MS: “He done talking yet?  Now do you see why I called him ‘White Bread’ Robbie?  He talks just like every white-washed face in any wrestling company you can name.”

RJ: “If you want to judge a book by its cover you go right ahead.  I’m of the mind that he’s going to get what he wants tonight.”

MS: “Like Kelsia isn’t prepared.  No matter who she chooses, Damon isn’t going to win.  And everyone and their mother knows that he’ll pick Aurora.  Don’t dare to think that Kelsia doesn’t know that.”

 

RJ: “Regardless, let’s send it up to Heather Lee for the main event of the evening.”

 

::And up in the ring, the aforementioned Miss Lee stands ready to announce the competitors for the upcoming mixed tag match.::

 

HL: “The following contest is our main event of the evening and it is set for one fall!”

 

::The lights dim and pyros go off sending everyone into a frenzy as “You’ve Got Another Thing Coming” by Judas Priest once against hits the speakers.  Kelsia exits from behind the curtain in full ring gear, soaking in the negative reaction of the fans along with the few cheers afforded her.  With a glare in her eyes and a wicked smile on her lips, Kelsia marches down the ramp towards the ring.  A few pro-Kelsia signs get her attention, but most fans get taunted or threatened with the back of her hand while she laughs them off.::

 

MS: “Frankly, I don’t think this match should be allowed no matter who their partners are.  Kelsia already had a match earlier tonight!”

 

RJ: “I’d almost agree with you, but considering how tough she seems to think she is, this should just be cake, right?  She can go in here and hide behind whoever her partner is.”

MS: “That almost made sense until you said ‘hide’.  This woman doesn’t ‘hide’, Robbie.”

 

::The old-school rock continues to pound through the speakers as Kelsia stops at the edge of the ramp and the beginning of the ringside area before moving forward, pulling herself up onto the ring apron and into the ring.  Standing up straight, flipping her hair back in the process, she climbs up on the second rope and enjoys the fan reaction.::

 

RJ: “She will when Damon hits the ring.”

MS: “You’re convinced, aren’t you?”

 

::Jumping down from the ropes, Kelsia stands ready as she watches the ramp with a smirk, awaiting her opponent.  As her theme fades, anticipation rises…until Sarah D’Angelo steps out to the strains of ‘Too Late to Worry’.  Standing at the top of the ramp, she brings a microphone to her lips and begins to speak.::

 

MS: “The hell is she doing here?”

RJ: “Running the show.  So let’s have a little respect here.”

 

Sarah: “Since your friend Uria was so keen on helping you earlier in your match against T&A, I’ve decided that he’s saved your hide enough for tonight.  So I picked your partner myself…and that partner is…”

 

::No sooner had she finished speaking than did ‘Orion’ by Metallica play for the second time tonight, prompting the appearance of Night Rider sans Angel Fyre.  He smirks at Sarah as he walks past her, making his way down to the ring to join Kelsia.  Vector smiles slightly, just shaking her head at Sarah as if to say ‘this is your big idea’ while joining Rider mid-ring after he steps between the ropes.  Sarah remains at the top of the ramp now as Heather Lee prepares to announce the other two competitors in the contest.::

 

MS: “Looks like big-mouth gets his wish…it will be Rider and Kelsia.”

RJ: “More like it looking as though the big man will have to back up his words against Damon.”

MS: “You’re kidding right?  There’s a one-foot and 155-pound weight difference between them!”

RJ: “David vs. Goliath, Mitch…that’s all I have to say.”

MS: “That’s saying more than enough.  How could you be so impossibly cliché?”

 

::The arena dims as the strong guitars of “Alive” by P.O.D. begin to play save for white lights shining from below the stage. A low layer of fog rolls along the stage and ramp as a spotlight orients on the form of Damon Cross stepping from behind the curtain, arms spread wide for a few moment as though in supplication. His expression is calm and his eyes are focused on the ring, but he isn’t shy about offering a smile or two for the fans.::

 

HL: “And their opponents.  Now approaching the ring from Dayton, Ohio, he stands five-feet-ten and weighs in at 205 pounds.  One half of The Exemplar…’White Knight’ Damon Cross!”

 

RJ: “He’s been making a bit of a name for himself lately, wrestling not only in ACW, but in the UWA alongside Hiashi.  And after the announcement earlier that they’d be going for the tag titles, I’d say he has reason to be pumped up.”

 

MS: “Doesn’t change the size difference between him and Rider, Robbie.  That will be the deciding factor here no matter who his partner is.”

