Monday August 9, 2010
Broadbent Arena- WhirlyBirdz Locker Room
Louisville, Kentucky
10:41 PM Local Time
Terrence Thompson had lost enough fights in his career to know that seeing ceiling lights immediately after regaining consciousness was probably a pretty good indication one just got his ass kicked.
“Oh, God... dammit,” Terrence moaned, as he rolled onto his side, blinking rapidly as he tried to steady the swaying locker room. Clutching his throbbing skull in pain, Terrence was dismayed, if not surprised, to find his forehead sticky with blood.
Closing his eyes in an attempt to clear the cobwebs, Terrence forced himself to sit up, fighting down the small wave of nausea that attacked him as he did so. Dimly, the events leading up to his knockout began to take shape in his muddled mind.
He had been in here with Wendy, celebrating the end of their match, when John Pariah had come in, and, to Terrence and Wendy’s shock, seemed fairly gracious over their match, and even shook Terrence’s hand. Then he had left, and Terrence had barely time to breathe when the door had burst open again, and the next thing he knew, he was lying on the ground, the entire cartel above him, taunting him.
He didn’t remember much else, but he could piece the puzzle together well enough to make a silent promise that the next member of the Cartel to cross him was going to end up in a body bag.
Terrence heard a weak, feminine groan off to his side, and, slowly opening his eyes, he looked in that direction.
Oh God, Wendy.
The red haired woman was crumpled against the wall, curled up in the fetal position, her hands on top of her head. With a jolt of panic, Terrence crawled over to the still form of his wife, rolling her on her back, and looking down at her.
“Wendy! Are you okay?”
Even as he spoke, he saw her eyelids flutter. A small trickle of blood ran from a cut on Wendy’s lip, but all that Wendy showed for her being shoved headfirst into the wall was a small red bump on her forehead. She must have gotten her hands over her head to protect her, Terrence realized gratefully, although he noted with rising anger that Grave’s shove still had been forceful enough to knock her out.
With another soft moan, Wendy’s eyes opened, her emerald irises staring up at Terrence. “Wha... what happened, Terry?”
“The fucking Cartel blindsided us! That’s what happened!” Terrence growled back, looking intently into his wifes eyes, checking for signs of a concussion. Her pupils were dilating- at least that was a good sign.
Wendy closed her eyes, grimacing as the memories of the past few moments came back to her. “I remember now,” she said weakly. “Tyler Graves threw me into the wall. He must have... joined the Cartel.”
Terrence nodded, opening his mouth to say as many disparaging things about Tyler Graves that he could think of, but all that came out was a grunt of protest as Wendy struggled to sit up. “No, hon. You should lay down,” Terrence admonished his wife gently.
Wendy, however, shoved his arms away, sitting fully upright. “I’m fine, Terry,” she snapped, harder than she meant to. Terrence blinked, surprised at the outburst, but he finally nodded. From the looks of things, she had come off better than he did. Still, he couldn’t help but worry about his wife.
For a short while, the two sat silently on the locker room floor. Terrence grimaced in pain as he felt the cut on his forehead. It was maybe a quarter inch long, and narrow. Better yet, it wasn’t very deep, so he would likely not require stitches. Wendy, for her part, raised the collar on the top of her ring gear, using it to wipe away the blood that had now stopped trickling from her lip.
“Thank GOD our daughter wasn’t here to see this,” Terrence muttered.
“Why?” Wendy huffed, and for a second Terrence stared at his wife in shock, amazed that she would disagree with him. But then he realizes she wasn’t- she was pursuing her own line of thought.
“Why would The Cartel attack us now?” Wendy asked, her voice thick with frustration. “They could have done it during the match- they were allowed to!”
“Because they knew we were expecting that.” Terrence responded. “We spent that entire match waiting for the hammer to fall, and, it never came. This way, they caught us when we were least expecting it.”
“Well, I can say one thing,” a third voice piped in, and both Birdz jumped, turning to see Daniel Pollaski at the other end of the room. “There was no way in HELL Brian Hollywood would have gotten involved in your match. Not with so much at stake riding on Cage Rage.”
Wendy paled. “Oh, God,” she said, wobbly getting to her feet, and running over to the telelvision. She had to know- if Brian Hollywood, God forbid, won the Grand Prix title...
“I’m fine, by the way,” Pollaski muttered, rubbing his jaw where Wild’s clothesline had connected.
Wendy flipped on the television, and gaped in amazement as she saw Brian Hollywood running through the crowd, Darin Zion in hot pursuit.
“It’s official,” Terrence declared behind her. “This is the most fucked up pay-per-view EVER.”
