Charlie’s room at the Marriott in downtown Minneapolis was nice enough, he supposed. The room was spacious and well-furnished, featuring a hot tub in the bathroom and plenty of vanity mirrors. It had all the fixings and amenities an XWF superstar could ask for.

Well, except for one…

Charlie grunted as he threw his suitcase atop the king sized bed. As soon as he got into the room Charlie went to work with his grimy hands, unzipping the bag and reaching deep inside for his fix. For that special little super-rock, capable of taking even mundane men to the greatest of heights.

But Charlie’s face soured when his hands came back empty.

“Where the fuck is it? I know I packed it…”

The Nickleman started throwing everything out of his suitcase, meticulously opening zippers and searching pants pockets. A few beads of sweat began to trickle down his forehead as his teeth clenched together. Charlie’s leathery skin became warm to the touch as the fiend fumed over his missing belongings.

“You’ve got to be fucking kidding me!”

The Nickleman threw the last pair of drawers in the suitcase towards the wall, accidentally striking an ornate lamp on the nightstand. The lamp fell, and immediately shattered across the floor- but Charlie didn’t give a damn about no lightbulb. He didn’t even seem to register the sound!

“Those T-S-A sons of bitches have screwed me again! Those fiends stole my shit!”

Charlie growled to no one in particular before turning his head and catching his own reflection in the mirror. He stared into the eyes of the crackhead behind the glass, but he didn’t seem to notice the leathery growths on his skin, the bags under his eyes, or the open sores on his cheeks. Or at least, he didn’t seem to care.

The only thing he cared about was getting his fix.

It occupied his mind at all times. His every waking hour was consumed by the desire. He had even begun to dream about it. The dreams were a welcome change for Charlie, because now he didn’t have to live with the nightmares. Just a few rocks a day was all he needed to escape the memories haunting his sobriety.

The Nickleman pounded his fist against the table in the room. The legs of the table cracked from the sheer force of the impact. Untamed rage flashed through his angled brows, but after a few deep breaths Charlie finally self-soothed enough to calm down.

“Well, shit- there’s no use in cryin’ over spilt crack! I know someone in this shithole city is holdin’...”

Charlie lightly tapped his knuckles against the damaged table, as if he were ending a meeting with himself. With that, he grabbed his room key and a small stack of cash before heading out into the gritty underworld of downtown Minneapolis.





We cut to a shot of Charlie Nickles standing in front of a local headshop. For our squares in the audience, a headshop is a type of store people who use illegal drugs shop at to purchase their required paraphernalia. They are very, very high-class establishments…as long as you ignore the homeless people standing around outside sharing a single cigarette.

A bell chimes as Charlie opens the front door. A young woman with dyed hair and a septum piercing looks up at Charlie from behind the counter.

“Hey, welcome to Smoke 4 Less. Can I help you find anything?”

Charlie took a brief look around the store before answering. They had some massive bongs up on shelves, and they had rotating glass cases with damn near every vape you could think of. But Charlie didn’t come here for bongs and kiddy vapes: he came for the hard stuff.

“Yeah…where are your oil burners? I’m not seeing em’. Are they in the back?”

The woman with the dyed hair scratched her head.

“Uh…what? Oil burners? Are those like, a special type of dab rig?”

She began looking through the various bowls for dab rigs, but Charlie quickly redirected her.

“No no no….oil BURNER….they’re usually about 5, no more than 10 bucks.”

The woman looked around the shop more than a little perplexed.

“I’ve like, never heard of those before…did you see them online? Is it like, a TikTok thing?”

“A TikTok thing? What the hell is that- actually, I don’t care. I’m talking about OIL BURNERS…”

Charlie’s voice grew louder as his face grew increasingly frustrated.

“Saying it louder isn’t helping. What are you trying to find, exactly? Maybe we have a replace-”

But Charlie cut her off before she could finish. He couldn’t deal with the pleasantries anymore: he needed his god-damned fix!

“It’s a CRACK PIPE, okay? That’s what I’m looking for! That’s what oil burners are, it’s code for a CRACK PIPE! Do you sell CRACK PIPES here?!?!”

