Monday April 22, 2013
Central Park- Byte This Preshow Festival
New York City, New York
1:11 PM Local Time
It’s a beautiful day in New York City as we fade into a festival atmosphere, with tents, and booths, and hundreds, if not thousands of milling people. The Byte This preshow festivities are evidently well underway. Admist the tents, a small grassy area has been roped off for promotional work. Right now, Wendy Briese is making good use of it, standing a couple of feet from the ropes, where several curious souls are milling about watching. Wendy’s not alone, either- her manager is standing right next to her, as is her husband. All are smiling (or in Pollaski’s case, smirking) at the camera. Despite the not-quite-warm weather, Pollaski’s bedecked in his usual shorts and Hawaiian shirt, while Wendy is wearing jeans and a windbreaker. Terrence has on his FFW racing firesuit, black with pink stripes.
Wendy: “Hey everyone! As you can see, I’m already here at Byte This, and we’ve got quite the party going! We’re still a couple hours from the start of the show, but man, you can see that people are already turning out in droves for this. It’s actually kind of a carnival atmosphere here, and I think that there’s something here for everyone. We’ve got great food, some really fun auctions for charity. I saw a couple of game booths, and of course, a chance to meet all of your favorite FFW Stars... Including myself!”
Wendy grins.
Wendy: “So if you’re in the New York area, come on down! There’s plenty of things for you to do before the show begins at four. And of course, we’ll be kicking things off proper at four o’clock with our fourth Byte This internet pay-per-view, which features four incredible matches! Of course, all this is going to benefit the Red Cross, so whether you come on down and donate blood and watch some wrestling, or simply tune in on your computer, everything’s going towards a great cause!”
Terrence takes a step forward, standing next to his wife, the pink linings of his racing suit glinting in the sun.
Terrence: “That’s right, hon. You see, between the terrorist attack in Boston, and the horrible tragedy in Texas, last week served as a very harsh reminder that disaster can strike at any time, anywhere in the world today. The Red Cross is here to provide relief for victims of disasters and tragedies. On average, the American Red Cross responds to about seventy THOUSAND disasters per YEAR. That ranges from individual house fires to wide-ranging catastrophes like Hurricane Sandy. They help people survive and get back on their feet in the wake of such tragedies. The proceeds that Byte This produces today will go towards helping the Red Cross be prepared for the NEXT disaster.”
Now Pollaski steps forward.
Pollaski: “And preparedness is a key factor. I never let a client get into that ring without having a solid gameplan in mind. But matches are scheduled, you KNOW when they’re going to happen. That’s not the case for most disasters. Earthquakes and tornadoes can strike without any warning whatsoever. In situations like that, the difference between life and death can come down to minutes. That’s why being as ready as possible is so important. Donating blood after the fact won’t save lives. That’s why it’s so important that your local communties blood reserves are well stocked TODAY, and ready to be put to use for the next emergency.”
Wendy: “Every two seconds, someone in America needs blood. That’s forty-four thousand donations needed every day, and over thirty MILLION in a year. Sadly, though, only thirty-eight percent of the U.S. population is even eligible to donate blood. Which means we need those who ARE able to be as generous as possible, especially if you have type O-negative blood, which can be universally used. Terry here has O-negative, and he gave today!”
Terrence grins, and gingerly taps his arm.
Terrence: “Did you know that if someone donated on their seventeenth birthday, and donated once every eight weeks until they were seventy-six... they’d have donated over forty-eight gallons of blood? That’s enough to have potentially saved a THOUSAND lives! And donating blood is a safe process. All donors are given a brief physical, to ensure that it’s safe for them to be a donor, and the entire process is done in a clean and sterile environment, to ensure the safety of both the donors and the recipients.”
Pollaski: “And blood is used for a lot more than you might think. Sure, it’s used to keep people who have lost too much blood in disasters alive, but it’s also used for transfusions in cancer patients going through chemotherapy, and victims of sickle-cell disease. They also-
“ARE SUPER HELLA TASTY!!!!!”
Pollaski’s voice is promptly cut off as a girl comes walking into the picture. She’s hardly the most attractive woman in the world, a little scrawny, with her hair a greasy dirty-blonde tangle. Despite the weather only being in the upper fifties, she’s dressed in a bikini top and a pair of short booty shorts. She’s also covered head to toe in glitter. Like... she just took a bath in it. The woman is holding a pouch of donated blood, complete with the Red Cross logo. As Terrence and Wendy watch in horror and disgust (Pollaski is oddly unaffected by all this), she takes a big unladylike swig, the blood sploshing onto her face, running down her cheeks.
Girl: “WHOOOOO! SPRING BREAK BLOOD KEGGER!”
There’s a long pause, with Terrence and Wendy both staring at the girl with slack-jawed expressions. Finally, Wendy finds her voice, albeit weakly.
Wendy: “That’s... Kool-Aid.... right?”
Terrence: “You’re a VAMPIRE!!”
Terrence snaps his fingers, pointing at her, his voice thick with jovial recognition. He always was quick on the uptake, that one. This proclamation is quickly followed by a smacking sound, as Wendy’s palm collides with her own face.
Wendy: “Oh, my god...”
Vampire Girl: “That’s right. And a member of the finest wrestling family in the world today, so you better show me the respect I deserve!”
Terrence scratches his chin, suddenly confused.
Terrence: “You’re a Mackenzie?”
Vampire Girl: “NO, YOU IDIOT! I’m a fucking BELMONT! I’m Pollaski’s newest client, Naughta!”
Pollaski: [very quietly] “You, uh... weren’t supposed to mention that part.”
Wendy’s disbelieving, horrified gaze has turned into a furious glare directed at her manager. Pollaski does his best to pretend not to notice, but he’s clearly unnerved by Wendy’s dagger-eyes.
Wendy: “Naughta... Belmont?”
It hits her. Another facepalm.
Wendy: “Oh... my... God...”
Terrence doesn’t seem to be any more impressed about this either.
Terrence: “So we’re stealing jokes from Geico, now?”
Pollaski: “FUCK GEICO! I HAD THIS PLANNED OUT WELL BEFORE THAT FUCKING COMMERCIAL AIRED!”
True story. Although there’s a slight pause after Pollaski’s outburst.
Pollaski: “What I meant to say is that I have absolutely no idea what you’re talking about. Kelly McGuffin does bad jokes. Maybe this is HER doing... you ever think of that?
The expression on Wendy’s face clearly indicates that she’s not buying this in the least. Or that she wants any part of it. That second emotion only increases when Naughta reaches into her shorts, and for all appearances starts fingering herself. Terrence’s eyes bulge, and Wendy angrily opens her mouth to object- only for Naughta to somehow pull another pouch of blood from her shorts. She opens it, and starts taking another drink.
Naughta: “Wow, this shit’s awesome. Is this really blood?”
Wendy facepalms for the third time. Two more and we have a record. Terrence covers his mouth, knowing full well his wife will kill him if he so much as smiles. Pollaski simply nods, although he’s starting to look like he may have bitten off more than he could chew with Naughta.
Pollaski: “Um... yes. Yes it is.”
Wendy: “Okay! Daniel, why don’t you show your new... ‘client’ around the place, and introduce her to the other girls? Or... just away from here. I’ll take care of the rest of things here.”
Pollaski opens his mouth to protest, but one glance at Wendy tells him that is a very VERY bad idea.
Pollaski: “Yeah. Come on, Naughta. Let’s go...”
Naughta: “I’m still going to get paid for this, right?”
Pollaski: [sigh] “Just keep walking...”
Wendy watches them as they exit, and sighs, taking a deep breath and turning back to the camera.
Wendy: “I can’t believe he seriously did all that just to make a stupid Belmont joke...”
Terrence: “Well, to be fair, it’d been like seven months. He was probably going through withdrawal.”
Hardly seems like an acceptable reason for Wendy, but for the sake of professionalism, she’s willing to let this go.
Wendy: “Okay, well, anyways. Like I was saying, I hope that as many as possible can make it down here for some fun and supporting a good cause. I know I’m looking forward to my match tonight, when I make my in-ring debut after a five and a half month wait, against Trinity. Now I...
Wendy’s interrupted again, as her husband clears his throat. Wendy glances over at him.
Terrence: “Y’know, I was just thinking. If Trinity’s really a nun, she could help out with this blood drive today. All she needs to do is get some communion wine, and do some transubstantiation, and then voila...
Terrence’s voice trails up when he realizes that Wendy’s glaring at him.
Terrence: “...Or does that put too much of the ‘Ewwww’ in the Eucharist?
And the glare goes straight from daggers to death-star calibur laser beams.
Terrence: “I’m... um... gonna go help Pollaski with Naughta...”
Wendy: “You do that.”
Terrence hastily exits after Pollaski and Naughta. Wendy pauses for a second, taking a deep breath, gathering her thoughts, before turning back to face the camera.
Wendy: “ANYWAYS... I don’t think I need to tell everyone that I’m pretty anxious about tonight. I mean, its been over five months since that ill-fated match I had in Glendale. I’ve been training hard ever since I got cleared to come back over a month ago, and I’m confident that I’m more than ready to step in that ring tonight. But still... you go so long, you have to pray that you haven’t missed a step or that you’ve shaken all the rust off. Especially when you hit the ground running, going up against such a challenging individual.”
“I know a ton of people are looking forward to this match, and I’m sure that you’re one of them, Trinity. After all, this whole Catholic Collision thing. New Doctrine versus Old Doctrine. The stuffy old conservative Irish-Catholic against the new liberal...”
Wendy bursts out laughing, shaking her head.
“I can’t even say it. You think you’re some sort of liberal progressive, Trinity? You think what you’re doing is anything new? No. It’s not. Catholicism has an unfortunately VERY long history of people like you. People who think the rules shouldn’t apply to them.”
“You probably know the histories, even at the highest ranks of the Church. Pope John the Twelfth turned the Vatican into his own personal whorehouse. Alexander the Sixth took nepotism to a level beyond anything Kat Stryfe could even begin to envision. Leo the Tenth was so bad, the church splintered in two and plunged Europe into centuries of bloody war. Even now, we hear the reports of corruption in the Vatican, and of the enormous task our new Pope Francis has in rooting it all out.”
“Our church has a lot of problems, Trinity. Luckily, you’re not one of them.”
Wendy folds her arms, biting her lip.
“You’re not a problem, Trinity, because when it comes to this church, you’re irrelevant. You can dress up in your Halloween costume all you want and scream ‘lookee me, I’m a nun!’, and it won’t matter worth a darn because your little fringe-cult means nothing. You’re little more than the mistress of a Catholic-themed brothel, and the only reason anyone’s even HEARD of you is because you’re a talented enough wrestler to get signed with the greatest women’s promotion on the planet.”
