Out of a cloudless sky on a windless November day came a sudden shadow that swooped across the bright aqua Corvette. Baine was standing beside the car, in pleasantly warm autumn sunshine, holding out his hand to accept the keys from Jim Shine, the salesman, when the fleeting shade touched him. He heard a brief thrumming like frantic wings. Glancing up, he expected to glimpse a sea gull, but not a single bird was in sight.

Unaccountably, the shadow had chilled him as though a cold wind had come with it, but the air was utterly still. He shivered, felt a blade of ice touch his palm, and jerked his hand back, even as he realized, too late, that it wasn't ice but merely the keys to the Corvette. He looked down in time to see them hit the pavement.

Sorry about that.

He starts to bend over and is stopped.

No, no. I'll get 'em.'

Perplexed, frowning, Baine raises his gaze to the sky again. Unblemished blue. Nothing in flight.

The nearest trees, along the nearby street, were phoenix palms with huge crowns of fronds, offering no branches on which a bird could alight. No birds were perched on the roof of the car dealership either.

'Pretty exciting,'

Baine looks at him, slightly disoriented.

 'Huh?'

Shine holds out the keys again. He resembled a pudgy choirboy with guileless blue eyes. Now, when he winked, his face squinted into a leer that was meant to be comic but that seemed disconcertingly like a glimpse of genuine and usually well-hidden decadence.

'Getting that first 'vette is almost as good as getting your first piece of ass.'

Baine was shivering slightly and still inexplicably cold. He accepted the keys. They no longer felt like ice.

The aqua Corvette waited, as sleek and cool as a high mountain spring slipping downhill over polished stones. Overall length: one hundred seventy-eight and a half inches. Wheelbase: ninety-six-point-two inches. Seventy-point-seven inches in width at the dogleg, forty-six-point-three inches high, with a minimum ground clearance of four-point-two inches. Baine knew the technical specifications of this car better than any preacher knew the details of any Bible story. He was a Vietnamese-American, and America was his religion; the highway was his church, and the Corvette was about to become the sacred vessel by which he partook of communion. Although he was no prude, Baine was mildly offended when Shine compared the transcendent experience of Corvette ownership to sex. For the moment, at least, the Corvette was better than any bedroom games, more exciting, purer, the very embodiment of speed and grace and freedom.

Baine shook Jim Shine's soft, slightly moist hand and slid into the driver's seat. Thirty-six and a half inches of headroom. Forty-two inches of leg room. Cramped sure, but damn this car looks great. His heart was pounding. In fact, he felt flushed.  He had already plugged his cellular phone into the cigarette lighter. The Corvette was his.

Crouching at the open window, grinning, Shine speaks.

'You're not just a mere mortal anymore.'

Baine starts the engine. A ninety-degree V8. Cast-iron block. Aluminum heads with hydraulic lifters. Jim Shine raised his voice.

 'No longer like other men. Now you're a god.'

Baine knew that Shine spoke with a good-humored mockery of the cult of the automobile - yet he half believed that it was true. Behind the wheel of the Corvette, with this childhood dream fulfilled, he seemed to be full of the power of the car, exalted. With the Corvette still in park, he eased his foot down on the accelerator, and the engine responded with a deep-throated growl. Five-point-seven liters of displacement with a ten-and-a-half-to-one compression ratio. Three hundred horsepower. Rising from a crouch, stepping back, Shine says,

 'Have fun.'

'Thanks, bub.'

Baine drives away from the Chevrolet dealership, into a California afternoon so blue and high and deep with promise that it was possible to believe he would live forever. With no purpose except to enjoy the Corvette, he went west to Newport Beach and then south on the fabled Pacific Coast Highway, past the enormous harbor full of yachts, through Corona Del Mar, along the newly developed hills called Newport Coast, with beaches and gently breaking surf and the sun-dappled ocean to his right, listening to an oldies radio station that rocked with the Beach Boys, the Everly Brothers, Chuck Berry, Little Richard, and Roy Orbison.