Terrence grabbed a chair, and sat down to watch the main event of the evening, but Wendy, relieved that at least Hollywood wasn’t winning the match, flipped the television off.
“Hey!” Terrence protested, but Wendy ignored him.
“We need to go get checked out by the medical staff,” Wendy replied firmly. “For all we know, we have concussions.”
“I’m fine,” Terrence declared, eyeballing his wife. “I’ve taken worse shots than that.”
But Wendy wasn’t finished. “Before we were attacked, we were telling Cassie to bring Theresa back to the arena,” she reminded her husband, “Do you want her to see you like this?”
Terrence grunted, although conceding the point. He didn’t really want his daughter seeing him covered in blood, that’s for sure. Lord knows how the confrontation with Mandrake would even effect her.
“Alright, let’s go,” Terrence grumbled, heading towards the locker room door. With a grim smile, Wendy followed behind, leaving Pollaski to scurry after them.
“Wait up!” The portly manager called as he left the room.
=======================================================================
Tuesday August 10, 2010
The Nest- Living Room
Indianapolis, Indiana
5:12 PM Local Time
Make up your mind...
Decide to walk with me...
Around the lake tonight
Around the lake tonight by my side.
Daniel Pollaski swore under his breath as the Toadies’ legendary hit “Possum Kingdom” began blaring from his cellphone. He was quickly learning that it was a bad idea to make one of your favorite songs your phone’s ringtone- it was too easy to develop a severe dislike when one kept hearing it whenever someone wanted to bother them.
Nevertheless, Daniel pressed pause on the X-Box 360 controller, pausing the Split/Second race he was facing (and losing to) Terrence in, and grabbed his Droid, flipping it on.
“‘Yallo...” Pollaski greeted the caller nonchalantly, looking over at Terrence and rolling his eyes. “Yeah, this is him. What’s up?”
At that moment, Wendy entered, holding a basket of laundry straight from the dryer, Theresa on her heels, holding two Hot Wheels in her hands. As Wendy sat down in the recliner, intending to fold while she watched her husband play his game, she looked over at Terrence. “Who is it?” she mouthed quietly.
Terrence shrugged, and set his controller on the end table. From the way Pollaski was talking, he could be on the phone for a while. He smiled at his daughter, who was busy running the cars back and forth over the carpet, quietly making ‘vroom’ sounds.
“How’s your forehead?” his wife asked, pointing to the band-aid that covered Terrence’s forehead. Wendy’s cut lip had healed quickly with minimal swelling, but Terrence hadn’t been as lucky. While he hadn’t needed stitches, an ugly scab still dotted Terrence’s face where he had been busted open, and Terrence had been covering it with a bandage. He looked over and smiled at his wife. “It’s fine,” he said.
Wendy looked as if she was going to respond, but Pollaski distracted them both by lowering the phone, covering the mouthpiece and clearing his throat.
“They want you to face Brian Hollywood in a number one contenders match this week,” Pollaski announced to the room.
Terrence blinked in surprise, and Wendy broke into a grin. “That’s great!” she said. “Congratulations, Terrence!”
Pollaski didn’t quite share their enthusiasm. “They’re making it a ‘luchas de apuestas’ match.”
“A... what?” Terrence asked, his brow furrowing in confusion.
“Literally, it’s a ‘match of wagers’,” Wendy explained calmly. “Each of you puts something on the line, and the winner takes all.”
“Oh, so what are the wagers?” Terrence asked.
“Well, for Brian, its his number one contendership to the Grand Prix title,” Pollaski explained, cringing at the expected outbursts from both the Birdz.
“What?” Wendy said furiously. “HIS number one- when did that happen?”
“At the pay-per-view,” Pollaski said. While all the WhirlyBirdz had been unconscious at the start of the main event,, Pollaski had gone back and rewatched the tape. “He removed himself from that Cage Rage match, then announced that he ‘got next’, so to speak. I guest he still thinks he’s ‘got next’, despite Darin Zion running him off.”
Wendy’s brow furrowed in anger, but she merely crossed her arms over her chest and said nothing. Terrence, on the other hand, calmly shrugged. “Either way, I win, and I ‘got next’. So what am I supposed to bet?”
Pollaski grimaced, and looked from Terrence, over to Wendy, then back to Terrence again. “If you lose, you’re stripped of the tag team titles. What do you think?”
Immediately, the atmosphere in the room changed, and both Terrence and Wendy paled slightly, looking at each other. Even little Theresa sensed that something was amiss, and she looked up from her cars at her parents.
“It’s your call, “ Pollaski prompted, his hand still over his phone’s mouthpiece.