“It doesn’t matter how many matches you win, and it certainly doesn’t matter how creatively you manage to warp Scripture to suit your own needs, that’s not going to change. Maybe that’s a bit of a frustration for you, because you’ve apparently so wrapped your identity in this charade, there is nothing else to you. I’m Catholic, yes, but there is FAR more to me than which church I go to on Sundays. You’re the slutty fake-nun who wrestles, nothing more.”
Wendy looks down at her hands, scratching her knuckles before glancing back up at the camera.
“Luckily for you, Trinity, this is going to be a wrestling match, and I learned long ago that God has other things to worry about than who win’s a sporting contest. Even better for you, you’re FAR more relevant in the Halls of Femme Fatale Wrestling than you will EVER be in the Vatican. You haven’t had all that many matches, but you’ve been flat out devastating when you have wrestled, even if all your tactics are a bit dodgy.”
“Forget all this battle of the Catholics nonsense... THIS is why I need to win tonight, Trinity. Because I don’t like losing.”
Wendy pauses for a second, then laughs, shaking her head as she realizes the utter ridiculousness of what she just said.
“Master of the obvious right there, eh? I don’t think any of us likes to lose a match, considering the how much it hurts, both physically and in the pride, but... when I drop a match, especially one I know I could have won, it BOTHERS me. I want it back. I want to face them again, and I want to beat them this time around. And you can look at Kitty Stryfe and Crystal HIlton as evidence of what happens the second time around. I don’t like to think of myself as a vindictive person, but when I want a revenge win, I seem to get it.”
“There’s only two women in the company right now that hold unanswered victories over me in singles competition- Valerie Lamb and Serafina Reynolds. Valerie Lamb... I know that rematch is going to happen sooner or later naturally. We’re going for the same title, and we’re both valid contenders for it. Our paths will cross sooner or later, maybe even as early as Unstoppable... with the title on the line.”
Wendy smiles slightly, apparently amused by her own wishful thinking.
“But Serafina... when I passed on my rematch clause to go after the greatest prize in women’s wrestling, I passed on any guarantee I had of another match with her. My own choice, I know. And one I don’t regret... but that night in September still burns brightly in my mind. One careless foot placement, a sweep of the leg, and it was over just like that.”
Wendy snaps her fingers, and grimaces, although it slowly turns into a smile.
“If I can’t beat Serafina directly, the next best thing I can do is to beat her nemesis. You’ve beaten her three times, now, although of course that’d have been zero if you hadn’t resorted to underhanded tactics, such as using a holy symbol you’re supposed to be venerating as a weapon, or having that fat phony figurehead you call the Cardinal attack her boyfriend. I know, I know... one of those was no holds barred, so you were fully within your legal... spare me, please. Even in an ‘anything goes’ match, there’s some lines you don’t cross. But you did, because you wouldn’t have stood a chance against Serafina otherwise.”
“But I’m going to do what Serafina couldn’t. I’m going to beat you. I’m going to leave ZERO doubt in that ring, when the end of the night comes, and there isn’t a trick you can come up with that’s going to prevent it. I almost hope you do try one of your underhanded tactics on me. I would love nothing more than to make it blow up completely in your face. It’d be a nice message to send to the Power Trip, and whoever’s making the decision on who I’m going to face at Relentless. I swore that I was going to take the Power Trip to task for what they’ve done, and I don’t see how you’re any different from them, save for the fact that you couldn’t make it past the audition stage.”
Wendy’s no longer smiling, just glaring intently into the camera.
“I’ve had my fill of cowards and cheaters who hide behind warped semantics in some pathetic, desperate attempt to justify themselves. I’ve had my fill watching the best women this company has to offer getting blindsided time and again and screwed out of match after match. I’ve had my fill of screwjobs, and mockeries, and all around pathetic behavior that no decent person would ever partake in.”
“In short, Trinity, I’ve had my fill of people like you, and I’m just getting started. So tonight, Trinity, you’re going to become more than just that “Slutty Fake-Nun who wrestles”. You’re going to become more relevant both inside this ring and out than you could ever possibly want.”
“You’re going to become an example.”
Wendy steps back, looking grimly at the camera, as it starts to fade out, only for it to snap back on with the sound of loud voices and screams.
Voice: “STOP HER!”
Wendy’s stern visage cracks as she looks to her side, her eyes widening as Naughta comes running back into the picture, her arms now full of blood pouches. She’s giggling maniacally, grinning back at her pursuers.
Naughta: “WHEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE! DRINK *ALL* THE BLOOD!”
And just like that, the glittery fake Belmont is off again, chased by a bunch of white-coated Red Cross workers. Wendy only watches in silent horror, as Terrence and Pollaski come running up. They stop, and Pollaski doubles over, panting, nearly falling to the ground when an irate Terrence shoves them.
Terrence: “YOU FUCKING IDIOT! You used CHERRYADE for FAKE BLOOD? Have you learned NOTHING from Belladonna?”
Pollaski’s still trying to catch is breath, and he sounds on the verge of tears as he looks at Terrence helplessly.
Pollaski: “I... think she’s... on crack... dude. Anyways... that’s real blood she’s got now, so...”
Wendy’s eyes bulge as she sees something off camera, and she begins to point helplessly, in the general direction of the off-camera FFW Racing booth.
Wendy: “Uh... Terrence? Naughta’s... um...”
Terrence looks up, following his wife’s point, and his eyes go wide too.
Terrence: “HEY! GET AWAY FROM MY RACE CAR YOU CRAZY BITCH! I HAVE TO RUN AT SALEM NEXT SUNDAY! Wai... WHAT ARE YOU DOING? NO! DON’T YOU DARE DUMP THAT INTO MY GAS TA-AUUUUUUUUUUUUGH!”
Terrence’s scream echoes throughout the Park, causing anyone who wasn’t looking at the Birdz before to be staring at them now. Pollaski cringes in sympathy, while Wendy’s turned beet red, shaking her head in dismay. Terrence stops his shriek, turning towards Pollaski, his face thunderous.
Terrence: “YOU! THIS IS *YOUR* FAULT!”
Pollaski gulps.
Pollaski: “Meep?”
Terrence: “AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!”
And with that rage filled shriek, Terrence leaps at Pollaski, tackling him and both men go tumbling to the ground. Pollaski immediately begins howling for mercy, although judging by the heavy blows being struck, Terrence’s mercy pretty much went down the drain seconds ago. Wendy stares at the fight for a couple of seconds.
Wendy: “[sigh] I’m going to go check on Theresa.”
And so she leaves her manager and husband behind, and the last thing we see as we fade out is Terrence continuing to attempt to ground and pound the unfortunate Pollaski into hamburger.
Sunday, April 28, 2013
EPISODE 208: The Beautiful People, Part III
Monday March 25, 2013
Aphrodite & Adonis
Indianapolis, Indiana
2:19 PM Local Time
“You call that a run? Faster, dammit!”
Wendy bit her lip at the bellowing of her manager in her ear. She was glad enough that the two were back on speaking terms- Pollaski’s strike had lasted about as long as it had taken Terrence to turn the garden hose on, and for Wendy to finish profusely apologizing to every parent in the neighborhood who had a sopping wet child come home on a fifty degree day. But still, ever since she had joined Aphrodite & Apollo, Pollaski had shown a significant amount of biterness towards her.
“I’m running as fast as I can.” Wendy hissed under her breath.
“LIARFACE! FACE OF A LI-”
“How would you know?! You’re not even here!” Wendy snarled, her eyes narrowing at the tablet she had set on the console of the treadmill. Pollaski was on the screen, sitting in his apartment, a XBox controller in one hand and a bag of Tim’s Cascade Potato Chips in the other. Even with Wendy paying nine hundred dollars a month to belong to the health club, Pollaski was banned from the premises due to his uncomely nature, and was talking to her via a bluetooth headset. It certainly made her workout sessions... interesting, to say the least.
“Alright,” Pollaski asked, popping a chip into his mouth. “How fast are you running?”
Wendy looked at the treadmill display, then back at the tablet, biting her lip. She looked back to the tablet.
“How fast?” Pollaski had sensed her hesitation.
“Five.”
“FIVE? For the love of all things holy, I can run five miles per hour!” Pollaski groaned, slapping his face. “Well, not for very long,” he admitted, seeing the skepticism on Wendy’s face. “But still.. you should be going well above that.”
“I know,” Wendy hissed, glancing around nervously. “But we’re not allowed to run any faster! Muffy says that working too hard is distracting, and that beautiful people shouldn’t need to run any faster than that!”
“Well, you’re not a beautiful person. You’re a wrestler.”
Wendy’s eyebrows raised, but Pollaski waved her silent. “And don’t give me that look. You know what I meant. You’re gonna have a few weeks, but that debut match is going to be here before you know it, Wendy. And you have a LOT of rust you need to scrape out.”
“I know that!” Wendy said through clenched teeth. The only thing she hated worse than arguing with Daniel Pollaski was arguing with Daniel Pollaski when he was right. “Maybe I’ll go for a run in the park later today...”
“Or maybe you can turn the damn speed up right the fuck now.” Pollaski said. “Or are you afraid?”
Wendy glared at the screen. Calling someone a chicken was a deathly insult in professional wrestling, and her manager knew that. Unlike some of her colleagues, Wendy wasn’t ashamed to admit that some aspects of the business scared her, but she wasn’t about to take this kind of abuse. “Why the heck would I be afraid of anything? Rules are rules, and I agreed to them.” Even if she hadn’t exactly read the contract that thoroughly before she signed it...
“Great,” Pollaski muttered with a sigh. “It’s already tougher for you than anyone else to win a damn match because you take half your options off the table over some precept of ‘honor’...”
Well, that’s a cynical way of looking at it, Wendy thought, scowling.
“...but now you’re not even going to be in peak condition because you don’t have the guts to tell Buffy to go fuck herself with a barbell...”
“It’s Muffy,” Wendy said, anger rising up inside her. “And I do NOT put myself at a disadvantage, I WILL be in peak condition when I get back in the ring, and I am NOT afraid!”
“Then prove it. Be a rebel. Turn up the speed, and see what happens.”
Wendy glanced around, swallowing hard. It was apparently a low-traffic time for the gym, most of the machines in her area sat idle. And of Muffy, or any of her watchdogs, she saw no sign. But still...
“Buck-AW!!!! Buckbuck-”
5.1
5.2
5.3
5.4
Wendy jammed her thumb into the speed up button over and over, envisioning in her mind’s eye that each time she was punching her manager in the face. When she was done, her thumb was quite sore, and she was working harder and breathing heavier, her face flushed both from exertion and anger.