At a stoplight in Laguna Beach, he pulled beside a classic Corvette: a silver 1963 Sting Ray with boat-tail rear end and split rear window. The driver, an aging surfer type with blond hair and a walrus moustache, looked at the new aqua 'vette and then at Baine. Baine made a circle of his thumb and forefinger, letting the stranger know that the Sting Ray was a fine machine, and the guy replied with a smile and a thumbs-up sign, which made Baine feel like part of a secret club.

Some people said that the American dream was almost extinguished and that the California dream was ashes. Nevertheless, for Baine on this wonderful afternoon, the promise of his country and the promise of the coast were burning bright. The sudden swooping shadow and the inexplicable chill were all but forgotten. He drove through Laguna Beach and Dana Point to San Clemente, where at last he turned and, as twilight fell, headed north again. Cruising aimlessly. He was getting a feel for the way the Corvette handled. Weighing three thousand two hundred and ninety-eight pounds, it hugged the pavement, low and solid, providing sports car intimacy with the road and incomparable responsiveness. He wove through a number of tree-lined residential streets merely to confirm that the Corvette's curb-to-curb turning diameter was forty feet, as promised.

Entering Dana Point from the south this time, he switched off the radio, picked up his cellular phone, and called his house keeper in Huntington Beach. She answered on the second ring, speaking Vietnamese, although she had immigrated to the United States twenty-two years ago, shortly before the fall of Saigon. Baine loved her like the mother he never had, but sometimes she made him crazy like a mother does.

'Hi, Lina.'

Baine?' she said.

Jaccob,'

He reminded her, for he had not used his given name for many years. Jaccob had long ago become Baine. His housekeeper issued a long-suffering sigh because she would have to use English. A year after they arrived from Vietnam, Baine had insisted that she should speak only English. Speaking in a heavy accent she speaks softly.

'You sound funny,'

'It's the cellular phone.'

'Whose phone?'

'The car phone.'

'Why you need car phone, Jaccob?'

They're really handy, couldn't get along without one. Listen, Lina, guess what-'

'Car phones for big shots.'

'Not anymore. Everybody's got one.'

'I don't. Phone and drive too dangerous.'

Baine sighed - and was slightly rattled by the realization that his sigh sounded exactly like Lina's.

 'I've never had an accident, Lina.'

'You will,' she said firmly.

Even with one hand, he was able to handle the Corvette with ease on the long straight-aways and wide sweeps of the Coast Highway. Rack and pinion steering with power assist. Rear-wheel drive. Four-speed automatic transmission with torque converter. He was gliding. Lina changed the subject:

Jaccob, haven't seen you in weeks.'

'We spent Sunday together. This is only Friday.'

'You come home to dinner?' she asked.

'Tonight? Gee, no, I can't. See, I just-'

'We have com tay cam.'

'-just bought-'

'You remember what is com tay cam - or maybe forget all about my cooking?'

'Of course, I know what it is, Lina. Chicken and rice in a clay pot. It's delicious.'

'Also having shrimp and watercress soup. You remember shrimp and watercress soup?'

'I remember, Lina.'

Night was creeping over the coast. Above the rising land to the east, the heavens were black and stippled with stars. To the west, the ocean was inky near the shore, striped with the silvery foam of incoming breakers, but indigo toward the horizon, where a final blade of bloody sunlight still cleaved the sea from the sky. Cruising through the falling darkness, Baine did feel a little bit like a god, as Jim Shine had promised. But he was unable to enjoy it because, at the same time, he felt too much like a thoughtless and ungrateful son.

 'Also having stir fry celery, carrots, cabbage, some peanuts - very good. My Nuoc Mam sauce.'

'You make the best Nuoc Mam in the world, and the best com tay cam, but I-'

'Maybe you got wok there in car with phone, you can drive and cook at same time?'

In desperation he blurted, Lina, I bought a new Corvette!'

'You bought phone and Corvette?'

