Smack ‘Em Whack ‘Em, Crash ‘Em Bash ‘Em

10.18.24 CommonSpirit Holy Cross Hospital Salt Lake City, Utah We open inside a hospital room roughly two miles from the Delta Center, where a visibly shaken Kenny Freeman is laying down on a bed, looking rather bruised up as he looks around with a crazed, startled look on his face…quickly revealing a glimpse of a small set of scratches near his right eye. “Where am I?” he asks, his voice wavering as his eyes continue to dart around the room. “Where’s Randall? Where’s Ivan?” “Sir, we need you to calm down,” states an orderly, a young woman wearing a medical mask as she raises her hands to emphasize her point. “We already told you it’ll take some time before you can be seen.” “Seen?” Kenny repeats, staring at the orderly in confusion. “I want to see my friends, I don’t know where you got the idea I want to--” Kenny stops in his tracks, the memories slowly but surely trickling back into his mind as he recalls the past few weeks… - 10.02.24 Red Army Training Facility Moscow, Russia

The first of these memories takes us to a makeshift studio, where Kenny and Randall are in the process of wrapping up their pre-taped vignette for ReVival 56. As a matter of fact, we catch up at the very tail end of Kenny’s final statement as he stares into the camera. “When I’m done, the Poor Whoresmen wll find out it’s only a matter of time before I take what’s rightfully mine! That title around Daytona’s waist is as good as mine, ya dig?” The last couple words draw a look of confusion from Randall, who just stares at his contemporary as the lights suddenly start flickering. “What was that?” asks the Entertainer, the strange occurrence taking hold of his focus. “Did…did someone flip a switch we don’t know about?” “No clue,” Kenny replies with a shrug. “But I think we’re done here for the day, let’s get this shipped over to--hey!” The exclamation comes as Kenny notices the camera has gone missing, somehow escaping his sight without so much as a trace of who is responsible…until he notices the blue portal on the floor beside the tripod. “Son of a--I need that camera back,” Kenny states, a sliver of anger behind his words as he approaches the portal. Peering through the rip in space and time, Kenny quickly notices a figure walking away, holding Kenny’s camera over its shoulder as if tempting fate. “Hey!” Kenny shouts through the portal, the voice echoing down until it reaches the figure. It stops, eventually turning around to reveal…another Kenny, a glare on his face. This prompts our brave Freeman to dive in through the portal, but before Randall can follow suit the portal closes. “Oh boy,” Randall mutters to himself, quickly rushing out of the room to inform Ivan and Max of the disappearance. Somewhere in the Multiverse… Kenny crashes to the ground upon his arrival, the portal quickly closing behind him as Freeman rises to his feet. Looking around to gather his bearings, Kenny sees his counterpart now running to create as much space as possible. For his part, the Kenny we know and love begins to give chase, closing that distance between them as soon as humanly possible. Try as he might, however, Kenny finds that the other one manages to outpace him before slipping away into an abandoned building up ahead. “Oh, I don’t like the look of that,” Kenny says to himself, shaking his head as he slowly enters the building. The place is devoid of internal illumination, the light from outside peeking through cracks in boarded-up windows as Freeman investigates with a sense of cautious urgency. If that sounds preposterous, well…just you wait. As he makes his way through barely-visible hallways, Kenny begins to hear noises of all sorts. A crash here, a bang there, and all the while a purring that echoes throughout the vicinity. “What is that, an engine?” Kenny asks himself in confusion, soon finding a staircase for him to ascend. The purring begins to grow in volume as he heads up to the next floor, troubling him somewhat as he reaches the end of the steps to find a single locked door greeting him. Kenny grabs the doorknob to turn it, only to wince in pain from a very curious reaction to touching the object. “Ah! It’s…not hot,” he cries out, though the statement that leaves his mouth only makes him more confused as the door seems to open itself with a creak of the hinges. Kenny carefully steps in through the door frame, where he sees the other one standing by with his camera…next to a chair facing away from our view. Perhaps all the more strange is that the purring we’ve heard has finally come to a stop, as a voice emanates from the view of the chair. “I see you’ve come to collect your precious camera, Mr. Freeman,” the voice states with a low, yet oddly familiar growl. “I’m afraid we cannot allow you to ADDRESS YOUR ENEMIES just yet, however…for we have some business to attend to. Get ‘im, Kenneth.” The other Kenny nods with a smirk, setting the camera down to charge at Kenny-PRIME…leading to a knock-down, drag-out (or is it the other way around) brawl throughout the empty room. Punches, kicks, the whole nine and a half yards are in play as Kenny tries his best to fend off the doppleganger. He eventually manages to catch “Kenneth” off-guard with a drop toe hold that sends him crashing to the floor, cinching in an STF before looking up at the chair with a look of rage on his face. “What do you want from me?” Kenny inquires, his voice nearly cracking from just how angry he is at the situation…only for his face to drop to a look of shock as the chair turns around, seemingly all by itself, to reveal the source of the voice. A tiny tabby kitten with eyes that Kenny recognizes from anywhere…because, despite being more feline in nature, they share a remarkably similar shade of blue as his own. “Your attention, of course,” the kitten states, the vaguely Kenny-sounding voice muffled by the cat’s natural sound of meowing. “That’s all I’ve ever wanted, after all.” - 10.18.24 CommonSpirit Holy Cross Hospital Salt Lake City, Utah The second memory quickly swoops in, bringing us just a couple hours earlier in the evening as an orange portal opens up outside the hospital. Kenny drops to the ground, lightly touching the scratches on his face before running toward the hospital’s main entrance. He pushes past a group of people to get to the reception desk, nearly falling on it to get the attention of the man working there. “Help me,” Kenny manages to utter, slowly sinking away from his place on the desk. “I need to be seen, I think I’ve got--” Kenny drops to the floor before he can finish speaking, though we do see him mouth the words “cat scratch fever” as a pair of staff help him into the waiting room. - And with that, we find ourselves back in the room where Kenny is being attended to, flailing around as staff try to restrain him…until Max and Ivan finally arrive alongside Randall, a look of confusion on all three of their faces. “I just met another Kenny,” Freeman faintly mutters upon seeing his comrades. “Two of them, in fact.” “Well that doesn’t surprise me,” Randall responds, but Kenny shakes his head. “You don’t get it,” he says, a cough coming out halfway throughout. “There’s a…a…” The anticipation raises an eyebrow from all three men before Kenny finishes his sentence. “Kitty Freeman.” With that, Kenny faints as staff attend to him once more. Randall looks over to Ivan with a look of concern. “You think he’s gonna be in any shape to face Crash Jackson in Reno?” “I sure hope so,” Max interjects, to which Ivan nods in agreement as we fade to black once more.