“There, was that so hard?” Pollaksi said smugly. “How fast are you going now?”
“Seven.” Wendy huffed her arms swinging back and forth. She was probably running too fast for her to reasonably make a long term pace of it now, but she’d be darned if she was going to let Pollaski goad her. “I swear, if I get in trouble for this...”
“What’s she gonna do? Give you a speeding ticket?” Pollaski guffawed at his own joke, then grinned. “Oh, speaking of authority figures, I got a call with Cody in an hour to finish the details of your contract.”
“Great!” Wendy huffed, allowing herself a small smile. She was certainly happier that Mr. Kincaid was handling her negotiations instead of Ms. Star... or Ms. Saint for that matter. As philosophically opposed as she was to much of Samantha Star’s ideals, she at least respected the woman’s vision in creating the company. Amanda Saint was a different matter. Wendy couldn’t understand how someone with such limited knowledge of the sport get into such a high position of power. But of the three, she knew by far that Cody Kincaid would be the fairest to her- and the most eager to have her back on the Femme Fatale Wrestling roster.
“Anything in particular you want me to bring up?”
“Yeah,” Wendy took a couple of deep breaths, briefly resisting the temptation to turn the speed down a bit. “You saw what happened to Cara and Colleen, Dan. I’m no higher on Samantha’s Christmas Card list than they are. It’s almost a miracle that Cody’s even allowed to take me back... but I don’t want to come back just to get fired on some stupid pretext. She’ll run all of us out if we let her.”
“Funny how you’ll rebel against your BOSS, but not a woman you shell out a zillion bucks to for a shitty health club,” Pollaski said, his voice dripping with sarcasm. “Anyways, I already talked to him about it when I first made inquiries about you returning. The fact is, Cara and Colleen took things past the Event Horizon. Cara went and tried to embarrass the company during a live television special, and Colleen took a match that was clearly a setup. By the time Cody even knew what was going on in either case, it was too late.”
Wendy bit her lip, wincing as the bouncing of her running caused her teeth to dig in more than she had wanted. Pollaski was right- her friends had both played right into Samanatha’s hands. At least Scarlett and Valerie were still employed. And if Samantha ran any of them off, it’d only hurt her in the long run. Already SVW was better off for having Colleen exclusive to them. But, Cara...
She was going to miss her.
“So what about pay?” Pollaski’s voice broke into her thoughts.
“More than nine hundred a month,” Wendy said, smiling self-deprecatingly. She shrugged. “I doubt I’ll be able to command what I was getting before I got injured. Just... make it something fair and comparable with the rest of the locker room. You’ve never let me down there.”
“Aight. Shouldn’t be too hard. Cody and I haven’t broken out the hardball for any negotiations yet. And I bet he’s looking forward to announcing your return.”
Wendy shook her head, gripping the rails of the treadmill to steady herself. “Don’t. Not yet at least.”
“Don’t announce to the world you’re back? After chomping at the bit for the past four months to return?”
“I’m not letting Chaos Theory turn into a repeat of Sin & Sacrifice,” Wendy said, her eyes narrowing. Everytime she thought about it, the back of her head throbbed as if remembering where Emma hit her with that pipe. Just thinking about it made her angry again. “If those goons try ANYTHING, I’ll be there to stop them, and it’ll be far better if they don’t know it.”
“And what if you’re not needed?” Pollaski wasn’t quite convinced of his client’s mindset, but Wendy wasn’t fazed.
“Then they can announce it in an interview after the match, or on the next show.” Wendy said with a shrug. “But Dan, knowing who we’re dealing with... I have a very very bad feeling that even I’m not going to be enough.”
“Thinking someone’s gonna turncoat? God, I hope it’s Val. Wouldn’t THAT be ironic? You come back to kick the ass of the woman who injured you.”
Wendy didn’t share her manager’s appreciation. “I don’t hope it’s anyone. Or even know. I just... have that feeling. Maybe I’m wrong. Dealing with the Power Trip can turn you parano-AIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEE!” She found herself pitching forward- still running at seven miles an hour.
The treadmill belt, however, had stopped.
Wendy grabbed the top of the treadmill, hoping to cling to it like it was a top rope in a battle royal. It didn’t quite work that way, and her fingers slipped off, and she fell. She shrieked in pain as her back smashed into the front of the treadmill, and she rolled away with the momentum from her fall. To add insult to injury, her tablet came flying through the air. Wendy barely had enough time to lift her hands to cover her face before the computer smashed into it. She heard it clatter away on the floor, and uncovered her face, the lights above blurry from the tears in her eyes.
“Ow....” she whimpered. Her back was hurting- heck everything was hurting- but it wasn’t nearly in the agony it was after she had injured it. Well, there’s one silver lining to what had just happened... it proved her back was healed and strong again.
But what HAD just happened?
For an answer, Wendy turned her head, and wasn’t all that surprised to see a petite, yet curvaceous woman standing over her. Her perfectly styled blonde hair bobbed about her shoulders as she looked down at Wendy, a mixture of irritation and pity on her face. In her hands was the cord to her treadmill, the prongs of the plug shining in the light.
“I think you’ve had enough for one day, Mrs. Thompson,” Muffy said calmly dropping the plug of the treadmill so that it fell atop her chest. And with that, the woman turned on her heel, and briskly walked away.
Leaving one very irritated and flustered redhead to painfully pick herself off the floor.
====================
Saturday April 27, 2013
White River State Park- The Lawn
Indianapolis, Indiana
1:15 PM Local Time
Located a mile west of downtown, just across the street from Victory Field, is the Lawn at White River State Park. Normally a concert venue on a hot summer night, the Lawn today has been given over to somewhat of an FFW Pre-show party. The stage has been set up, and there’s a few vendor and food booths lining one side of a pathway running through the Lawn. Only a few of the attendees are there now, because most of the thousand or so people are paying attention to the stage, where Wendy Briese has just been announced. The expected hometown girl pop is dying down a bit, as Wendy stands with a microphone in her hand. It’s not the warmest here in Indy... just fifty degrees or so, so Wendy’s wearing a pair of jeans and a windbreaker. She waves to the crowd, grinning at the ovation she’s getting.
“Thank you! Thanks... no, seriously guys. Thank you so much for the warm welcome. FFW goes all over the country, and we get so many great fans, but I said it before, and I’ll say it again, there is NO crowd we ever encounter that’s as good as the one we get in Indianapolis.”
Obvious cheap hometown pop.
“So... who’s got their tickets for Breaking Point tonight?”
Another cheer, although not nearly as loud as the initial ovation. Perhap 85-90% of the crowd responded int he affirmative.
“Well, if you didn’t get it on time... I hate to say this... but we’ve been sold out for a while now, and that includes the tickets that were just released today. So... I suppose you could try Ticketmaster, or Stubhub, or just watch it from a restaurant downtown, I’m pretty sure the atmosphere’s going to be intense down there! Or, you could take these...”
Wendy holds up a pair of tickets to the event, the ticketless in the crowd immediately clamoring for them, expecting her to throw them. Wendy fans them out, holding them up, as she smiles sympathetically.
“We’re actually raffling these off at the Red Cross table over there. It’s... I think it’s five... is it? Yes... they’re saying it’s five dollars per ticket, and they’re giving away five pairs of lower level tickets for the winners. So buy one.. or a few tickets. The more you buy, the better chance you have of winning, and of course, all proceeds from the raffle are going to the Red Cross. So if you didn’t get a chance to donate for Byte This, well...”
Wendy has tucked the tickets back into her windbreaker, and is looking around the Lawn, grinning as she remembers the show just five days prior in New York, although there’s a bit of irritation there as she remembers the events surrounding her own match.
“You all saw that, I hope? Great show, great times...we had a lot of fun, and we raised quite a bit of money for the Red Cross. Now I’ve had a LOT of people asking me about what happened there, how I basically had Trinity dead to rights in that figure-four, and then the Cardinal conks me on the head, and suddenly the match is over, and I win by disqualification. Yeah, I am annoyed by that, a bit. But, its Trinity- that’s kind of par for the course for her, and I’m pretty certain that had the match been allowed to play out, Trinity would have lasted maybe another minute tops in that hold. She was pretty much done, I felt, and I didn’t sense any indication that she was remotely close to breaking out of it. So you know, tapout, disqualifcation, I suppose either way we saw what Trinity really is, and I win, so I can’t complain too much...”
Someone yells something out from the side of the stage, and Wendy looks over towards the voice, not quite sure of what was said. The voice yells again, and while the words can’t be heard exactly, it does sound to be a question of some sort. Wendy’s evidently heard it, as she smiles, and shrugs.
“Did it hurt? Yeah, it did a bit. Not as much as, say, Emma MacNamara’s lead pipe. But I certainly didn’t appreciate it, no. But the Cardinal got what he wanted, and Trinity didn’t tap, and I suppose she gets to walk around acting like getting disqualified is somehow an accomplishment, so... I’m sure they’re happy, for whatever reason. Other than that though, I had a lot of fun, and we raised over a half million dollars for the red cross, and I guess got quite a bit of blood donated too, so all in all I’d say Byte This is a success, and hopefully it won’t be fourteen months until the next one. And of course, since Amanda Saint will be out of FFW... hopefully once and for all.. by the end of Relentless, we should have a fifth one lined up fairly quickly. I dunno... maybe we can get them to hold it at the White River State Park?”
Another cheap hometown crowd pop, at the thought of a Byte This occuring right where they are standing. Wendy grins, but holds up her hands, as if saying, ‘hang on, guys’.
“Now, don’t get too excited, I’m not making any promises. But I’ll put the word into Cody’s ear, and maybe we can get something going. For now though, let’s just be happy that FFW has come to the Circle City today, and we’re in store for a HECK of a Breaking Point from the Banker’s Life Fieldhouse tonight. Because after one grueling match since coming back to FFW... Wendy Briese is making her triumphant homecoming tonight.”
Another hometown pop. Wendy grins.
“Thank God for Byte This though, otherwise instead of ‘Wendy Briese’s homecoming!’ everyone would be saying ‘WHY HASN’T SHE LEFT YET?!’”
Light laughter at the joke. Wendy cringes, realizing it’s fallen flat.
“So, tonight I’m going to be facing Katherine Stryfe, and let’s just say, I’ve been hoping for this one for a while.”
“Kat said it on Twitter a few days ago, so most of you know by now that I’ve already beaten her in a match. Most of you don’t know the whole story about that... you see, it was a couple of years ago... I had actually just joined FFW, but I was still in another company that has now since gone defunct. Kat was there too, and once night, well, she just didn’t show up for her match. I was backstage, and I had just seen her in FFW a couple days before that, so I mentioned how disappointed I was that she wasn’t able to make it. Well, someone took that as me calling her out, so they booked me against her on the next show.”