'No, I've had the phone for years. The-'

'What's this Corvette?'

'You know, Lina. A car. A sports car.'

'You bought sports car?'

'Remember, I always said if I was a big success some day-'

'What sport?'

'Huh?'

'Football?'

Lina was stubborn, more of a traditionalist than was the Queen of England, and set in her ways, but she was not thick-headed or uninformed. She knew perfectly well what a sports car was, and she knew what a Corvette was, because Baine's bedroom walls had been papered with pictures of them since she came to work for him. She also knew what a Corvette meant to Baine, what it symbolized; she sensed that, in the Corvette, he was moving still farther away from his roots, and she disapproved. She wasn't a screamer, however, and she wasn't given to scolding, so the best way she could find to register her disapproval was to pretend that his car and his behavior in general were so bizarre as to be virtually beyond her understanding.

'Baseball?'

'They call the color "bright aqua metallic." It's beautiful, Lina, a lot like the color of that vase on the living-room mantel. It's got-'

'Expensive?'

'Huh? Well, yeah, it's a really good car. I mean, it doesn't cost what a Mercedes-'

Actors all drive Corvettes?'

Actors? No, I've-'

'You spend everything on car, go broke?'

'No, no. I'd never-'

'You go broke, don't take welfare.'

'I'm not broke, Lina.'

'You go broke, you come back home to live all the time.'

'That won't be necessary, Lina.'

I always here.'

Baine felt like dirt. Although he had done nothing wrong, he felt uncomfortably revealed in the headlights of oncoming cars, as though they were the harsh lamps in a police interrogation room, and as though he was trying to conceal a crime. He sighed and eased the Corvette into the right-hand lane, joining the slower traffic. He wasn't capable of handling the car well, talking on the cellular phone, and sparring with his indefatigable housekeeper.

 'Where's your truck?'

'I traded it on the Corvette.'

'Your actor friends drive Toyota. Honda. Ford. Never see one drive Corvette.'

'I thought you didn't know what a Corvette was?'

'I know,' Oh, yes, I know,'

Making one of those abrupt hundred-eighty-degree turns that only a mother could perform without credibility whiplash.

'Doctors drive Corvette. You are always smart, Baine, get good grades, could have been doctor.'

Sometimes it seemed that she was Baine's real mother.

Anyway, I'm not an actor anymore, Lina, not as of last month. Now I'm a full-time wrestler, not just part-time anymore.'

'No job.'

' Wrestler.'

'Fancy way of saying no job,'

'The latest contract I signed-'

Dinner burning, I must go. You come to dinner?'

Sure Lina, I will see you soon.'

Baine hangs up the phone and heads to his home. He sits quietly thinking of his match this week. He reaches beside his seat and retrieves a laptop computer, and pulls to the side of the road where he proceeds to place a digital web camera upon the dashboard and attach it to his computer. He adjusts the focus and angle of the camera and presses a few keys. after setting up the record function he again starts on his way.

You know, I have sat back a bit this week and watched the promotional videos done by my opponents Juan Ramirez and Jericho Dylan. I kept my comments to myself, contemplating on what I could really say to cause an impact on these guys, as well as the newcomer River Angelus. I wonder what I can say that hasn't been said to death about these guys. I have faced and beaten Juan on more than one occasion, as well as Jericho Dylan. Hell I am starting to believe that Juan and Jericho were signed to the ULW just for the real talent to give the beat down to. I do not know of anyone here that hasn't beaten Jericho. His misfortune started when my brother Devin beat his punk ass down, and he hasn't recovered since. So what will become of him after yet another loss at the hands of the Dominion? Where can a man at the bottom of the pile go when you cant go any further down?

