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The Midnight Bell
By Ric Drasin We open up on a huge arena, as there is a wrestling match in progress when lifetime favorite in the sport, Jake 'The Equalizer' Davis, realizes that his opponent Big Red is out to injure him. Big Red's biker tag partner 'Cut Throat' is in his corner cheering him on to kill Jake. This stops being entertainment and becomes very real as Big Red bites Jakes little finger off and spits it out into the audience. At this point the audience is stunned and Jake has no choice other than to really defend himself. Anything pre-arranged is off. The fight begins. Jake continues to try to keep Big Red from doing damage, but he's hurting. Jake's body isn't what it used to be, so he has to rely on his street fighting smarts and instinct to stay alive. Big Red is going for the kill and as he comes to put Jake away; Jake sees an opening and takes it. He literally catches Big Red mid stream, topples him over the top rope and Red's body collapses onto an unprotected metal chair rod, sticking up and impaling him through the heart. The crowd goes silent and Jake is in disbelief as to what actually happened. He makes it to the dressing room with blood gushing out of his hand, his finger is obviously missing. As we see Jake wrapping his hand in the dressing room, we see shadows emerge at the end of the lockers. A few bikers, one being 'Cut Throat' is faintly seen but heard telling Jake that his time is coming soon and then they quickly vanish as if it were a mist in the wind. Jake, not sure what actually happened is joined by his young daughter Harley as she wants to get him to the hospital for stitches in his hand. At the hospital while the Doctor is stitching up the missing finger, Jake tells Harley that it's time to get away for awhile and he knows of a small town where a few of his ex wrestler friends live and that he will take her there for a vacation and recoup. Next morning we see Jake and Harley as he's digging up cans
in his back yard full of cash that he had saved over the years and tells
her that this was his stash, as he doesn't trust the banks. They take off for a small town just East of New Mexico. While driving along the long lonely highway, Jake sees a band of motorcyclists in his rear view mirror coming up behind at an amazing speed. As the biker's pull up and pass Jake, he recognizes one of them to be 'Cut Throat', Big Red's tag partner. They just glare and snicker at Jake and then speed off. Jake and Harley end up in Summerville where they hook up with his former tag partner Vernon, who is now the town's minister, and his son AJ, who is the town's Sheriff. Of course everyone is happy to see each other as they chat, but to Jake's surprise, Vernon and AJ have a small group of younger wrestlers that they train and use on local wrestling shows once a week. They are anxious to show the 'old master' Jake how much these boys have learned and invite him down to the gym where they train. Vernon also mentions that there is a local promoter, 'Chuck,' who runs these shows and has his own group of renegades that he trains. Chuck is going to put both groups against each other at a big event coming up called Sangre fest. Sangre fest being a town festival held every year at the same time that earns most of its revenue to keep the town going. Sangre fest cultivates a wrestling show with the Archangel (town hero) against the Master of The Undead, based on a local legend; the Archangel defeated the Master saving all the people of the town 200 years ago. This year, AJ is playing the Archangel. Vernon and AJ take Jake & Harley around town and introduce them to some of the town's people (cameos played by real wrestling legends) as Jake spots a biker bar with some undesirables out front. It's explained to him that these are some of Chuck's renegades that will be wrestling at the Sangrefest. Jake zooms in on one and recognizes 'Cut Throat'. However, he keeps it to himself, with some confusion of why he keeps appearing. During the course of conversation, AJ tells Jake that it's been a busy few months over some unsolved beatings and murders. There have been strange findings along with some unexplained puncture wounds in the victim's neck. They feel it may be a copycat situation or something to warn the town about Sangre fest that the real undead will actually return. Never the less they have to get it solved before this event or the town will financially fail. Jake and Harley wander into the training center located in the basement of the church to watch some of the wrestlers train. They all know of him and ask if he'd show them some new moves. Jake agrees to do it the following day as Chuck shows up to watch. He doesn't like Jake being there, feeling that he has more clout with the wrestlers and may take over. Chuck goes back to his renegades and mentions that they need to put the hurt on Jake at some point before this Sangre fest. Another training session comes about and this time a couple of Chuck's renegades come and watch making snide comments about Jake and him being too old to be doing this. One of them hops into the ring and makes a comment about Jake's daughter being a fine piece of woman someday. Infuriated, Jake quickly takes him down and disposes of him while another hits Jake in the back of the head. AJ's wrestlers move in on him but Jake tells them to stay back, and he'll take care of this guy. He tosses him around a few times and quickly sends him out of the building. Of course his students are in awe of it all. This really infuriates Chuck and forces him to use other methods. Word gets out in wrestling circles that Jake's in town and 'Angela,' a Wrestling Magazine editor, (used to have a crush on Jake) gets wind of it and plans to fly out and see him and this show to get a story on him. Angela arrives in town and quickly finds where Jake is. She shows up at a training session unannounced and surprises him. They're happy to see each other and spend the next few hours catching up on old times. She informs Jake that Big Red's body was never found at the morgue and it's possible that he's not even dead. This eases Jake's mind a bit since he never intentionally intended to kill anyone. As a few days go by, another body is found and Angela is