The room was quiet for sometime after that. Finally, Terrence scratched under his chin, and sighed. “Talk about your all or nothing gambles,” he said quietly, then shook his head. “Tell them no thanks, I would, if the tag titles were solely mine, but I’m not screwing Wendy over because I want to-”
“Do it.” Wendy said fiercely, interrupting her husband.
Both Terrence and Pollaski looked over at the redhead, stunned by the words. Wendy merely shrugged. “You’ve had to make so many sacrifices for my career over teh past few months, Terry. I walked out on you before Summer Games, and I betrayed you at that press conference back in March.”
“Yeah, cause you were blackmailed,” Terrence growled, remembering all too well the situation Victor Mandrake had forced Wendy into. “It’s still-”
“Tell them we say yes,” Wendy interrupted again, this time ignoring Terrence and speaking directly to Pollaski. “I’m not going to let your loyalty to me hold you back when it doesn’t have to. Besides, I’d be a poor wife indeed if I didn’t have faith in you.”
“It could be a trap,” Terrence warned.
“So was last week, and the week before that,” Wendy countered. “There’s nothing the Cartel can throw at us that we can’t handle. If you don’t want the match, decline. But don’t hold out because you’re afraid of costing me my belt.”
The room fell silent again as Terrence stared blankly ahead for several seconds. Finally, he took a deep breath, and turned towards Pollaski.
“Fine. I’m in.” He said, his eyes glaring into Pollsaki’s. And you tell them that Brian Hollywood better look really closely at the company medical plan, because he’s going to need it by the time I’m done with him.”
Pollaski nodded, and finally put his phone back to his ear. “You there? Sorry ‘bout that. Yeah, he’s in.”
While Pollaski continued to talk to PWX corporate, Terrence turned to his wife, smiling.
“Thanks,” he said.
Wendy merely shrugged and smiled. “What are wives for/ Just try not to lose.”
Terrence burst into laughter. “To Brian Hollywood? I thought you said you had faith in me!”
Even Wendy had to smile at that.
=======================================================================
Thursday August 12, 2010
The Nest- Living Room
Indianapolis, Indiana
4:10 PM Local Time
[Well, this is a little interesting.]
[As is the case with a good percentage of WhirlyBirdz promos, we are in the rather nice living room of The Nest, which, for all you new Birdz fans, is the trendy nickname for the WhirlyBirdz house, located in the northwestern corner of Indianapolis.]
[On the couch, alone in the room, sits the Mechanical Mayhem. As usual, Terrence is dressed in a t-shirt and jeans, the t-shirt being a dark blue NAPA Auto screenprint. He’s sitting fairly relaxed in the couch, wearing that customary smirk that pretty much appears in every single one of his promos.]
[What’s interesting though, is the item that Terrence Thompson is holding in his hand as he fades in. Small, Gray. Plastic, with a paper sticker covering the front and the top.]
[A Super Nintendo Cartridge]
[Street Fighter II: TURBO]
[Now THAT is what we call old-school]
Twister- “When I was a kid, one of my favorite games was Street Fighter II. I would play that game for hours, but the funny thing is, every time I played the Arcade mode, I wuould beat everybody down. I’d bash Balrog, I’d Vex Vega, and I’d stymie Sagat. But then... I would get to Bison, and that blue fire wielding motherfucker would kick my ass from one side of Shadowloo to the next. And everytime I lost, I would continue the game, and get my ass kicked all over again. This could continue for a long time- either until I tired of the game, and went on to do something else, or, by some freaking miracle, I managed to eek out a win on my thirty-fourth attempt, and finally beat the damn thing. I always imagined that one fluke victory was because Bison just got fucking sick of facing me, and figured that if he let me win once, I would finally go away.”
[For the record, Terrence’s favorite character was Guile. Is anybody honestly surprised?]
[SONIC BOOM!]
Twister: “Facing the Cartel is like being Bison in Street Fighter II. Every time you beat them, they just hit the damned Start button, and come back for more. I beat John Ojeda, they come back. My wife beats Brian Hollywood, they come back. My wife beats Wild with John Pariah as the freakin’ referee, they come back. We beat the Cartel in a Cartel rules match...”
[Exasperated eyeroll from Terrence as he finishes the sentence]
Twister: “They come back.”
[Terrence leans over, and sets the cartridge on the end table, then turns his attention back to the camera.]
Twister: “I’m sure we’ll hear some bragging from the Cartel. After all, they’ve brought Tyler Graves, who has yet to even win a match since returning to PWX, into their organization, and they managed to catch Wendy and I by surprise in our own locker room. I’m sure that more than makes up for every single Cartel member not named Brian Willett getting their asses handed to them in the ring.”