Wendy’s voice has changed remarkably. She’s no longer in hometown fan-fave pep talk mode. She actually sounds somewhat angry.
“Kat never apologized, not to the ownership, and certainly not to the fans she had jilted. She never even bothered to explain why she hadn’t shown up. The next show, she simply walked down to the ring, and gave me one of the most lethargic efforts I had ever been up against, lost fairly quickly, and then just walked up the ramp, never to wrestle in that company again. Nothing like the Kat Stryfe I’d heard of, or seen elsewhere. It was, I’ll be honest, one of the worst matches I’d ever been in. That’s why you don’t see me standing here bragging about it. It was an embarassment, and I felt bad for the fans who had paid money hoping to see a great match.”
“But as I was walking up the ring after that match, I just started thinking. I thought back to my introductory show in FFW, when Kat cut a promo for her main event match in which she was high... or pretended to be high... I don’t know which, and I really don’t care, because the whole thing was a debacle. Then I remembered the next week, when she lashed out at Ms. Star for making her defend her title against Camilla, calling her stupid and gullible for not liking HER being irresponsible on camera. Then I thought about her jilting the fans in that other company... and her pathetic match with me. And that’s when I realized that Katherine Stryfe has one of the worst attitudes of any professional wrestler I’d ever seen in my life.”
The crowds actually quiet, with even a nervous tension in the air. Obviously, this wasn’t the direction they were expecting the White Knight to go. But Wendy’s pacing back and forth, not even noticing the lack of cheering, so intent is she on her words.
“And here we are, two years later, and Katherine has done absolutely nothing to change my opinion. And the worst thing is... Kat’s not going to deny this. She takes PRIDE in her rotten attitude. Like frequently being equivocated with a female dog is an ACCOMPLISHMENT or something. Well... she’s WRONG. DEAD wrong. Her accomplishments in the ring are numerous, yes, but in her mind... all this embittered garbage she spews doesn’t make her some sort of a tough person. It doesn’t make her a psychological master. All it’s gotten her is a two year blue-streak of griping and moaning and bitterness that’s alienated pretty much every single person in this company, and possibly this industry with her attitude. And at this point, I’m absolutely sick of it. And I doubt I’m the only one!”
Someone who’s either a huge Wendy fan or hates Kat Stryfe yells out “YEAH!”, which eases the tension the crowd was feeling from the angry redhead. Even Wendy pauses, rubbing her nose in an attempt to keep herself from laughing at the outburst. Finally, she regains enough composure to continue.
“Heck, I know for a fact I’m not the only one who’s sick of Kat Stryfe’s sniffing and moaning and whining about anything that happens in this company that tilts the spotlight away from her. We saw it just this week. The announcers for Season Ten of Future Shock are announced, and Misty Whitmore gets the selection. And what do we see? Kat Stryfe throwing a tantrum over Twitter. Of course I wasn’t chosen! I’m more experienced and I have tag titles! I’m never applying again! WAH!”
Wendy scrunches up her face in a mock pout. This draws a little more laughter, but Wendy simply rolls her eyes in exasperation, and continues.
“My six year old daughter acts better to disappointment. Did it ever occur to Kat that no one in their right mind would EVER put her behind the microphone of one of our shows on a regular basis? For starters, most people would rather their Friday nights not be ruined by some bitter HAG raining misery down on them in between obsessively trying to remind us all how great she is...”
“Second of all, who would trust her? A person who’s put on that microphone is supposed PROMOTE this company, and could you trust Kat with THAT task? This is the woman who called a significant portion of our roster COWARDS because they wouldn’t take matches in another company. That they somehow would not do as well in the ring outside of Femme Fatale Wrestling. Just think about that logic for a second. I don’t even know where to begin... is there some magic circle in FFW that somehow makes exclusive wrestlers better than they actually are? If so, could someone tell me where it is, because I think its only fair that I get in on these ridiculous super powers!”
More laughter, and this time Wendy does grin at the rather ludicrous notion.
“I have wrestled in eleven other companies over the years, so I think at this point I’m a pretty good judge of talent, and I can tell you that the vast majority of women in Femme Fatale Wrestling would do BRILLIANTLY in any company they went to. But why would we WANT them to go elsewhere? THIS is our company, right here! This is our HOME! What do other companies offer that FFW can’t? The chance to wrestle men? Well, I’ve done that, many times over many years, and I can tell you it’s a different challenge, but not necessarily harder. Some of the toughest opponents I ever faced are women, most of them right here, and I’ll get honest, some of the guys out there... you ever been put in a headlock by a guy who didn’t put on deodorant?”
Some groaning from the fans, and Wendy makes a disgusted face, but she presses on.
“But as asinine and illogical as it is for Kat to say something like that, it’s even more insulting. To say that our best women would get the snot knocked out of them in another company says that FFW is second-rate. That we’re like some mid-major of professional wrestling, and Camilla Pazzini’s like Ball State. Oh, she does fine and dandy here in the MAC, but let’s put her in the Big Ten... “
Wendy swings her hand back and forth, as if she’s slapping around an invisible opponent in front of her.
“You ever watch MACtion? Do you think the announcers sit there in the booth, spending the entire game talking about how badly those teams would get their butts whooped by Wisconsin? Would we want someone doing the same thing here in FFW, on one of our television shows, even if it were true? And it’s NOT true. Oh dear god its not true, and you send anyone who says so to me, and I’ll set them straight. I’m not going to go around putting other companies down and saying we’re vastly superior, but I do know we’re not INFERIOR. I do know that this is one of the greatest wrestling companies this planet has ever seen, and I am PROUD to call myself a Femme Fatale, and if Kat Stryfe isn’t the same way, then why the HECK is she even here?”
“Say what you will about the Power Trip and their methods, and boy is there a lot to say... but at least they have SOME pride in this place. At least they’re not on Twitter bashing the company and its wrestlers in some sick twisted method of justifying their own failures. As much as I’m not a fan of a woman like Isabella Pazzini holding our top belt, I don’t want Katherine Stryfe representing this company in ANY aspect. Not as an announcer, and especially not as a champion. And I cannot WAIT until Relentless, when Eileen Amaro is going to kindly REMOVE that belt from Kat and give us an Evolution Champion that doesn’t throw heaps of embittered misery all over the place!.”
This draws a pop for Eileen. Wendy only waits a second before continuing, and the pop begins to die down.
“And it’s not about ability here. Katherine Stryfe is an AMAZING wrestler, and there’s no disputing that. She’s got, what, now? Six separate title reigns in FFW? You don’t get that by being a lousy wrestler. In fact, it’d be almost SCARY how good Katherine Stryfe would be if her attitude DIDN’T suck. But I suppose Kat thinks it makes her more credible if no one else in the company can stand her.”
“I mean, who would? Kat Stryfe is the first to cry, very loudly, and very shrilly, at the teensiest hint that someone might be disrespecting her, which happens early and often, don’t you know? Especially where her accomplishments are concerned. I don’t know if many of you know this, but she IS the only Grand Slam Champion in FFW history...”
“But nobody cares, because nobody respects her. At least that’s what she wants us all to believe. The truth is... she’s probably right. We SHOULD acknowledge more the amazing feat that she’s managed to pull off. The thing is, she’s got no one to blame but herself for it, because its the way she treats others that overshadows and tarnishes her accomplishments. She tries to shove her accolades down our throat again and again and again. The problem is... most people have gag reflexes, and for a reason. When something is shoved down our throat, the gag reflex kicks in, and the end result is generally not very pretty. That’s why instead of gleaming in the sunlight of her radience, most of her titles and trophies are covered with icky little piles of mush.”
For the second time in the promo, Wendy looks disgusted just thinking about it, and several more people in the audience groan at her analogy.
“She can claim she’s earned the right to brag all she wants, and perhaps she has, but she can’t stop for one second and think that maybe she’s being a bit counterproductive to herself. Because when it comes down to it, respect is a two way street here. To get some... you’re probably going to have to give some. And when has she given her opponent the slightest hint of respect? Just look back at the tapes of her previous interviews. Desirae Kain’s the champion of champions of Future Shock. I think most of us could respect that... but not Katherine Stryfe! Oh no, Desirae’s a joke who didn’t have to earn ANYTHING, and... oh look. Desirae Kain’s apparently one of us MANY FFW Wrestlers who couldn’t cut it anywhere else.”
Wendy rolls her eyes again.
“Jennifer Williams of course is stupid, and has led such an amazingly easy life... something I strongly doubt, considering all that we’ve seen what kind of man her brother is, and heard about what her family’s been through. But, of course, Kat Stryfe has to be the ONLY one who’s suffered any sort of real life hardship, because otherwise that would take the spotlight away from her. And I’m not making light of what Kat’s been through, I know she’s been through tough times, and she’s going through one right now. But that does NOT excuse the way she treats other people, nor does it give her a right to look down on ANYONE.”
“Then there’s Camilla Pazzini, who didn’t deserve to be in the Femme For All because she’d taken some time off after being injured in the Ultraviolence Championship. And of course she SAT on the Ultraviolence title, which is a huge disgrace. Funny thing about that... the longest lull between defenses Camilla had was from March Seventeenth to May Twenty-Sixth... which would be seventy days for those of you keeping track. Kat’s is CURRENTLY sitting at seventy-six days... and we’re looking at another month until Relentless, so Kat might want to check her numbers the next time she ever accuses ANYONE of sitting on a title...”
“I don’t even care what she says about me, because when it comes to having opinions, Kat’s credibility is pretty much shot. I know she said that I should have been FFW Champion by this point... and that actually offends the heck out of me. I KNOW she doesn’t respect me... her attitude the first time we met suggests that. The only reason she said something like that was to try and make her own opinions seem not so selfish. It’s a classic semantic trick... pretend someone else is the victim so that you don’t look like its all about you. Well, no one believed it then, and no one believes it now, especially since Kat accused me yesterday of trying to win favors with Mr. Kincaid, when I offered to pay half his fine. Dont’ let whatever she says fool you, guys. her actions have proven that Kat respects me no more than she respects Desirae, Camilla, or Scarlett...”
“SPEAKING of Scarlett, she’s of course the overrated hack who owes her entire career to being married to Cody Kincaid. Neverminding that she BEAT Kat Stryfe... everything she’s ever accomplished in this company’s tainted because of who’s she’s married to... right. Now listen. I’m not happy with what Scarlett did at Chaos Theory, and I’m certainly not thrilled with her explanation, nor her attitude about this whole thing... but if I had to listen to this IDIOT spreading lies about me unchecked for two years, I’d probably go a little bonkers too!”