The woman was so taken aback that her septum piercing was nearly sucked into her nasal cavity! She placed a hand over her chest as Charlie’s sweat started to drip across the customer service counter.

“Oh you poor thing…no, we don’t sell that kind of stuff here. We’re mostly a vape and CBD shop. But, maybe if you wanted to try getting off…that stuff...we’ve got some really good CBD prerolls here!”

The Nickleman rolled his eyes at this woman’s bleeding heart.

“Save your fucking judgement, okay, whore? You make, what, ten bucks an hour to sell vapes to kids? I’m a famous fuckin’ MEGA-STAR, okay? I’m known by fans all across the world, and I make more money in one night of fighting than you make in a year!”

But the woman isn’t buying Charlie’s entirely true story. As far as she can tell, Charlie’s just another crackhead having an outburst. And truthfully: she’s kinda right.

“Hey man, no need to get personal….I know addiction is tough. My uncle’s girlfriend struggles a lot with addiction. He met her at the strip club, and, you know, apparently these CBD pre-rolls have helped her with quitting cold turkey. It’s something to think about, that’s all.”

Charlie was beyond exasperated. He clenched one hand into a fist upon the counter as he dragged his other hand through his graying hair.

“You want me to QUIT?

The one thing that makes me feel calm at night, the one thing that makes me feel energized in the morning, the one thing that still brings me pleasure in this God-forsaken world? You want me to give up crack…bitch, have you lost your FUCKING mind?!

Do you know what I have to go through everyday? It’s a battlefield inside my head! Memories of my daughter, my sister, the life I used to have…and you’re telling me to just smoke a god-damned joint? That weak shit might be enough for you, but it ain’t enough for me!

I NEED CRACK, damn it! And I need you to sell me a fucking pipe to smoke it with!”

The doorway bell chimed as Charlie was mid-tirade. He turned around to see two teenage stoners walking into the shop. One of the teens was wearing a retro XWF t-shirt, and the other, slightly pudgier teen, was wearing a black beanie emblazoned with the Warfare logo.

“Holy shit…is that Charlie Nickles?! Oh my God, he really is a crackhead!”

“I thought that was just a character he played for TV! I didn’t know the shit was really real like this!”

The two teens quickly share an excited glance.

“That’s so X-TREME!!!”

The woman behind the counter was too shocked to react, but the two teens fist-bumped just like their favorite XWF stars used to do. Charlie turned around and felt his stomach drop to the floor.

These two kids were…laughing.

Charlie felt like he was in a life or death struggle for his sanity- and these kids were just fucking laughing.

Charlie should have been angry.

But instead, he only felt shame.

The deep kind of shame, that you can feel down to your bones.

Complete and total social debasement.

So Charlie did the only thing he could think to do…

Lie.

“TV character..yeah, that’s, that’s all I’m doing here guys. I’m just filming a promo for the upcoming edition of Warfare! That whole crack thing is one hundred percent just a gimmick to drive interest and views. You know how these things are, of course.”

But the kids weren’t buying it. Whether it was the preposterous amount of sweat dripping from Charlie’s forehead, the sores on his weathered face, or his constant shifting- the world will never know!

“Yeah right, dude! I’ve seen crackheads before, and you, sir, look tweaked the fuck out!”

Charlie sneered. He was going to respond- but the tubby teen spoke up first.

“Hey Chucky, if you’re looking for crack you’re in the wrong place! All you gotta do is talk to those guys.”

The teen pointed outside the store, through the looking glass, at the group of raggedy looking people still sharing that same cigarette along the curb. Charlie’s shame melted as the thought of acquiring his next fix became concrete.

“The homeless guys? Well, that makes sense. But I wanted to get my pipe first!”

The kids chuckled again.

“Homeless? Those guys aren’t homeless, they’re all dressed in the new YEEZY LINE!”

“Yeah doncha’ know?! That’s the new fashion these days!”

Charlie scratched his chin, considering for a moment that he may in fact be behind the times.

“Huh. Good to know.”

