Hello, Static.

HELLO, STATIC. Filed transcript. Submitted by "Toxic Waste" Rancid to the STRIFE media coordinator's office, May 14. Recorded on a handheld phone camera. Vertical orientation. The video itself has not been released to the public; the federation's editorial team has declined on production-quality grounds. The audio transcription has been filed for the record at the contributor's insistence. ———————————————— [Audio begins mid-laugh. The laugh is the kind that doesn't have a clean start or a clean end — it's been going for a while and will keep going for a while. The camera is shaking. Background looks like an empty parking lot at night, but not the kind of parking lot a normal person would film a video in. Industrial. Wet. There is a streetlight that flickers twice during the recording. RANCID's face is too close to the lens for most of the runtime. The green hair is doing something with the streetlight that the camera does not handle well.] RANCID: Heeeey. Hey hey hey. Hey there, Static. RANCID: I been told the federation wants me to do a thing. A little — what'd they call it — a pre-match. They want me to do a pre-match. They sent a guy from the office. I told the guy from the office I was busy. The guy from the office said it was important. The guy from the office is in the trunk of my van. Just kidding. He's fine. Probably. Hey. [He laughs. Looks somewhere off-camera. Looks back.] RANCID: Static. STAH-tic. I'm doing the syllables. I been thinking about you. You and me. In the cage. Coming up real soon. The hex thing. The thing they built. With the door that locks. Real fun room they built, that one. Real fun. I like the door. I been telling 'em for weeks I like the door. They keep saying I'm not allowed to lock it during my matches. I keep saying ask me again when I'm winning. RANCID: Hey, Static. You want to know how I came up. I been thinking I should tell you. So the locker room understands. So you understand. So you know what walks in that cage with you. RANCID: I was raised by wolves. Real ones. Up by Love Canal, the whole pack, raised me right next to the runoff stream from the third plant. They taught me everything I know about kicking. I was raised by my mother, who left the day after I was born, but came back to visit twice a year and brought a different name every time. I was raised by the orderlies at the state psychiatric hospital in Buffalo until I was sixteen, and they were kind people, mostly, and I sometimes still think about them when I am trying to fall asleep, which is never. I was raised by a guy named Lou in the back of a junkyard in Niagara Falls. Lou owned a goat. The goat's name was also Lou. I was raised by Lou. [He grins at the camera. The grin holds for too long. The streetlight flickers.] RANCID: All of those are true. Or none of them are. Doesn't matter. I'm here now. So are you. And we're gonna meet in the room with the door. RANCID: I want to talk to you about the work, Static. The work. I been hearing you talk about the work. Other guys too. The Doctrine guy. The lucha guy. The work. Everybody's been doing the work. The federation's all about the work lately. RANCID: I want you to know something. I don't do work. I'm not — like — I don't prepare. I don't study tape. I don't make notes about your tendencies. What I do is I show up. I show up with whatever I brought. And the rest of it just kinda happens. The kendo stick. The chair. The light tube if there's a light tube. The cage wall. I'm bringing the cage wall too, by the way. The cage wall is my buddy. The cage wall and I been through some stuff together. RANCID: I lost to Dorian Graves a couple weeks back. You probably watched it. I watched it. It was real interesting. I been doing some thinking about it. [Beat. He stops grinning briefly. The face that replaces the grin is not better.] RANCID: I been doing zero thinking about it. Match happened. He won. I left. I went and got tacos. I am over it. Hey. [Grin back.] RANCID: Static. Static. Listen. I got the news today. About after our match. You and me, then you and that kid, right? The high-flyer kid. Dla-mini. Dla-mini. Two weeks. He's getting the New Wave shot at you. That's — Static, that's a gift. The federation is giving you a gift. That kid wears his ribcage on the outside of his body. You're gonna unfold him. I'm almost jealous of you. Almost. I'm not jealous because first you got me. First you got me, Static. And then you get the gift. Two for one. RANCID: You ever fight a guy who came up the way I came up? I want you to think about that. You ever fight a guy who did not learn the rules? Because the rules are learned. You either get taught the rules or you don't. I didn't. Nobody bothered. Out by the Pits we had different rules. We had like, two rules. Don't be inside when the drum ruptures. Don't be on fire when you're trying to leave. Both of those — those also did not apply to me, I should mention. I was inside. I was on fire. I am still on fire. In a sense. [Long laugh. He moves the camera. It is now pointing at the ground briefly. Then back at his face.] RANCID: I'll see you soon, Static. I'm gonna bring something. I haven't decided what yet. Could be a thing with nails. Could be a thing on fire. Could be — y'know, sometimes I just walk in there with my hands. I been working on my hands. People think I don't work. I work. I work on my hands. RANCID: Real nice cage they built us. [Beat. He looks past the camera at something off-screen. Whatever he sees, he likes.] RANCID: Bell rings, Static. Bell rings, the work starts. [The streetlight flickers a third time. He laughs. The recording ends mid-laugh.] ———————————————— [End transcript.]