::He makes his way down to the ring leisurely, slapping the hands of the fans who reach out to him, particularly the children in the crowd, and he will point out any signs that show him support. Upon reaching the ring, he walks around to the steps and shrugs out of the white robe and mantle he wears, handing it to an attendant before climbing the steps and stepping through the ropes into the ring. He gives one last wave to the fans from the top turnbuckle before jumping back down to the mat and proceeding to loosen up a bit before the bell rings.::

 

HL: “And his partner…”

MS: “Like it’s a mystery…”

RJ: “Shut up and let them be introduced.”

::A song not heard in an ACW for some time, ‘Cold’ by Static-X, begins to pound through the PA.  The theme was once used by Aurora Jansen back during her first months with the company…and the crowd reacts accordingly before she even appears.::

 

MS: “What’d I tell you, huh?”

RJ: “Um, Mitchell…look at the stage.  That’s not Aurora!”

 

::True enough, the woman stepping from behind the curtain wasn’t Aurora, but Alexa Rose.  The Women’s Title was slung over her shoulder as she grinned towards the now wide-eyed Kelsia in the ring.  With a burst of pyro raining from above through a loud explosion, the theme fades out and is replaced with ‘Brackish’ by Kittie as Alexa makes her way down to the ring.::

MS: “What a dirty trick, switching out partners like that just for a mental edge!  And this guy’s supposed to be some kind of paragon?!  What a crock!”

 

RJ: “You and everyone else were the ones sold on him picking Aurora instead.”

 

::As Alexa climbs up onto the ring apron, Damon sits on the second rope and holds up the third for her, ever the gentleman.  Rose doesn’t know what to make of it at first, but then offers a slight smile and accepts the gesture, holding her title up as she enters the ring much to the delight of the crowd.

 

The referee calls for the bell as Damon and Rider stay in to start the match.  Damon doesn’t look the least bit tentative about facing off with the massive Dark Sider, locking up with him immediately only to be shoved back to the mat.  Rolling with the impact, Damon comes up to his knees near the ropes, watching as Rider flexes his impressive physique. With a cocky smirk, Cross gets back up on his feet and moves in a little more steadily this time only to have himself tossed aside once again by the bigger man’s intense power.

 

Shaking it off, Damon weathers taunts from Kelsia’s corner as well as support from his own and, for a third time, goes at Rider.  But it’s a feint this time as he fires a few stinging kicks to the right knee of his opponent.  The shots take Rider off-balance briefly…enough for the White Knight to duck under a wild chop and to land a few more shots at the big man’s leg.::

RJ: “Smart move by Damon, trying to chop down this massive tree.  But Rider’s going to catch him eventually…Cross has to stave that off as long as possible.”

MS: “Two seconds ain’t long enough!  He’s got Damon around the throat…and throws him hard into the corner!”

 

::The 360-pounder charges towards the corner two seconds after tossing Damon there only to find empty corner.  Chest-first into the turnbuckles, Rider is momentarily stalled as his smaller opponent lands a precision standing dropkick to the middle of his back.  The blow only seems to anger Rider, who turns and charges Damon with a clothesline attempt.  Damon ducks this, but is ill-prepared for the reverse thrust kick that takes him into the air and down to his hands and knees on the mat.

 

With the air driven out of his body, the White Knight is easy pickings for Rider, who picks him up with ease, needing only one arm to hoist him into the air.  Altering his grip slightly, the massive man from the Dark Side powers Damon down with a slam and goes for the pin, but Cross throws his shoulder up at two.  A vicious knee to the bread basked followed by a rapid snap suplex drives more air and fight out of the young wrestler and prompts Kelsia to call for the tag.  Rider obliges, dragging Cross over to the corner by the hair.::

MS: “Now it’s about time that Kelsia shows this punk what she’s all about!”

RJ: “After Rider’s already roughed him up to the point where he’s ill-suited to fight back, right?”

MS: “That’s what a partner is for.  Sarah’s the one who chose him.  She should have thought of this.”

 

::Rider ends his first in-ring tenure by whipping Damon hard into the corner, which Vector takes advantage of with several backhand chops.  The blows light up the white-covered chest of Damon, but they also wake him up.  Catching Kelsia’s arm when she swings for another chop, Cross quickly goes low and hoists her up over his shoulders, dumping her to the mat with a fireman’s carry takedown.  Immediately he snatches hold of one of her legs and drags her away from the ropes.