Charlie walked past the kids and started to step out of the store when suddenly-

“Hey, WAIT!”

Charlie turned around with a curious, albeit slightly agitated, brow.

“Can we get your autograph? Or even better, a selfie with you?!”

Charlie smiled softly at first, but then, he dramatically curled it into a snarl.

“You can get fucked.”

The bell chimed one last time as Charlie slammed shut the headshop’s door.





Crack cocaine doesn’t cook itself.

So Charlie waits impatiently for the next batch, sitting in the middle of a dilapidated trap house somewhere deep in the ghettos of Minneapolis. Surrounded by a bunch of homeless looking drug dealers wearing YEEZY!

“So, when the fuck is it gonna be ready?”

That’s when a woman with obviously dyed blonde hair speaks up. A shoddy streak of purple runs through her bangs, but that doesn’t stop her from running her mouth.

“It’s coming as soon as it can! But while you wait, you’re more than welcome to a couple lines…”

She passes the plate of cut-up cocaine over to Charlie, but he refuses it out of hand. He’s clearly a sophisticated connoisseur.


“No thanks, I don’t snort my coke. I only smoke it.”

“Suit yourself, Mr. Fancy Pants.”

She snorts a fat line of questionable powder off the plate before rubbing her powdered nose. That’s when the ‘ding’ of a timer sounds out from the kitchen. Charlie sits up eagerly.

“Does that mean what I think it means?”

Charlie grins wolfishly as another drug pusher, a hefty bald man who considers himself a workhorse, speaks up to confirm Charlie’s hypothesis.

“It means exactly what you think it means.”

Charlie’s smile is so big it damn near stretches to the heavens! He pulls out his short stack of cash, laying it all on the table as another drug pusher carries a tray out to the living room, placing it atop the coffee table. This drug pusher looked like the twin brother of someone famous, but Charlie couldn’t quite put his finger on it.

But he was finally able to put his fingers all over some crack rocks!

“Let me test this shit out real quick…lemme just Crush The Edge here…”

Charlie spoke softly to nobody in particular as he picked out one particularly fat rock. He lifted the rock off the tray before bringing it up to his mouth, slowly. His dry tongue rolls out from behind his busted teeth like some sort of Alien Xenomorph, testing the rock’s taste with a few proper licks.

Then, Charlie takes a bite out of the crack rock. He chews down hard, crushing the edge of the rock before placing it back down on the tray. The drug pushers all look at Charlie anxiously, waiting for him to judge the quality of their cook.

After he lets the taste settle on his palette, Charlie damn nears breaks into a standing ovation!

“Now that’s some fucking HEAT right there!”

Charlie daps up the man who cooked the crack before we suddenly launch into a montage scene! We see Charlie smoking crack with his newfound friends, giggling and telling each other stories like some high school girls at a slumber party.

In between every scene of Charlie taking a hit, we see his pile of money slowly recede. The stack grows smaller and smaller every time we cut between a visual of Charlie riding the cocaine dragon.

The montage suddenly slows down as Charlie exhales one fat, massive toke of crack smoke.

“Whaddiya’ guys say your gang was called again?”

The woman with the blonde and purple hair responds first.

“Bloods off Broadway. Named after the park on our block, ya heard?”

Charlie shakes his head affirmatively.

“Heard!”

But then, a weird sense of deja vu hits Charlie. BoB?

He shakes away the impulsive thought, clearing his mind with another toke of smoke as we get back into the montage of Charlie partying with his new gang friends.

At the end of the montage, Charlie’s stack of money is completely gone: as is every single crack rock on the tray. The Nickleman looks around, dazed and extremely twitchy.

“Wait…where the…where the fuck’s my money go?! And who smoked all the crack I bought?!”

But before anyone can respond, Charlie goes into a heated rage!

“First, TSA took my fix…and now, you fucking chodes took all my money AND smoked all my shit?! Fuck nah!”

The Bloods off Broadway try to explain, but Charlie’s not hearing it. He’s just seeing red! He begins smashing heads, kicking guts, and flipping chairs! The drug dealers try to calm him down, but when that doesn’t work, they realize they have no choice but to fight him!

