Hitman My Real Life in the Cartoon World (67 page)

Two hours later we hesitantly boarded the bus for the death ride back. The kamikaze driver explained that after 10 p.m. there was a curfew in Delhi; if we weren’t back in time we’d have to wait till morning before we could enter the city. The traffic got heavier as it grew darker, and our driver played chicken with tankers and oxcarts, passing numerous smol-dering, burnt-out wrecks that hadn’t been there on the way to Agra. Those Stampede Wrestling black-ice hell rides, even the time Smith drove André to the airport, they were a merry-go-round ride compared to this. God, don’t let Julie and me die here, I prayed as Tatanka crossed himself.

The drive back took seven hours. I found myself pounding on the bulletproof glass screaming at the driver, but he gave me a confident thumbs up, grinning at me with teeth stained red from betel nut.

He thought I was cheering him on for doing such a good job! A dog was crushed under the wheels of the careening bus and nobody batted an eye. When we pulled into a truck stop for gas, another bus, packed with Indians, pulled up alongside us, and they began spilling out. Three or four of them commenced to throw up violently. Owen shouted, “Hey look!”—as though this was a sight to see.

Jerry Brisco raced to the window, camera in hand, to get a closer look. It probably made my trip and everyone else’s on that lousy bus to watch the ripple effect on Brisco, who scrambled down the steps and upchucked his curried rice.

We finally made it to Delhi, only minutes before curfew. I called home from our room to check on the kids, and Stu told me that Davey had been acquitted of his assault charge. Apparently that dumbass Karl Moffat testified that Davey was every bit strong enough to suplex someone on his head, which the man who had been injured accused Davey of doing to him. It was just like Karl to take the stand to swear that wrestling was the whole truth and nothing but. The prosecutor seemed to be gambling that Davey would never confess that the pro matches were choreographed, but luckily for Davey, he had no problem saying so.

Although he had won the war, the legal battle depleted him financially to the point that his only coping mechanism was to take more downers. This is the point when things really started to get out of hand for Davey.

On day six of the India tour, Diesel told me that he and Razor were really going to WCW, for $750,000 a year, which was more than I was making. They had given Vince notice and were down to their last ninety days in the WWF.

By the time I set my bag down in Louisville, Kentucky, on February 18 for an In Your House cage match with Diesel, I was beyond tired. The ring had been gimmicked in such a way that when Diesel had me beat and was making his escape, Undertaker suddenly exhumed himself from under the ring floor and snatched Diesel’s leg, pulling him beneath the boards to avenge his interference in our match at Royal Rumble ’96. Smoke effects were billowing while I climbed over the cage and out of the ring to retain the belt. Once again, the pay-per-view ended with Undertaker and Diesel backing each other down while I slunk back to the dressing room with the belt. Being saved by interference at two pay-per-views in a row did nothing to keep a babyface champion like me strong.

I was completely caught off guard when I called the Lonesome Dove offices later that day and producer Steve North calmly told me that the series had been canceled. He said that ratings were great, but production costs were too high. Hearing this broke my heart. Now the new dawn I was riding into was only a dimly lit path, and I was uncertain whether the path even went anywhere.

I decided to stick by my original plan and take at least six months off anyway. Carlo and I had come to a parting of the ways; in fact, I was only too happy to put in a good word for him, and he ended up with Jack Tunney’s job as president of the WWF’s Canadian arm. My new acting agent, Barry Bloom, could use the six-month hiatus from wrestling to get me established. Barry and I agreed that he’d have nothing to do with my wrestling career, even though he represented a bunch of WCW talent. I never lost sight of the fact that wrestling buttered my bread. In the dressing rooms I kept the news that Lonesome Dove had been canceled to myself.

The next day, I was happily surprised to see Roddy at the Cincinnati Gardens for Raw. He’d recently been appointed the new figurehead interim president of the WWF, replacing Jack Tunney’s character role. That afternoon Vince got me, Shawn and Roddy together and carefully rehearsed the live interview we were to have that night, building heat for our title match. Shawn was scripted to outwit me all the way through it.