 

Yanking and twisting on that grasped right leg, Damon manages to drive a few knees into the back of the number-one contender’s thigh before she finally squirms free and gets her hands on the ropes.  Patiently, the youngest Cross backs off, that charming smile still on his face as he watches Kelsia pull her way up via the ropes.  With a snarl, Kelsia charges him and strikes out with a hard elbow across the jaw.  The shot rocks Damon, who rears back to fire off a forearm of his own, but pauses halfway to Kelsia’s jaw.  Not inhibited by honor in any form, she rakes his eyes quickly and shoots him off to the far ropes.::

MS: “Such a good kid, huh?  Doesn’t want to hit a lady?  Well, that’s not just a lady…that’s Kelsia Vector!”

 

RJ: “Point taken, I suppose.  She’s really taking the fight to Damon here…with moves just like that!”

MS: “Way to go, Hot Chocolate!”

 

::The move in question is a running front kick to the chest of Damon, one that knocks him back into the ropes.  Not content with that shot alone, Vector backs off again and charges, looking for an STO.  She cinches her arm across the chest of her opponent and hooks the leg, but the Knight puts on the breaks.  A stiff elbow to the side of Kelsia’s head shakes loose her grip, allowing Damon to get one of his own and to drive her to the mat face-first.::

MS: “Ouch!  What IS it with people and going for the face?!”

RJ: “What is it with these people and weak noses and jaws?”

MS: “You’re a riot, Jones.”

 

::Damon goes for the tag to Alexa Rose who is eager to try her hand against Kelsia again, but the blow was not so powerful that Vector was completely out of sorts.  When she sees Damon going for the tag, she scrambles to her corner and tags in Rider not moments before Rose steps between the ropes.  The massive Night Rider just glares down at Alexa who doesn’t back off for a moment while shooting glares past him at her ‘poppet.

 

The White Knight offers to tag back in, but Alexa brushes it off and goes at Rider, taking the same method of assault as Damon did, going for the right knee.  She succeeds in getting Rider down to a knee, but when she rushes off the ropes, he gets a massive hand around her throat and lifts her up into the air.  You can hear the crowd holding their breath as the Women’s Champion tries to fight her way out of the hold…but the Dark Sider holds on tight.::

MS: “Should have tagged her chump of a partner back in!  Rose might not make it to Crossroads if Rider has his way!”

RJ: “Look at him gloat…what kind of man is that?”

MS: “The kind who knows what he wants and how to get it.”

 

::But he does take a bit too long, allowing Alexa to pry herself out of his grip.  Landing behind Rider, she hits the ropes before he has a chance to turn about and drives her shoulder hard into the back of Rider’s right leg.::

RJ: “A spear to the knee!  I’ll he shocked if she didn’t blow out his kneecap with that impact!”

MS: “He’s still standing, Robbie…and he’s not happy!”

 

::That’s an understatement.  Alexa keeps up her assault on the leg with kicks along with the occasional shoulder to the stomach after she shoves Rider into the corner, but heavy forearms delivered to her back quickly knock the wind out of her and, seeing her dropped to the mat for a few moments, Kelsia is eager for a tag.  Rider obliges her and Vector enters the ring with purpose, gloating as she circles the fallen, gasping Alexa.  Taunting from a distance, she gets no reaction from the champion until she steps in…and takes herself into range for another spear from the Amazon.::

 

MS: “Get Alexa off of her, ref!”

RJ: “No chance of that, Mitch!  Look at the champion fire off those right hands!  She’s going to pulp Hot Chocolate’s face!”

MS: “She’s not now!”

 

::The big man makes his way in the ring again and grabs Alexa by the hair, pulling her off of Kelsia while the dark-skinned contender gets to her feet and lands a few hard kicks to the stomach of her opponent.  Damon, unseen by both, had moved around the corner to the ropes and had his hands on the top strand.  Waiting for just the right moment, he found it when Kelsia paused in her assault, seeing him.  Rider followed that gaze, tossing Alexa aside as Cross went up to the top strand and sprang off, coming down with a double knee-drop that takes the still-standing Rider hard to the mat.

 

The crowd pops heavily for the high-flying move, but Vector takes advantage of Damon’s recovery time, rushing him with a thrust kick.  She doesn’t count on him catching her leg, however…or the double-leg take down that followed.  Cross had something in mind, and while his partner regained her air and as Rider still tried to shake off the cobwebs, half of the Exemplar wrapped Kelsia into his sharpshooter variation.::

RJ: “Test of Faith by Damon Cross as this match breaks down into a melee!”