The woman with the blonde and purple hair charges at him, trying to slice at his ear with a kitchen knife-

But Charlie’s too fast!

He scoop powerslams her through the coffee table!

And then another, and another!

Before Charlie even realizes it, the entire gang has been defeated. Their blood covers his hands and his shirt, but Charlie doesn’t give a fuck about that shit.

All he cares about is getting his next fix.

Charlie scours all through the house until he finds his money. He stuffs it back in his pocket like it was stolen, before he steps over the bodies of the wounded dealers. As he goes to leave the house, he catches a glimpse of himself in the mirror-

And usually, he would just walk past it…

But this time, he stood still.

Because the man behind the glass was no longer reflecting him.

Instead, he was just staring.

Judging.

Charlie glared at himself in the mirror, but when the man behind the glass stared back, Charlie gasped.

“You just got your fix. Ain’t you happy yet?”

Charlie stared at the man in the mirror.

For several long seconds, he said nothing.

Then his brow furrowed.

“What the fuck kinda question is that?”

The man behind the glass tilted his head.

Charlie didn’t.

“I asked you a question.”

The reflection smiled.

Charlie didn’t.

“You’re not happy.”

Charlie scoffed.

“I just got what I wanted.”

“That wasn't what I asked.”

Charlie’s eyes narrowed.

“The fuck you want from me, freak?”

“Nothing.”

A pause.

“I just wanna know why you keep doing this.”

Charlie’s face hardened.

“Doing what?”

The reflection looked down at Charlie’s hands.

They were still covered in blood.

“This.”

Charlie glanced down.

Then back up.

“They tried to rob me!”

“Did they?”

“Yeah.”

“You sure?”

“I SAID YEAH!”

Charlie slammed both hands against the mirror. The glass rattled violently, but the man staring back at him didn't flinch.

“Funny.”

“What?”

“You always have somebody to blame.”

Charlie froze.

“TSA stole your drugs.”

“Your opponent disrespected your house.”

“Your old friends abandoned you.”

“The XWF forgot what you gave it.”

The reflection leaned closer.

“And now these guys stole your money.”

Charlie’s breathing became heavier.

“They DID!”

“Maybe.”

The reflection shrugged.

“But you know what I don't hear?”

Charlie said nothing.

“Your name.”

Silence.

The room suddenly felt much smaller.

The Marriott suite.

The broken lamp.

The overturned suitcase.

The blood on Charlie’s shirt.

The drugs sitting only a few feet away.

And that fucking mirror Charlie had been staring at for hours.

But for the first time all night, he really looked at what he saw in the glass.

The leathery skin.

The bags beneath his eyes.

The sores.

The gray hair.

The blood.

The trembling hands.

The reflection wasn't some monster.

That was the problem.

It was Charlie.

Exactly as he was.

And somehow, that was worse.

“You think you know me?”

“I am you.”

Charlie swallowed hard.

“Remember BoB?”

“Shut the fuck up!”

“You found another family tonight.”

Charlie shook his head.

“They were fucking losers.”

“You liked them.”

Charlie looked away.

“You laughed with them.”

“I was high.”

“You felt like you belonged.”

Charlie’s jaw clenched.

“And then you destroyed them.”

“They fucked with me!”

“No, they didn’t.”

The reflection's voice became quieter.

“You did.”

Charlie stepped backward.

“You're full of shit. You’ve always been full of shit!”

“Am I?”

“Yeah.”

“Then why are you crying?”

Charlie immediately wiped beneath his eye.

His fingers came away wet.

He stared at them.

He looked almost offended by the discovery.

“I'm not fucking crying!”

The reflection smiled again as Charlie looked toward the drugs. His breathing steadied. His eyes settled. He reached for the crack as the reflection watched him in silent judgement.

“You know what?”

Charlie held the rock between his fingers.

“Maybe you're right.”

The reflection raised an eyebrow.

Charlie smiled.

“Maybe I'm not happy…but I don't need to be happy.”

Charlie brought the rock closer to his face.

“I just need to be fucked up enough that I don't give a shit.”