When I went out to do the interview, he was already in the ring with Vince. Every word out of Shawn’s mouth had so much more impact than what I had been told to say. And Vince was right there to make sure that Shawn was humble, lovable and not too Shawn-ish. On mic, he bragged about how well conditioned he was as he lifted his red-and-white candy-striped leather vest exposing a rock-hard six-pack. When Vince asked me about my conditioning, I coolly described myself as being a lot like the little pink rabbit in the Energizer battery commercials that just keeps going and going and going.

At just the right moment Roddy stormed out in his role as the president and explained the rules for our upcoming one-hour marathon match. I knew right then that I’d better get ready for the hardest fight of my career. While I was over in India sick with the shits, Shawn had been home training like a lunatic. Damned if he wasn’t in incredible shape.

In late February, Jim Ross and a WWF camera crew flew up to Calgary to get some footage of me training for the big match. They had filmed Shawn in sunny San Antonio, where he ran the steps at a football stadium, did upside-down sit-ups and pretended to spar with his mentor, Jose Lothario.

Vince was selling Shawn as a guy trying to realize his boyhood dream of winning the gold. I was portrayed as the wily veteran from the dungeon who had every intention of being the champion for a long time.

February in Calgary is the coldest time of the year, but they had me jog along Scotsman’s Hill so they could get panoramic views of the city with the Rockies in the background. I don’t think J.R. and the camera crew were trying to be funny, but I couldn’t help but see the humor in the footage they shot.

It was so icy that I had to run carefully, so it came across on film like I was running about a mile an hour. Another magic moment taped for the world to see was when they asked me to swim laps in my pool. But the topper was when they filmed Stu stretching me in the dungeon, an eighty-year-old man tying me up in knots with me eagerly tapping out!

I trained for that match as hard as I ever had for anything. Shawn was eight years younger than me, and I wasn’t going to let him outshine me. Like me and Davey at Wembley, I wanted the fans to remember the loser in this one. I would break their hearts and disappear until Shawn had nobody to work with except me. I saw a rematch up ahead with me taking back the title, which would build up for yet one more match where I’d be more than happy to put Shawn over—to once and for all thrust the torch into his hand. Done right, Shawn and I could draw money for years with a big rivalry, taking turns putting each other over.

I found Shawn at lunchtime on the day of WrestleMania XII, and we sat down to compose our match much like musicians composing a song. I let him piece much of the first twenty-five minutes together while I figured out the rest. We sat for over three hours, tweaking each spot until we could sing them in our heads. I told him I expected we’d be working a rematch when I came back in six months.

In order to feed the supposed heat between us, I wouldn’t be shaking his hand after he won.

Instead, I’d simply walk out, leaving the crowd to assume that I was really pissed off at the ref’s decision. Shawn nodded and said, “No problem.” He’d spent much of the morning practicing a special entrance, being lowered to the ring by a steel cable. I was impressed with how focused he was.

Warrior was back, looking very jacked-up on steroids. During his match with Hunter he blew up badly, even though it consisted of three clotheslines and lasted a mere 1:38. As the show went on, many of the boys, tears in their eyes, sought me out to thank me, as was the custom on a day when the belt was to change hands—if you’d carried the belt with dignity and worked hard.

On account of Diesel and Razor’s defection to WCW, every wrestler was being leveraged to sign a new long-term contract. There was guaranteed money, which had never been offered in the WWF

before, but the contracts were one-sided, with little protection for the talent. I was glad I was leaving for a while. My contract would expire while I was off, leaving me in a great bargaining position if I wanted to play the WCW card. I didn’t ever want to end up there, but if I could show Vince my loyalty by not going, I thought I could ride out my career in the WWF in grand style.

Shawn did make a spectacular entrance, sliding down to the ring from a steel cable strung from the rafters while his ring music thumped “I’m just a sexy boy . . .” He seemed to explode from the ceiling as fireworks went off around the arena. His waist-length blond hair was neatly pulled back, and the words “Heartbreak Kid” were emblazoned on the ass of his white, silver-trimmed tights. The Boy Toy had come to fulfill his lifelong dream.

In stark contrast, I marched out with little pomp and circumstance, wearing a new ring coat and a black outfit. I looked every bit the tough ring general, serious and confident, the dutiful torchbearer.