A pop from the crowd, and Wendy smirks a bit mischieviously.
“Yes, I called Kat an idiot, mainly because I’d rather not say any of the OTHER things I’m thinking of here. That’s probably got her in a tizzy, because lord knows in her minds the ‘good girls’ are only supposed to talk about rainbows and lollipops and unicorns and how super spiffy it is to be facing the most decorated wrestler in FFW history... except EVERYONE has their point of tolerance, and I cleared mine with this woman about two years ago. I’ve just been waiting for the right time to let it all out, and golly gee, tonight sure seems to be it.”
Another pop, and Wendy’s smile disappears, as she paces back and forth on the stage.
“I can only hope that she views this match as more worth her time than she did our previous meeting. I don’t see why she won’t... she seems to be at least giving more of a dang INSIDE the ring, however the way she acts outside of it. But this is still a miserable wretch we’re looking at, and one that I’ve just about had my fill of. So it doesn’t matter if we get the Kat who won the FFW Championship, or the Kat who phoned it in against me two years ago... I’m going all out either way, just like I do every match. And I’m going to get that win, send the good people of Indianapolis home happy, and kickstart what I hope to become a run to the FFW Championship.”
“As far as Kat goes, maybe this will serve as a wake up call, but I doubt it. She’ll keep letting her own attitude tarnish her own legacy, while all the while blaming everyone around for her own doing. Maybe one day she’ll figure it out, and realize that she’s the one who needs to do the polishing.”
“I guarantee you that we’ll all be much better off for it. Thanks guys! I hope to see all of you tonight at the show!”
‘Elevation’ begins to play over the loudspeaker, and the crowd cheers. Wendy gives a few more waves, and then hands her microphone to a man that appears to be an emcee. As she walks to the back, the scene fades.
Aphrodite & Adonis
Indianapolis, Indiana
2:19 PM Local Time
“You call that a run? Faster, dammit!”
Wendy bit her lip at the bellowing of her manager in her ear. She was glad enough that the two were back on speaking terms- Pollaski’s strike had lasted about as long as it had taken Terrence to turn the garden hose on, and for Wendy to finish profusely apologizing to every parent in the neighborhood who had a sopping wet child come home on a fifty degree day. But still, ever since she had joined Aphrodite & Apollo, Pollaski had shown a significant amount of biterness towards her.
“I’m running as fast as I can.” Wendy hissed under her breath.
“LIARFACE! FACE OF A LI-”
“How would you know?! You’re not even here!” Wendy snarled, her eyes narrowing at the tablet she had set on the console of the treadmill. Pollaski was on the screen, sitting in his apartment, a XBox controller in one hand and a bag of Tim’s Cascade Potato Chips in the other. Even with Wendy paying nine hundred dollars a month to belong to the health club, Pollaski was banned from the premises due to his uncomely nature, and was talking to her via a bluetooth headset. It certainly made her workout sessions... interesting, to say the least.
“Alright,” Pollaski asked, popping a chip into his mouth. “How fast are you running?”
Wendy looked at the treadmill display, then back at the tablet, biting her lip. She looked back to the tablet.
“How fast?” Pollaski had sensed her hesitation.
“Five.”
“FIVE? For the love of all things holy, I can run five miles per hour!” Pollaski groaned, slapping his face. “Well, not for very long,” he admitted, seeing the skepticism on Wendy’s face. “But still.. you should be going well above that.”
“I know,” Wendy hissed, glancing around nervously. “But we’re not allowed to run any faster! Muffy says that working too hard is distracting, and that beautiful people shouldn’t need to run any faster than that!”
“Well, you’re not a beautiful person. You’re a wrestler.”
Wendy’s eyebrows raised, but Pollaski waved her silent. “And don’t give me that look. You know what I meant. You’re gonna have a few weeks, but that debut match is going to be here before you know it, Wendy. And you have a LOT of rust you need to scrape out.”
“I know that!” Wendy said through clenched teeth. The only thing she hated worse than arguing with Daniel Pollaski was arguing with Daniel Pollaski when he was right. “Maybe I’ll go for a run in the park later today...”
“Or maybe you can turn the damn speed up right the fuck now.” Pollaski said. “Or are you afraid?”
Wendy glared at the screen. Calling someone a chicken was a deathly insult in professional wrestling, and her manager knew that. Unlike some of her colleagues, Wendy wasn’t ashamed to admit that some aspects of the business scared her, but she wasn’t about to take this kind of abuse. “Why the heck would I be afraid of anything? Rules are rules, and I agreed to them.” Even if she hadn’t exactly read the contract that thoroughly before she signed it...
“Great,” Pollaski muttered with a sigh. “It’s already tougher for you than anyone else to win a damn match because you take half your options off the table over some precept of ‘honor’...”
Well, that’s a cynical way of looking at it, Wendy thought, scowling.
“...but now you’re not even going to be in peak condition because you don’t have the guts to tell Buffy to go fuck herself with a barbell...”
“It’s Muffy,” Wendy said, anger rising up inside her. “And I do NOT put myself at a disadvantage, I WILL be in peak condition when I get back in the ring, and I am NOT afraid!”
“Then prove it. Be a rebel. Turn up the speed, and see what happens.”
Wendy glanced around, swallowing hard. It was apparently a low-traffic time for the gym, most of the machines in her area sat idle. And of Muffy, or any of her watchdogs, she saw no sign. But still...
“Buck-AW!!!! Buckbuck-”
5.1
5.2
5.3
5.4
Wendy jammed her thumb into the speed up button over and over, envisioning in her mind’s eye that each time she was punching her manager in the face. When she was done, her thumb was quite sore, and she was working harder and breathing heavier, her face flushed both from exertion and anger.
“There, was that so hard?” Pollaksi said smugly. “How fast are you going now?”
“Seven.” Wendy huffed her arms swinging back and forth. She was probably running too fast for her to reasonably make a long term pace of it now, but she’d be darned if she was going to let Pollaski goad her. “I swear, if I get in trouble for this...”
“What’s she gonna do? Give you a speeding ticket?” Pollaski guffawed at his own joke, then grinned. “Oh, speaking of authority figures, I got a call with Cody in an hour to finish the details of your contract.”
“Great!” Wendy huffed, allowing herself a small smile. She was certainly happier that Mr. Kincaid was handling her negotiations instead of Ms. Star... or Ms. Saint for that matter. As philosophically opposed as she was to much of Samantha Star’s ideals, she at least respected the woman’s vision in creating the company. Amanda Saint was a different matter. Wendy couldn’t understand how someone with such limited knowledge of the sport get into such a high position of power. But of the three, she knew by far that Cody Kincaid would be the fairest to her- and the most eager to have her back on the Femme Fatale Wrestling roster.
“Anything in particular you want me to bring up?”
“Yeah,” Wendy took a couple of deep breaths, briefly resisting the temptation to turn the speed down a bit. “You saw what happened to Cara and Colleen, Dan. I’m no higher on Samantha’s Christmas Card list than they are. It’s almost a miracle that Cody’s even allowed to take me back... but I don’t want to come back just to get fired on some stupid pretext. She’ll run all of us out if we let her.”
“Funny how you’ll rebel against your BOSS, but not a woman you shell out a zillion bucks to for a shitty health club,” Pollaski said, his voice dripping with sarcasm. “Anyways, I already talked to him about it when I first made inquiries about you returning. The fact is, Cara and Colleen took things past the Event Horizon. Cara went and tried to embarrass the company during a live television special, and Colleen took a match that was clearly a setup. By the time Cody even knew what was going on in either case, it was too late.”
Wendy bit her lip, wincing as the bouncing of her running caused her teeth to dig in more than she had wanted. Pollaski was right- her friends had both played right into Samanatha’s hands. At least Scarlett and Valerie were still employed. And if Samantha ran any of them off, it’d only hurt her in the long run. Already SVW was better off for having Colleen exclusive to them. But, Cara...
She was going to miss her.
“So what about pay?” Pollaski’s voice broke into her thoughts.
“More than nine hundred a month,” Wendy said, smiling self-deprecatingly. She shrugged. “I doubt I’ll be able to command what I was getting before I got injured. Just... make it something fair and comparable with the rest of the locker room. You’ve never let me down there.”
“Aight. Shouldn’t be too hard. Cody and I haven’t broken out the hardball for any negotiations yet. And I bet he’s looking forward to announcing your return.”
Wendy shook her head, gripping the rails of the treadmill to steady herself. “Don’t. Not yet at least.”
“Don’t announce to the world you’re back? After chomping at the bit for the past four months to return?”
“I’m not letting Chaos Theory turn into a repeat of Sin & Sacrifice,” Wendy said, her eyes narrowing. Everytime she thought about it, the back of her head throbbed as if remembering where Emma hit her with that pipe. Just thinking about it made her angry again. “If those goons try ANYTHING, I’ll be there to stop them, and it’ll be far better if they don’t know it.”
“And what if you’re not needed?” Pollaski wasn’t quite convinced of his client’s mindset, but Wendy wasn’t fazed.
“Then they can announce it in an interview after the match, or on the next show.” Wendy said with a shrug. “But Dan, knowing who we’re dealing with... I have a very very bad feeling that even I’m not going to be enough.”
“Thinking someone’s gonna turncoat? God, I hope it’s Val. Wouldn’t THAT be ironic? You come back to kick the ass of the woman who injured you.”
Wendy didn’t share her manager’s appreciation. “I don’t hope it’s anyone. Or even know. I just... have that feeling. Maybe I’m wrong. Dealing with the Power Trip can turn you parano-AIIIIIEEEEEEEEEEE!” She found herself pitching forward- still running at seven miles an hour.
The treadmill belt, however, had stopped.
Wendy grabbed the top of the treadmill, hoping to cling to it like it was a top rope in a battle royal. It didn’t quite work that way, and her fingers slipped off, and she fell. She shrieked in pain as her back smashed into the front of the treadmill, and she rolled away with the momentum from her fall. To add insult to injury, her tablet came flying through the air. Wendy barely had enough time to lift her hands to cover her face before the computer smashed into it. She heard it clatter away on the floor, and uncovered her face, the lights above blurry from the tears in her eyes.
“Ow....” she whimpered. Her back was hurting- heck everything was hurting- but it wasn’t nearly in the agony it was after she had injured it. Well, there’s one silver lining to what had just happened... it proved her back was healed and strong again.
But what HAD just happened?
For an answer, Wendy turned her head, and wasn’t all that surprised to see a petite, yet curvaceous woman standing over her. Her perfectly styled blonde hair bobbed about her shoulders as she looked down at Wendy, a mixture of irritation and pity on her face. In her hands was the cord to her treadmill, the prongs of the plug shining in the light.
