenris, a man who was well-respected as a champion in SCW. A former MMA fighter. You would’ve heard of him, you would’ve seen him. When I stepped foot in SCW, he pretty much asked who I was and shat on every single one of my accomplishments. Me, a multiple-time world champion over 15 years. A guy who had taken on and beaten the best of the best, made to look like a fool because someone decided to use a comeback that was meant for middle schoolers with nothing else to say.”
“The old Conor McGregor ‘Who the fuck is that guy?’ A stupid comeback that seems to not get old with stupidity.”
“It’s basically what Carter did to you. You’ve been in this company for a while. You went away and made something of yourself and became a world champion in another company before coming back. But you have always been a danger. Something that Austin knows. I respect Austin James Mercer, and I respect his opinion, and he told me just how good you are. Something that I’ve known from watching you. But you and I have never faced. You and I have never had the pleasure of being able to get into a professional wrestling ring and seeing which one of us is the superior Alex.”
He smiles slowly before continuing.
“Many would say that it is me. I’m a three-time SCW world champion. An 11-time world champion. I have held championships all over the world and have been a multiple-time champion in this company over multiple divisions. I have beaten some of the best, and I am a member of the SCW Hall of Fame. On paper, Raven, it’s not even close. But we don’t rely on reports and paper, do we? This is the professional wrestling business.”
“We settle things through fights.”
“So, here we are, Alexander. Facing off at High Stakes. And the simple reason why? Because there’s nothing else for us to do. You and I have had words backstage, said in the heat of the moment because we were both going after Carter. But in the end, you failed to get the job done in a tournament, and I failed to get the job done one-on-one with Carter. Just think about it, somewhere out there is an alternate universe where this match is happening, but it’s happening for the SCW World Heavyweight Championship. An alternate universe where you beat Aiden Reynolds and I beat Carter.”
“But… that isn’t what happened.”
“So now what? Where do we go from here? I’m sure that a lot of people are going to tell you that if you beat me, it’s not going to mean a lot. Sure, I beat Finn for the world championship, but I promptly lost it to Carter. Some are going to tell you that if you beat me, you’re not beating me in my prime and you’re just taking advantage of an old man. Who knows? Maybe they’re right. I’m as cynical as they come. But no, Alexander, if you beat me, then you have every right to gloat about it. Use this win to go after anything that you want. That is, of course, if you win. But what if you don’t?”
Alex pauses and shakes his head before stepping forward and continuing.
“You are a hell of a lot better than your record and your failures lead some to believe. There are so many who automatically write you off because you have never succeeded in your quest to become the SCW world champion. But I know better. I know that a win over Alexander Raven is nothing to be overlooked. It’s nothing to be taken for granted. I beat you, and I know that it’s a win worth bragging about. A win worth talking about. And it’s one that can get me back on track to what I want to do, even if what I want to do hasn’t actually presented itself yet. The truth is, I don’t know where I’m going or what I’m doing. It’s clear that the world championship is not in the cards for me right now.”
“So… where to? Well, one step at a time. One match at a time. One win at a time. And one loss at a time. That’s all this is. A High Stakes match to find out who the better Alex is. And does it really need to be any more than that? Does every match need to have a story of hatred and anger behind it? Does every match need to be for a championship? Can’t it just be between two exceptional athletes trying to figure out who the better professional wrestler is? That’s what we have. And that’s all this match needs to be.”