I could see Dallas and Blade sitting in the front row, next to Georgia’s middle son, Matthew, whom I’d brought along on the trip because he was such a good kid. Matt’s friend T.J. Wilson, who was like an adopted Hart kid, was also with them, along with Georgia and my mom. Stu was seated somewhere else with Freddie Blassie.

The crowd was intense, anticipating the passing of the torch. From the start, Shawn made it clear that this wasn’t going to be so much a great work as a great contest. It was rather obvious to me that he’d been coached to lean on me as much as he could. He did sneaky tricks, such as dragging his heavy, steel-toed motorcycle boots across my face, scraping my lips up, which led to a subtle hour-long potato harvest. At one point while I was on the floor, Shawn climbed up to the top corner and dove out on me. He overshot and was flying head-first toward the railing, if not the front row. If I didn’t catch him, he might seriously hurt himself. I put my own body on the line and quite literally pulled him out of the air, right on top of me, saving him and his lifelong dream of being champion.

We were both able to remember every spot we’d mapped out only hours before, two great wrestlers in their prime trying to outdo each other under the guise of working together. I’ve always believed that the intention was for Shawn to drag me off the mat for the last twenty minutes. But it made for a beautiful story—the lion and the gazelle, or perhaps the wolf and the fox. If fans go back and study this one closely, they’ll see that at times I?was stiff, but I was never slow or heavy.

Our match seemed to unravel in slow motion as my heart beat strong in my chest. Shawn took some fantastic bumps. From the way he went dead weight on me, I assumed he was getting tired, and I was somewhat surprised that I had to keep dragging him off the mat. At the fifty-minute mark I dove out through the ropes like a spear, flattening Shawn in the aisle. Once back in the ring I took in the sold-out crowd and it reminded me of when Muhammad Ali stood in his corner and looked over at George Foreman in Zaire. Unlike his, my fate was decided, but I was determined to keep my dignity.

Shawn was up on the apron; as I went to suplex him in, he dropped behind me. I was quick to reverse and German suplex him straight back. When I did, he bit his tongue, which had nothing to do with me, but he decided to slam me in the gut with a stiff punch anyway. One potato, two potato, three . . . until I had no recourse but to snap a stiff boot square into his face, letting him know the next one would be serious. With cocky arrogance Shawn waved me on to keep it coming.

With five minutes remaining I hoisted him up like a sack of cement and snapped him in half across my knee. I smiled at the time clock. I had told Shawn the last five minutes were all his, and we were right on schedule.

I leaped off the second rope only to be jolted by a vicious stiff boot to the jaw from Shawn, and then one potato after another. He took every liberty he could, stiffing me on drop kicks and elbow smashes. Even so, we both knew the match was a masterpiece. When Shawn nailed me with a high flying elbow, I crashed hard to the mat, and Shawn proved to have been playing a bit of possum.

Suddenly he nipped up to his feet with all the energy in the world.

I was there to catch Shawn on all of his daredevil pinning combinations. Following the script to the letter, I delivered as promised. Howard Finkel finally announced, “One minute remaining!” as Shawn slammed me and made his way to the top turnbuckle. I could see thirty-eight seconds remaining on the clock when Shawn came off at me with a drop kick. Catching the world by surprise, I grabbed the heels of his boots and he crashed to the mat. I stepped through and twisted him into the sharpshooter, and the crowd roared its approval at the surprising twist that I might actually win. But it was all part of the final swerve.

As I arched back, careful not to put too much weight on his back, I heard the crowd counting down ten . . . nine . . . eight . . . until Shawn, hanging on for dear life, was saved by the sound of the bell.

I’d won! At least in my eyes—and those of my fans! Earl handed me the belt, and I dropped to the floor to leave, passing newly reinstated WWF figurehead president Gorilla Monsoon in the aisle. I was totally exhausted, gulping some much needed air, as I heard Monsoon on the house mic ordering me back into the ring to go into sudden-death overtime. I willed myself to turn around and contest Gorilla’s decision. While I argued with him, the bell clanged and the match resumed.

I pounced right on the wounded Boy Toy, pounding him mercilessly. Three minutes into overtime, it was time to go home. This had been a beautiful movie to watch, especially since the crowd loved us both by the end of it. It was probably the greatest match I ever had, or close anyway. I squeezed Shawn’s wrist to give him the cue that we were going home. In this ending, the better man would lose.