[Well, to be fair, Chris Stern never lost a match either., He lost a loot of blood, and probably a few brain cells, but not the match!]
Twister: “But I suppose when you’re the boss, no matter how shitty you and your friends are made to look, you can keep yourself in the limelight with just a few words. And that’s why, once again, Brian Hollywood is the number one contender to the Grand Prix title.”
[Terrence breaks into an ear to ear smirk]
Twister: “For about a week.”
[Small chuckle]
Twister: “Brian, I suppose I owe you and the Cartel a small ‘thank you’ for getting Mandrake out of our lives. I supposed if I was gutless and spineless,, I would have gone with the ‘five guys with a cattle prod’ method as well. “
[Small shrug]
Twister: “I guess whatever’s effective, right?”
[Pause for a second.]
Twister: “But Brian, you need a wake up call. You’re the owner of PWX- I can’t dispute that. And you can do anything you want with this company, so long as you don’t compromise our contracts. But I know you, Brian. You’re a businessman at heart, and you want to make money.”
[Terrence straightens up, and even leans forward a bit, his smirk still boring into the camera.]
Twister: “So, since you were nice enough to run Victor Mandrake out of the PWX, I’ll let you in on a little secret.”
[Terrence cups his right hand to his mouth, and speaks in a stage-whisper.]
Twister: “What’s good for business in the PWX is not you.”
[And the smirk is back.]
Twister: “Look through the history books, Brian. How many great wrestling promotions were destroyed because the morons running them thought they and their friends were still the best in the company, despite all evidence to the contrary?“
[Terrence slightly shifts his position on the couch to make himself more comfortable. As he talks, it sounds less like a wrestling promo, and more like Terrence trying to explain something to a five year old.]
Twister: “Believe me Brian, while next week is going to hurt- a lot- take solace in the fact that its really the best thing for the PWX, even if its the worst thing possible for you.”
[Another small pause, and the smirk disappears completely from Terrence’s face. His eyes harden, and he snorts in annoyance.]
Twister: “And yes, it is going to be very bad for you, Brian. Because even without a chance at the belt on the line, I’ve been wanting a shot at you. Like I’ve said before, I bear no grudge for what happens to my wife in a wrestling match- she’s made her own bed there. But see, when you start trying to drive a chair into her skull, or holding her down so that another man can slap her, you’re no longer messing with Wendy Briese, the wrestler. You’re messing with Wendy Briese-Thompson, my wife. You’re messing with my family.”
[Terrence leans forward, his narrrowed eyes never leaving the camera.]
Twister: “Nobody fucking messes with my family.”
[Terrence leans back slightly, and raises his right arm, as if he’s grabbing for something hanging from the ceiling.]
Twister: “And now you’re dangling that carrot, telling me that all I have to do to get a shot at the Grand Prix title is to kick your sorry ass?”
[Malicious grin.]
Twister: “Almost seems a little too good to be true.”
[Shrug]
Twister: “And it probably is. After all, even Helen Keller could see that the carrot you’re dangling is little more than bait. You’ve made it no secret that you want these tag titles off of Wendy and I, and this is just your latest scheme to do so. I’m sure you have some plan, probably involving four or five of your friends, to make sure you come out on top this week.”
[Terrence scoffs and shakes his head]
Twister: “Yeah, ain’t gonna work.”
[Smirk: On]
Twister: “You see, my personal issues with you aside, ever since I lost that match at Full Throttle to Jacob Wright, I’ve been wanting another crack at the belt. I’ve paid my dues by demolishing every single person that’s gotten in my way. And now, that title shot, that chance to once again be the top man in PWX, is right in front of me, and you think I’m going to choke?”
[Terrence shakes his head again, as if the notion of him failing here was even possible.]
Twister: “Do whatever you think you need to do to win, Brian. I’ve beaten every member of your pathetic Cartel, and if I have to do it again, I will. I don’t care if five, ten, twenty, or even fifty guys run down that ramp, the end result is going to be the same. You flat on your back, and me the new number one contender.”
[Terrence reaches to his other side, and grabs something off the camera. He holds it up, and we can see that it’s both of the PWX Tag Titles.]
Twister: “And yes, I’ll be taking our tag belts home as well.”
[Terrence sets both belts on his lap, and leans forward to the camera, his eyes blazing with intensity.]
Twister: “And that, Brian, isn’t an Executive Promise.”
[One last smirk]
Twister: “It’s the fucking truth.”
[Fade]
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