“I think you’ve had enough for one day, Mrs. Thompson,” Muffy said calmly dropping the plug of the treadmill so that it fell atop her chest. And with that, the woman turned on her heel, and briskly walked away.
Leaving one very irritated and flustered redhead to painfully pick herself off the floor.
====================
Saturday April 27, 2013
White River State Park- The Lawn
Indianapolis, Indiana
1:15 PM Local Time
Located a mile west of downtown, just across the street from Victory Field, is the Lawn at White River State Park. Normally a concert venue on a hot summer night, the Lawn today has been given over to somewhat of an FFW Pre-show party. The stage has been set up, and there’s a few vendor and food booths lining one side of a pathway running through the Lawn. Only a few of the attendees are there now, because most of the thousand or so people are paying attention to the stage, where Wendy Briese has just been announced. The expected hometown girl pop is dying down a bit, as Wendy stands with a microphone in her hand. It’s not the warmest here in Indy... just fifty degrees or so, so Wendy’s wearing a pair of jeans and a windbreaker. She waves to the crowd, grinning at the ovation she’s getting.
“Thank you! Thanks... no, seriously guys. Thank you so much for the warm welcome. FFW goes all over the country, and we get so many great fans, but I said it before, and I’ll say it again, there is NO crowd we ever encounter that’s as good as the one we get in Indianapolis.”
Obvious cheap hometown pop.
“So... who’s got their tickets for Breaking Point tonight?”
Another cheer, although not nearly as loud as the initial ovation. Perhap 85-90% of the crowd responded int he affirmative.
“Well, if you didn’t get it on time... I hate to say this... but we’ve been sold out for a while now, and that includes the tickets that were just released today. So... I suppose you could try Ticketmaster, or Stubhub, or just watch it from a restaurant downtown, I’m pretty sure the atmosphere’s going to be intense down there! Or, you could take these...”
Wendy holds up a pair of tickets to the event, the ticketless in the crowd immediately clamoring for them, expecting her to throw them. Wendy fans them out, holding them up, as she smiles sympathetically.
“We’re actually raffling these off at the Red Cross table over there. It’s... I think it’s five... is it? Yes... they’re saying it’s five dollars per ticket, and they’re giving away five pairs of lower level tickets for the winners. So buy one.. or a few tickets. The more you buy, the better chance you have of winning, and of course, all proceeds from the raffle are going to the Red Cross. So if you didn’t get a chance to donate for Byte This, well...”
Wendy has tucked the tickets back into her windbreaker, and is looking around the Lawn, grinning as she remembers the show just five days prior in New York, although there’s a bit of irritation there as she remembers the events surrounding her own match.
“You all saw that, I hope? Great show, great times...we had a lot of fun, and we raised quite a bit of money for the Red Cross. Now I’ve had a LOT of people asking me about what happened there, how I basically had Trinity dead to rights in that figure-four, and then the Cardinal conks me on the head, and suddenly the match is over, and I win by disqualification. Yeah, I am annoyed by that, a bit. But, its Trinity- that’s kind of par for the course for her, and I’m pretty certain that had the match been allowed to play out, Trinity would have lasted maybe another minute tops in that hold. She was pretty much done, I felt, and I didn’t sense any indication that she was remotely close to breaking out of it. So you know, tapout, disqualifcation, I suppose either way we saw what Trinity really is, and I win, so I can’t complain too much...”
Someone yells something out from the side of the stage, and Wendy looks over towards the voice, not quite sure of what was said. The voice yells again, and while the words can’t be heard exactly, it does sound to be a question of some sort. Wendy’s evidently heard it, as she smiles, and shrugs.
“Did it hurt? Yeah, it did a bit. Not as much as, say, Emma MacNamara’s lead pipe. But I certainly didn’t appreciate it, no. But the Cardinal got what he wanted, and Trinity didn’t tap, and I suppose she gets to walk around acting like getting disqualified is somehow an accomplishment, so... I’m sure they’re happy, for whatever reason. Other than that though, I had a lot of fun, and we raised over a half million dollars for the red cross, and I guess got quite a bit of blood donated too, so all in all I’d say Byte This is a success, and hopefully it won’t be fourteen months until the next one. And of course, since Amanda Saint will be out of FFW... hopefully once and for all.. by the end of Relentless, we should have a fifth one lined up fairly quickly. I dunno... maybe we can get them to hold it at the White River State Park?”
Another cheap hometown crowd pop, at the thought of a Byte This occuring right where they are standing. Wendy grins, but holds up her hands, as if saying, ‘hang on, guys’.
“Now, don’t get too excited, I’m not making any promises. But I’ll put the word into Cody’s ear, and maybe we can get something going. For now though, let’s just be happy that FFW has come to the Circle City today, and we’re in store for a HECK of a Breaking Point from the Banker’s Life Fieldhouse tonight. Because after one grueling match since coming back to FFW... Wendy Briese is making her triumphant homecoming tonight.”
Another hometown pop. Wendy grins.
“Thank God for Byte This though, otherwise instead of ‘Wendy Briese’s homecoming!’ everyone would be saying ‘WHY HASN’T SHE LEFT YET?!’”
Light laughter at the joke. Wendy cringes, realizing it’s fallen flat.
“So, tonight I’m going to be facing Katherine Stryfe, and let’s just say, I’ve been hoping for this one for a while.”
“Kat said it on Twitter a few days ago, so most of you know by now that I’ve already beaten her in a match. Most of you don’t know the whole story about that... you see, it was a couple of years ago... I had actually just joined FFW, but I was still in another company that has now since gone defunct. Kat was there too, and once night, well, she just didn’t show up for her match. I was backstage, and I had just seen her in FFW a couple days before that, so I mentioned how disappointed I was that she wasn’t able to make it. Well, someone took that as me calling her out, so they booked me against her on the next show.”
Wendy’s voice has changed remarkably. She’s no longer in hometown fan-fave pep talk mode. She actually sounds somewhat angry.
“Kat never apologized, not to the ownership, and certainly not to the fans she had jilted. She never even bothered to explain why she hadn’t shown up. The next show, she simply walked down to the ring, and gave me one of the most lethargic efforts I had ever been up against, lost fairly quickly, and then just walked up the ramp, never to wrestle in that company again. Nothing like the Kat Stryfe I’d heard of, or seen elsewhere. It was, I’ll be honest, one of the worst matches I’d ever been in. That’s why you don’t see me standing here bragging about it. It was an embarassment, and I felt bad for the fans who had paid money hoping to see a great match.”
“But as I was walking up the ring after that match, I just started thinking. I thought back to my introductory show in FFW, when Kat cut a promo for her main event match in which she was high... or pretended to be high... I don’t know which, and I really don’t care, because the whole thing was a debacle. Then I remembered the next week, when she lashed out at Ms. Star for making her defend her title against Camilla, calling her stupid and gullible for not liking HER being irresponsible on camera. Then I thought about her jilting the fans in that other company... and her pathetic match with me. And that’s when I realized that Katherine Stryfe has one of the worst attitudes of any professional wrestler I’d ever seen in my life.”
The crowds actually quiet, with even a nervous tension in the air. Obviously, this wasn’t the direction they were expecting the White Knight to go. But Wendy’s pacing back and forth, not even noticing the lack of cheering, so intent is she on her words.
“And here we are, two years later, and Katherine has done absolutely nothing to change my opinion. And the worst thing is... Kat’s not going to deny this. She takes PRIDE in her rotten attitude. Like frequently being equivocated with a female dog is an ACCOMPLISHMENT or something. Well... she’s WRONG. DEAD wrong. Her accomplishments in the ring are numerous, yes, but in her mind... all this embittered garbage she spews doesn’t make her some sort of a tough person. It doesn’t make her a psychological master. All it’s gotten her is a two year blue-streak of griping and moaning and bitterness that’s alienated pretty much every single person in this company, and possibly this industry with her attitude. And at this point, I’m absolutely sick of it. And I doubt I’m the only one!”
Someone who’s either a huge Wendy fan or hates Kat Stryfe yells out “YEAH!”, which eases the tension the crowd was feeling from the angry redhead. Even Wendy pauses, rubbing her nose in an attempt to keep herself from laughing at the outburst. Finally, she regains enough composure to continue.
“Heck, I know for a fact I’m not the only one who’s sick of Kat Stryfe’s sniffing and moaning and whining about anything that happens in this company that tilts the spotlight away from her. We saw it just this week. The announcers for Season Ten of Future Shock are announced, and Misty Whitmore gets the selection. And what do we see? Kat Stryfe throwing a tantrum over Twitter. Of course I wasn’t chosen! I’m more experienced and I have tag titles! I’m never applying again! WAH!”
Wendy scrunches up her face in a mock pout. This draws a little more laughter, but Wendy simply rolls her eyes in exasperation, and continues.
“My six year old daughter acts better to disappointment. Did it ever occur to Kat that no one in their right mind would EVER put her behind the microphone of one of our shows on a regular basis? For starters, most people would rather their Friday nights not be ruined by some bitter HAG raining misery down on them in between obsessively trying to remind us all how great she is...”
“Second of all, who would trust her? A person who’s put on that microphone is supposed PROMOTE this company, and could you trust Kat with THAT task? This is the woman who called a significant portion of our roster COWARDS because they wouldn’t take matches in another company. That they somehow would not do as well in the ring outside of Femme Fatale Wrestling. Just think about that logic for a second. I don’t even know where to begin... is there some magic circle in FFW that somehow makes exclusive wrestlers better than they actually are? If so, could someone tell me where it is, because I think its only fair that I get in on these ridiculous super powers!”
More laughter, and this time Wendy does grin at the rather ludicrous notion.
“I have wrestled in eleven other companies over the years, so I think at this point I’m a pretty good judge of talent, and I can tell you that the vast majority of women in Femme Fatale Wrestling would do BRILLIANTLY in any company they went to. But why would we WANT them to go elsewhere? THIS is our company, right here! This is our HOME! What do other companies offer that FFW can’t? The chance to wrestle men? Well, I’ve done that, many times over many years, and I can tell you it’s a different challenge, but not necessarily harder. Some of the toughest opponents I ever faced are women, most of them right here, and I’ll get honest, some of the guys out there... you ever been put in a headlock by a guy who didn’t put on deodorant?”
Some groaning from the fans, and Wendy makes a disgusted face, but she presses on.
