Stu-E sat in the dimly lit room, the glow from his phone casting long shadows across his face. His jaw tightened as Sarah’s message played again, her words sharp enough to cut through steel. The corners of his mouth twitched into a devilish smile, when the video ended, he leaned back in his chair, his fingers steepling in front of his face, and exhaled through his nose, slow and measured.

"Callahan..." he murmured, his voice low and gravelly, he pressed his lips into a thin line, his gaze fixating on nothing in particular. "I bloody love it!"

He stood abruptly, the chair behind him scraping against the floor. Every movement was deliberate, a man who didn’t waste energy on anything he didn’t mean. Stu-E paced the room, his boots thudding against the hardwood in a rhythm that mirrored the storm brewing in his chest. He stopped suddenly, turning to face the camera he'd set up in the corner, the red recording light blinking like a heartbeat.

“Sarah,” he began, his voice steady. “You think I don’t know who you are? You think I don’t see the fire, the drive, the chip on your shoulder that’s been growing since day one? You think I don’t respect it?”

He scoffed, shaking his head. “Respect ain’t the problem, Sarah. Respect, you’ve always had. I called Eve knowing she’d be on the phone right back to you and I knew it would fire you up. And well, well done. You’ve confirmed everything I knew, and everything I thought about you.”

Stu-E’s eyes narrowed, his tone hardening. “You say you’re gonna show me who you are at Havoc? Good. I want to see it. But don’t just show me. Show them. Show every single person in that arena why you deserve to stand shoulder to shoulder with the World Champion as my equal. Because I’ll tell you this right now, Sarah—when it’s all said and done, when that bell rings, and our hands are raised in victory? It won’t be because you showed me who you are. It’ll be because you showed them why they should never forget.”

He paused, letting the words hang in the air like smoke after a fire. Then, without another word, he walked over to the camera, reached out, and ended the recording. The scene faded to black as the sound of his footsteps echoed into silence.