He doesn't even know. Hell after watching his promotional video, I noticed he failed to even mention the match he will be in this week. Disrespect of this kind cannot and will not be tolerated. He has learned that lesson on a great number of occasions, but perhaps the lesson needs taught to him again as I know he is a slow learner after all. Juan you are indeed correct that twice you have faced the Dominion, and twice you have failed to attain a win. Upon losing to us you not only lost two matches, but lost a shot at the thing you want to taste so badly. Tag Team Gold. You had a shot at it, but like your dreams and admirations of becoming the best in the business, the dream died when the referee counted you down with the three count. Now you talk like the third time is a charm. What a joke. A pathetic joke, but a joke none the less. It is more like three strikes, your out. No deposit, no return, no escape from the trap your stammering skull cave has gotten you into.

As I watched your PR, I waited to hear what heinous plot you had in store for us. What untold horror you were about to release to punish us for past transgression. All you could come up with was calling us all fuckers and assholes. Fuckers and assholes, sad man real sad. Nothing of real sustenance to your PR. at all. If your insight and aggressive tendencies were liquefied, and turned to gasoline you know how much fuel you would get? Well, I estimate you couldn't power a flea mobile with enough juice to make one lap around the inside loop of a cheerio. Why even show up at all Juan? Why put yourself through yet another humiliating defeat against us? Sure you beat Curtis jack once, but I am willing to bet dollars to doughnuts,  You wont get a win like that again. Especially in this match. Oh, and the part about us getting out in one piece, when you wake up in the emergency room next week, let me know if that was what you had in mind.

Now Jericho, as I stated before I watched your promo. I didn't know if you were trying for a generic version of the matrix or what. You had nothing to say about the match, the ULW, or anyone in the federation. Why the hell would you do that? Are you so scared and intimidated that anything you think of saying sticks frozen to the back of your through? Why are you so scared to do a promo that actually pertains to wrestling? You thinking about doing a Griffon fade out where you quit every two weeks, only to come back even more pathetic that before? You need to focus on what you say before saying it or you will sound more like a jackass, than you usually do. Or are you waiting instructions from the great and powerful tech gods to show you the path to victory? Either way you look at it you are just a scared little man, with small insignificant thoughts. That is why you are destined to fail this week on Vengeance. Sorry to be the one to break it to you, but obviously no one else wants to be the one to break your heart.

Now on to River Angelus. As of yet you have been silently standing in the background of your team. Maybe hoping you will be forgotten, or perhaps praying that they will win this match for you. Either way is fine by me. Like Jericho, your nonchalant  style of doing nothing will not aid you here in this match. You may have heard the old saying that "silence is golden". You are trying to cash in on this maybe? Good thing, you will need all the money you can get to pay the nursing home for your new lifestyle. I am sure you can appreciate eating tapioca pudding through a straw for the rest of your life after I bust your teeth outta your cocksucker once and for all. River, I plan on kicking you in the mouth so hard that Hurst's nuts will swell. I don't care who you are, or where you come from because the fact of the matter is this. You, like your partners have no chance in hell at winning.

With the opposition being put where they belong, I guess the next step is to say a few words to my partners. First being my friend, brother, and full time tag team partner who will hold half of the tag team championship Devin Hawk. Devin I know you are having a hell of a road trip this week, as well as training your ass off. We have been tag partners as long as we have been wrestling. You know me as well as I know you, and know we can depend on one another. Our abilities in the ring since I quit the acting gig months back have been superb, to say the least. So I will just say, leave some for me bro.

Now at last I come to Curtis Jack. He has made a hell of a name for himself here in the ULW, and I couldn't ask for a better third man to be in the Dominion's corner. Unlike Juan, whom has nothing but doubts about his team, I know you will not let us down as we will not let you down. Juan and Rain are in need of some old fashioned schooling so they may better learn their place. So I ask you to join us in the classroom we call the squared circle and emit to these guys a lesson they will never forget. You know Jericho is in the special needs classes, so we had better double up on his classes. So lets get together and beat these three bitches down to the opening carder positions they deserve.

Baine pulls in front of a large estate and presses a button on a remote above the sun visor. This causes the gates to open. He drives in and parks.

Get ready boys. Because Vengeance this week, will be your genocide.