MS: “He’s not even the legal man in the ring right now!  This should be a disqualification!”

::Rider gets up to one knee and sets himself to rise but Alexa, with her bearings back, charges him from the blind side.  She lands a hard knee to the side of his head and keeps on moving, but when she comes back around with an attempted one-handed bulldog, Rider throws her off like a child.  Landing on her feet, she turns on her heel only to see the big man bearing down on her with a thrust kick of his own in mind.

On the other side of the ring, Kelsia makes her way to the ropes and Damon, reluctantly, releases the hold.  Vector scrambles from the ring as Alexa manages to avoid the impact of Rider’s size 15.  A scoop slam after the fact, however, drives some of the fight from Rose, prompting Damon to come at Rider himself…an attempt which ends in a bone-shattering chokeslam in the middle of the ring.  Knowing that Kelsia was legal, Rider moves to the ropes and yells down at her, imploring her to get back into the ring to finish the match.::

MS: “He’s a one-man wrecking crew, Robbie!  Rider has laid out both Cross and Rose and if he gets Kelsia back in here, this match will be definitively over!”

 

::Kelsia did make her way back up onto the apron, but she was almost knocked off of it when both Damon and Alexa, pulling themselves up, charged the slowly-turning Rider.  A double-choke comes of the initial attempt, but the Knight and the Amazon kick their way out of it, with Damon taking it a step further, utilizing a low dropkick to Rider’s oft-assaulted right knee.  Alexa hits the ropes and comes off with a spear aimed at the Dark Sider’s chest, driving him down to the mat.::

RJ: “The big man is down…and out!”

MS: “Double baseball slide from Alexa and Damon drive him out of the ring, but now Kelsia’s back in and pounding on Alexa!”

RJ: “Not for long!  A headbutt from the champion rocks Kelsia’s world…and she backs right into Damon!”

 

::The youngest Cross had had enough of being a gentleman by this point, apparently.  Driving a knee into Kelsia’s stomach, he locks her in for a suplex and hoists her up, but instead of driving her over and down onto her back, he slingshots her off the top rope and into a familiar-looking sit-out slam.::

RJ: “Was that a Dreamcatcher?!”

MS: “Not with that slingshot it wasn’t!  That’s Damon’s Confession of Sin!”

RJ: “Not many people sin more than Kelsia around here…”

 

::The impact is ring-shaking, but Damon couldn’t make the pin.  He pulled Alexa up as Vector began to stir, then saw Rider looking to make his way back into the ring.  Throwing caution to the wind, Cross executes another baseball slide that, for the moment, shoved Rider back a bit.  Springing up to the top rope, he spins off with a Shining Press 450-splash right onto the standing Rider, taking him down to the floor as Alexa started another brawl with Kelsia.

A rake to the eyes primes the champion for a Kelsia Kiss Krusher.  The sharp roundhouse kick, however, sails over Alexa’s head when she makes a last second duck.  The turning of her back to Rose in the midst of the maneuver leaves the number-one contender wide open and Rose takes full advantage.  Hoisting Kelsia high overhead, she drives the dark-skinned woman down hard to the mat with her signature Black Rose.  Outside the ring, Rider and Damon are brawling heavily, with the big man getting the better of the exchange for the moment.  As Alexa makes the pin, however, Damon uses what little juice he has left to keep Rider from breaking it up, forcing him to watch from inches away as the referee counts.::

 

MS: “Just a few more inches, Rider!  That’s your Chocolate Thunder, isn’t it?!”

RJ: “His Chocolate Thunder is hardly coherent!  And Alexa isn’t about to waste this change to put some momentum on her side!”

“One…two…three!”

 

::Cross finally lets go of Rider as Alexa rolls out of the ring, post-bell.  The big man’s concern for Kelsia is obviously honest, but he still glares daggers at Damon and Alexa as the referee raises their arms while Heather Lee makes the announcement.::

HL: “Your winners…Damon Cross and Alexa Rose!”

 

MS: “I damn sure hope that Damon had his fun, because Kelsia and Rider won’t take this quietly!”

RJ: “Does Kelsia ever do anything quietly?  The fact is that Alexa made her point well tonight and Damon got a piece of revenge for his sister as that little limp Kelsia’s packing indicates.”

 

::Vector did have to put weight on that leg gingerly, most likely from Damon’s Test of Faith, but she still kept that confident look on her face as she leaned against Rider.  This was far from over.