attacked at her motel room but only scratched up, as the assailant was scared off. The Paramedics come, treat her and let her go back to her room with unnoticed puncture wounds on her neck. A few hours prior to that some of the girl wrestlers reported a peeping tom in their training session, which needs to be investigated. Klaus, who is the church ground's keeper, is questioned as he knows all that goes on around the church, but they come up empty handed. A few days later Jake goes down to the gym and finds that the top rope has been broken and there's some blood on the floor. He also spots something white under a chair and leans to get it seeing that it's a broken canine tooth. Actually a hollow one. He passes it on to AJ for some lab work to see if they can match it to any of the murder scenes. Later that evening Angela calls him to come by. He arrives to her room and they talk for a spell as she begins to put her arms around him. We see in the dim light her mouth open as if to kiss him and fangs appear. Just at that moment, there is a knock on the door and it's AJ looking for Jake. Angela quickly backs into the darkness to recompose herself. AJ wants Jake to come with him right away to a station has they have Klaus in custody and feel that he's been the one behind all of this the whole time., which foils any of Angela's plans. Klaus confesses to the crimes of peeping tom so they just assume that he's responsible for everything else. This is enough to satisfy the Mayor and keep the show running. This should put the town at ease and it's the day of the fest. Carnival rides are erected, the town's people don't believe that whatever evil has permeated their town has been solved. The Mayor is happy cause he wants the money to flow in, no matter what. It's closing in on the night of the show and Jake runs down to the basement to get a pair of wrestling boots as he overhears voices below. Chuck talking to his wrestlers about the show and this is 200 years later. This is the night that we arise and take over. Now we have regained Angela as one of us after all this time of waiting for her to come back as our leader all of these years. Jake finally puts the pieces together and is heard running up the stairs as they go after him. The Renegades grab Jake and pulls him back down to the basement and tie him up from the ceiling, suspended by his arms and legs, telling him that they want the young blood of his daughter Harley and he can hang there and just visualize what's going on. Once gone Jake summons the last bit of strength in his body. Using his legs he pendulums his body back and forth, until he's able to break loose of the ropes. Jake quickly makes his way back to the tent, hopefully in time to stop the event. As the Midnight Bell is about to ring, AJ's wrestlers enter the ring in a 6-man tag match. We see AJ dressed as the Archangel. Then enters Chuck's team. The Renegades have arrived. Among them we see 'Cut Throat'. The bell rings and all the wrestlers start their battle, chairs being thrown, and blood splattering everywhere and all of a sudden the Renegades transform into Vampires. Just then Jake finally appears and sees this from the wings as AJ is getting the hell knocked out of him by a wrestler whose face he cannot see. It's the Master of the Undead. Jake runs into the ring to pull him off AJ, as the Master turns towards Jake and he sees that it's Big Red. Red just smiles and say's, 'now it's your turn to die.' Harley sees this and jumps into the ring to save her Dad as Red grabs her by the throat and tells Jake that she's first. Jake knocks Red's legs out from underneath him and yells at AJ to grab Harley. Cut Throat tries to get Harley by the neck and starts to pick her up as Vernon steps in and hold the Cross up at him. Cut Throat looks at the cross, backs up and then knocks it out of Vernon's hand telling him that this only works in movies. Harley picks up a big piece of board from the broken ring that has a nail sticking out of it and tells Vernon to duck as she swings it around. This hits Cut Throat in the side of the head with the nail, he drops to the floor and Vernon and Harley make their way out of the tent. The town's people (legend cameo's) have all jumped out of their chairs by this time and are battling the vampires as well. Everyone is running out of the tent as it catches fire from some torches used to light the entry and have been knocked over. People screaming and running frantically and the Mayor jumping over women and children to get out first. Jake and Red go at it toe to toe. Red sniffs Jake and asks, 'what keeps your blood so young, old man? Jake replies that he's full of piss and vinegar. Red say's 'I don't smell that, I smell Bull Shit' and tries to take another finger, this time Jake sees one last open spot and takes it, he drops down quick and monkey flips Red over the rope again and this time lands on a wooden chair which splinters and the wooden stake goes through his shoulder.. De ja vu. Jake thinking that Red is done turns to find his daughter as she yells 'look out', he turns around and is face to face with Red again but all of a sudden blood drips from Red's mouth as a stake protrudes from his chest. As he drops to the ground Angela is behind him and has driven a stake through his back and heart. She looks at Jake with sad eyes and then shows her fangs and snarls. Jake grabs Harley and runs out of the tent. Angela and Chuck are attacking some of the people. Everyone is out of the tent as the Vampires have burned up, died and it's smoldering with flames dispersing and smoke. Vernon and AJ have Harley outside, along with everyone else who survived as the tent collapses. It is believed that this is the end of the horror and the legend of Sangre fest. As we pull back Jake says to Harley that Angela must've been taken in the tent and he felt that it was something against her will. He will miss her. But, we see off in the woods, a figure running in the dark, as we follow, we close in as it turns to us and stops. Eyes are glowing and fangs out, its Angela as she quickly transforms into a Bat and flies off towards a full moon and we freeze frame. Is this the Bloody end or just the beginning of 'Angela's Revenge." Registered WGA
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