“But as asinine and illogical as it is for Kat to say something like that, it’s even more insulting. To say that our best women would get the snot knocked out of them in another company says that FFW is second-rate. That we’re like some mid-major of professional wrestling, and Camilla Pazzini’s like Ball State. Oh, she does fine and dandy here in the MAC, but let’s put her in the Big Ten... “
Wendy swings her hand back and forth, as if she’s slapping around an invisible opponent in front of her.
“You ever watch MACtion? Do you think the announcers sit there in the booth, spending the entire game talking about how badly those teams would get their butts whooped by Wisconsin? Would we want someone doing the same thing here in FFW, on one of our television shows, even if it were true? And it’s NOT true. Oh dear god its not true, and you send anyone who says so to me, and I’ll set them straight. I’m not going to go around putting other companies down and saying we’re vastly superior, but I do know we’re not INFERIOR. I do know that this is one of the greatest wrestling companies this planet has ever seen, and I am PROUD to call myself a Femme Fatale, and if Kat Stryfe isn’t the same way, then why the HECK is she even here?”
“Say what you will about the Power Trip and their methods, and boy is there a lot to say... but at least they have SOME pride in this place. At least they’re not on Twitter bashing the company and its wrestlers in some sick twisted method of justifying their own failures. As much as I’m not a fan of a woman like Isabella Pazzini holding our top belt, I don’t want Katherine Stryfe representing this company in ANY aspect. Not as an announcer, and especially not as a champion. And I cannot WAIT until Relentless, when Eileen Amaro is going to kindly REMOVE that belt from Kat and give us an Evolution Champion that doesn’t throw heaps of embittered misery all over the place!.”
This draws a pop for Eileen. Wendy only waits a second before continuing, and the pop begins to die down.
“And it’s not about ability here. Katherine Stryfe is an AMAZING wrestler, and there’s no disputing that. She’s got, what, now? Six separate title reigns in FFW? You don’t get that by being a lousy wrestler. In fact, it’d be almost SCARY how good Katherine Stryfe would be if her attitude DIDN’T suck. But I suppose Kat thinks it makes her more credible if no one else in the company can stand her.”
“I mean, who would? Kat Stryfe is the first to cry, very loudly, and very shrilly, at the teensiest hint that someone might be disrespecting her, which happens early and often, don’t you know? Especially where her accomplishments are concerned. I don’t know if many of you know this, but she IS the only Grand Slam Champion in FFW history...”
“But nobody cares, because nobody respects her. At least that’s what she wants us all to believe. The truth is... she’s probably right. We SHOULD acknowledge more the amazing feat that she’s managed to pull off. The thing is, she’s got no one to blame but herself for it, because its the way she treats others that overshadows and tarnishes her accomplishments. She tries to shove her accolades down our throat again and again and again. The problem is... most people have gag reflexes, and for a reason. When something is shoved down our throat, the gag reflex kicks in, and the end result is generally not very pretty. That’s why instead of gleaming in the sunlight of her radience, most of her titles and trophies are covered with icky little piles of mush.”
For the second time in the promo, Wendy looks disgusted just thinking about it, and several more people in the audience groan at her analogy.
“She can claim she’s earned the right to brag all she wants, and perhaps she has, but she can’t stop for one second and think that maybe she’s being a bit counterproductive to herself. Because when it comes down to it, respect is a two way street here. To get some... you’re probably going to have to give some. And when has she given her opponent the slightest hint of respect? Just look back at the tapes of her previous interviews. Desirae Kain’s the champion of champions of Future Shock. I think most of us could respect that... but not Katherine Stryfe! Oh no, Desirae’s a joke who didn’t have to earn ANYTHING, and... oh look. Desirae Kain’s apparently one of us MANY FFW Wrestlers who couldn’t cut it anywhere else.”
Wendy rolls her eyes again.
“Jennifer Williams of course is stupid, and has led such an amazingly easy life... something I strongly doubt, considering all that we’ve seen what kind of man her brother is, and heard about what her family’s been through. But, of course, Kat Stryfe has to be the ONLY one who’s suffered any sort of real life hardship, because otherwise that would take the spotlight away from her. And I’m not making light of what Kat’s been through, I know she’s been through tough times, and she’s going through one right now. But that does NOT excuse the way she treats other people, nor does it give her a right to look down on ANYONE.”
“Then there’s Camilla Pazzini, who didn’t deserve to be in the Femme For All because she’d taken some time off after being injured in the Ultraviolence Championship. And of course she SAT on the Ultraviolence title, which is a huge disgrace. Funny thing about that... the longest lull between defenses Camilla had was from March Seventeenth to May Twenty-Sixth... which would be seventy days for those of you keeping track. Kat’s is CURRENTLY sitting at seventy-six days... and we’re looking at another month until Relentless, so Kat might want to check her numbers the next time she ever accuses ANYONE of sitting on a title...”
“I don’t even care what she says about me, because when it comes to having opinions, Kat’s credibility is pretty much shot. I know she said that I should have been FFW Champion by this point... and that actually offends the heck out of me. I KNOW she doesn’t respect me... her attitude the first time we met suggests that. The only reason she said something like that was to try and make her own opinions seem not so selfish. It’s a classic semantic trick... pretend someone else is the victim so that you don’t look like its all about you. Well, no one believed it then, and no one believes it now, especially since Kat accused me yesterday of trying to win favors with Mr. Kincaid, when I offered to pay half his fine. Dont’ let whatever she says fool you, guys. her actions have proven that Kat respects me no more than she respects Desirae, Camilla, or Scarlett...”
“SPEAKING of Scarlett, she’s of course the overrated hack who owes her entire career to being married to Cody Kincaid. Neverminding that she BEAT Kat Stryfe... everything she’s ever accomplished in this company’s tainted because of who’s she’s married to... right. Now listen. I’m not happy with what Scarlett did at Chaos Theory, and I’m certainly not thrilled with her explanation, nor her attitude about this whole thing... but if I had to listen to this IDIOT spreading lies about me unchecked for two years, I’d probably go a little bonkers too!”
A pop from the crowd, and Wendy smirks a bit mischieviously.
“Yes, I called Kat an idiot, mainly because I’d rather not say any of the OTHER things I’m thinking of here. That’s probably got her in a tizzy, because lord knows in her minds the ‘good girls’ are only supposed to talk about rainbows and lollipops and unicorns and how super spiffy it is to be facing the most decorated wrestler in FFW history... except EVERYONE has their point of tolerance, and I cleared mine with this woman about two years ago. I’ve just been waiting for the right time to let it all out, and golly gee, tonight sure seems to be it.”
Another pop, and Wendy’s smile disappears, as she paces back and forth on the stage.
“I can only hope that she views this match as more worth her time than she did our previous meeting. I don’t see why she won’t... she seems to be at least giving more of a dang INSIDE the ring, however the way she acts outside of it. But this is still a miserable wretch we’re looking at, and one that I’ve just about had my fill of. So it doesn’t matter if we get the Kat who won the FFW Championship, or the Kat who phoned it in against me two years ago... I’m going all out either way, just like I do every match. And I’m going to get that win, send the good people of Indianapolis home happy, and kickstart what I hope to become a run to the FFW Championship.”
“As far as Kat goes, maybe this will serve as a wake up call, but I doubt it. She’ll keep letting her own attitude tarnish her own legacy, while all the while blaming everyone around for her own doing. Maybe one day she’ll figure it out, and realize that she’s the one who needs to do the polishing.”
“I guarantee you that we’ll all be much better off for it. Thanks guys! I hope to see all of you tonight at the show!”
‘Elevation’ begins to play over the loudspeaker, and the crowd cheers. Wendy gives a few more waves, and then hands her microphone to a man that appears to be an emcee. As she walks to the back, the scene fades.
EPISODE 207: The Beautiful People, Part II
Wednesday March 13, 2011
Aphrodite & Apollo- Parking Lot
Indianapolis, Indiana
2:40 PM Local Time
“I tried to tell you.”
Wendy Briese looked away from the nearly unrecognizable facade of her old gym, towards her manager’s voice. Pollaski had just pulled into the parking lot minutes ago,and now sat in his car with the window down, looking up at the building as well.
Wendy glanced back at the gym, sighing deeply. “When?” she asked, trying to keep the weary disappointment out of her voice.
“First of the year,” Pollaski replied. “Old Bob just didn’t have the heart for it anymore, I guess. Last I heard, he’s living it up on South Padre Island. Eternal spring break, or some shit like that. I figured you knew.”
There was no accusatory tone in Pollaski’s voice, but nonetheless, Wendy felt a pang of shame. She SHOULD have known, and she didn’t know how she could have gone over three months without checking in. She did spend hours upon hours here back when she was an active competitor, after all. How could she have been so negligent?
Heck, for all she knew, maybe her disappearance had been the reason Bob closed up shop.
Before the rational aspect could argue with that incredibly self-centered sentiment, she was distracted by the sound of the car door slamming. Pollaski was on his feet, stretching idly as he looked back up at the Health Club. He looked over at Wendy, shrugging. “Well, shall we?”
“Shall we what?”
“Go inside,” Pollaski replied. “Near as I can tell, you need a new place to train at, and this is still the closest place. So let’s see what they have to offer.”
Wendy glanced back up at the sign, once again reading the words.
APHRODITE & APOLLO: A HEALTH CLUB FOR BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE
“Somehow, I have a feeling they’re not going to have a ring in there,” Wendy replied skeptically.
“Probably not,” Pollaski agreed. “But, and I’ll check my sources again, with Speed City gone, the nearest place with a ring to train in is way the frick out in Anderson. So unless you want to drive an hour each way every day to train...”
Wendy’s head snapped back at her manager, alarmed. No ring?! At all?! How on earth was she...
But Pollaski could already sense what was coming, and waved a dismissive hand. “I’ll call Crossroads Wrestling, and get them to lend us their ring,” he said, referring to a local regional company. “The owner owes me, and I know for a fact he’s a fan of yours.”
Wendy bit her upper lip, thinking. It wasn’t an ideal situation, especially compared to what she had been used to before her injury. But the situation had changed, and she was now facing the very real possibility that her workouts and her in-ring training would have to be in separate facilities. Either that, or add two hours of commute time...
Either way, it wouldn’t hurt to see what all her options were.
“Alright,” she said, sighing. “Let’s check out this ‘club for beautiful people’.
From the moment the two entered the doors, Wendy was stunned. Speed City wasn’t exactly primitive, but it certainly went for a more spartan appearance- a wide open area with cardio equipment lining the walls, with speed bags and heavy bags and a sparring mat in the center, with a ring dominating the entire setup. Aphrodite & Apollo was much more brightly lit, with partitions separating various groups of equipment, and mirrors covering nearly every surface they could. Even the front desk had changed, going from a simple wooden table with a sign in sheet, to a massive lit up glass cabinet stocked with health bars, protein drinks, and various other odds and ends.
How did they manage to renovate this and reopen, all in less than three months?
“Is that Lynn St. Carmichael from WISH?” Pollaski whispered, and Wendy looked up. Twenty feet away, speedwalking on a treadmill, was the blonde Channel 8 Weathergirl, wearing a sports bra and shorts so tight Wendy wondered how various parts of her were even getting bloodflow. The woman didn’t even notice the newcomers, as she was watching television on a crystal clear high definition television. Wendy realized each machine had its own television. Speed City had only one- an 27 inch box so old it had wooden cabinet paneling that was exclusively used for boxers or wrestlers to review match tapes.
Wendy swallowed hard, her mind racing. She had come through the doors, expecting to dislike- no- despise the place. But everything was just so new, and shiny, and state of the art and...
Beautiful.
She could sense Pollaski was looking at her, expectantly. She swallowed hard.
“I suppose taking a tour wouldn’t hurt,” she finally managed to say.
Pollaski snorted, and Wendy cringed inside. She hated it when she was that transparent... which seemed to pretty much be all the time.
“Sir! SIR!” came a female voice from across the way, and Wendy looked up to see another woman, this one barely in her twenties and brunette, but no less attractive than the weather girl still on the treadmill, came briskly walking towards them. “You can’t be in here, sir!”
Pollaski blinked, taken aback for once in his life. Wendy, despite her startled disbelief of the woman’s treatment of a prospective customer, smiled as friendly as she could muster.
“Oh, he’s with me. I’ve come to see about membership in this gym.”
The brunette looked her over, then glanced at Pollaski, cringing slightly, then looking back at Wendy. “Well, that may be ma’am, but he’s still going to have to leave. While you might be Aphrodite & Apollo material, HE definitely is NOT.”
Neither Wendy nor her manager said anything, simply staring at the brunette with their mouths open. The young woman continued on, undeterred. “You see ma’am, when people come to A&A, they expect the best, and we believe they deserve the best. And part of that means that our customers not have to be forced to look at... the more homely members of our society. When you come to Aphrodite & Apollo you see what you are- gorgeous brilliance.”
“So the people who are out of shape... the one’s who need to be working out the MOST.. aren’t allowed in a HEALTH CLUB? How does that make sense?” Pollaski scoffed.
The woman looked at Pollaski, cringing as if she couldn’t even stand the sight of him. “I’m sure there’s a 24/7 Fitness SOMEWHERE around here you could go to.” She said smugly.
“Yeah, you know what? Fuck this place,” Pollaski said, rolling his eyes. “Come on, Wendy, I’m sure we can find a better-”
“Hang on, Pollaski,” Wendy snapped, feeling the heat coming to her face. She turned back to her brunette. “What you have just said to my mana- my FRIEND here is completely unwarranted, unkind, and uncalled for, I would like to speak to your manager, please.”
The Brunette simply rolled her eyes. “I’m just doing what my manager told me to do, MA’AM. She replied, her worlds dripping with acidic sarcasm. “She doesn’t want THOSE kinds of people in here distracting people who are here to simply work out and enjoy beauty.”
“Then perhaps she and I need to have a little talk about the importance of things other than aesthetics,” Wendy replied hotly. “Such as maybe treating other people with respect!”
The Brunette sighed, looking up at the ceiling as if Wendy had just said the dumbest thing ever. “Okay, if you REALLY want to talk to her, I’ll go get her,” she said, acting as if Wendy had completely ruined her day with the request.
“Please do.” Wendy said, her smile very strained as the woman slowly sauntered away. It wasn’t often she gave someone this much of a piece of her mind, but if anyone deserved it, it was whatever callous woman set up a health club, and only let people in whom she deemed beautiful enough!
“Well, I’m gonna go wait outside,” Pollaski said, grinning at her. “Give them hell, Wendy.”
“Oh, you bet I will,” the redhead said through clenched teeth.
=================
Wednesday March 13, 2013
The Nest- Kitchen
Indianapolis, Indiana
4:16 PM Local Time
“I’m such a sucker!”
The words were muffled, considering that Wendy’s head was cradled in her arms, resting on the kitchen table. Wendy had felt more miserable plenty of times in her thirty-one year old life, but she couldn’t recall any of them that came through self-inflicted means.
At least not at the moment.
Her husband sat across from her, still in his coveralls from a day at the garage. He casually was browsing through a brochure, looking fairly unimpressed. “Supreme Platinum Executive Recurring Membership,” he read, shaking his head. “$900 a month for a health club.”
“I know, its ridiculous,” Wendy said, looking up from her arms. “It’s expensive, and ostentatious, and they’re not even that friendly.”
“Yeah, didn’t they throw your manager out for not being good looking enough?”
“Yeah, they did-”
“And you still signed up to give them over ten thousand dollars a year.”
Wendy nodded.
“Would this be why Pollaski is protesting on our driveway right now?”
Wendy’s head fell back onto the table with a soft thud. “Yes, Terrence. This is why Pollaski is picketing our driveway right now.” She paused, sighing. “I was going to complain about the way they treated him, but then one thing kind of led to another, and the next thing I knew, I’m scoring ninety four percent on some beauty recognition program and signing a contract,” she finished miserably.
“They were dangling the S.P.E.R.M. right out there, and you swallowed it.” Terrence commented, holding up the brochure again. Wendy looked up, disgust slowly turning into horror as she read the membership plan’s name again, and then her head went right back into the table. Terrence chuckled, and shook his head as he looked back down at the brochure. “It must have been a HELL of a sales pitch.”
“You should see the place, Terry,” Wendy said, looking back up. “Each individual workout station is climate controlled. They have individual steam rooms and exfoliating showers, and... my god, the equipment! They have Star-Trac treadmills! And Tour De France simulation exercise bikes! And...”
“How good’s the ring?”
Wendy paused in her excited rambling to stare guiltily at Terrence. “They, uh... don’t have a ring. Or sparring mats, or punching bags even. Muffy says they’re undignified.”
“Muffy.” Terrence blinked, nonplussed.
“She’s the owner,” Wendy replied, waving away Terrence’s stunned look. “And besides, this will just be for cardio conditioning. Pollaski says that he can get me usage of Crossroad’s ring for the sparring work.”
“Was that before or after you stabbed him in the back over a climate controlled exercise bike that can simulate the Tour De France?” Terrence asked.
“Before,” Wendy confessed.
“So just to let me sum it all up, you just bought a nine hundred dollar a month gym membership from a woman named Muffy that doesn’t even cover half of your training regime and completely pissed your manager and friend off.” Terrence said.
Wendy nodded grimly, and flashed a weak smile that was dripping with guilt. “Pretty stupid, I know.”
“Not one of your finer moments,” Terrence agreed. “So now what?”
“Well, I’m locked into A&A for six months,” the redhead said with a sigh, “so I might as well go. It’s the closest place to us anyways, and if Pollaski can get me enough ring time with Crossroads, I should be okay. But I guess the first thing to do is to get my manager to stop protesting outside my house,” she finished, standing up.
“Want me to get the garden hose?” Terrence asked, standing up as well.
“Terry, it’s fifty degrees out,” Wendy said as she began walking towards the front door.
“Yeah, so that’ll get him back to his nice, warm, dry apartment pretty damn quick.”
“I’m just going to talk to him,” Wendy said, rolling her eyes. She reached for the door, and swung it open... and froze.
Her daughter had joined the protest.
In fact, it seemed like half the neighborhood kids were outside her yard, carrying signs that said “UNFAIR” and “BACKSTABBER” as they marched back and forth. Around them, on the ground, lay a bunch of candy bar wrappers, no doubt the bribery Pollaski had used to get the kids to join the demonstration. Of all the children, though, only Theresa seemed to be approaching her task with any form or enthusiasm, yelling out something about embarrasing daughters during school.
Wendy sighed, rolling her eyes and calling out. “Theresa, please come inside, okay?”
In response, her daughter spun around, raising her fist in the air and screaming. “THE REVOLUTION WILL OUTLIVE ANY TYRANNY!” Her proclomation was rewarded with cheers.
Wendy’s jaw dropped. It wasn’t very often that Theresa flat out defied her, and she was certainly old enough to know that it wasn’t going to end well at all for her if she did. She opened her mouth, ready to give a much more stern order to get in the house, when she heard her husband turning around behind her.
“That’s it, I’m getting the hose,” he muttered, marching towards the side of the house.
Wendy froze, torn in between putting an end to this nonsense, or simply stopping it from getting any worse. With a sigh of resignation, she spun around, and ran after her husband.
“FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, TERRENCE, NO!”
Aphrodite & Apollo- Parking Lot
Indianapolis, Indiana
2:40 PM Local Time
“I tried to tell you.”
Wendy Briese looked away from the nearly unrecognizable facade of her old gym, towards her manager’s voice. Pollaski had just pulled into the parking lot minutes ago,and now sat in his car with the window down, looking up at the building as well.
Wendy glanced back at the gym, sighing deeply. “When?” she asked, trying to keep the weary disappointment out of her voice.
“First of the year,” Pollaski replied. “Old Bob just didn’t have the heart for it anymore, I guess. Last I heard, he’s living it up on South Padre Island. Eternal spring break, or some shit like that. I figured you knew.”
There was no accusatory tone in Pollaski’s voice, but nonetheless, Wendy felt a pang of shame. She SHOULD have known, and she didn’t know how she could have gone over three months without checking in. She did spend hours upon hours here back when she was an active competitor, after all. How could she have been so negligent?
Heck, for all she knew, maybe her disappearance had been the reason Bob closed up shop.
Before the rational aspect could argue with that incredibly self-centered sentiment, she was distracted by the sound of the car door slamming. Pollaski was on his feet, stretching idly as he looked back up at the Health Club. He looked over at Wendy, shrugging. “Well, shall we?”
“Shall we what?”
“Go inside,” Pollaski replied. “Near as I can tell, you need a new place to train at, and this is still the closest place. So let’s see what they have to offer.”
Wendy glanced back up at the sign, once again reading the words.
APHRODITE & APOLLO: A HEALTH CLUB FOR BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE
“Somehow, I have a feeling they’re not going to have a ring in there,” Wendy replied skeptically.
“Probably not,” Pollaski agreed. “But, and I’ll check my sources again, with Speed City gone, the nearest place with a ring to train in is way the frick out in Anderson. So unless you want to drive an hour each way every day to train...”
Wendy’s head snapped back at her manager, alarmed. No ring?! At all?! How on earth was she...
But Pollaski could already sense what was coming, and waved a dismissive hand. “I’ll call Crossroads Wrestling, and get them to lend us their ring,” he said, referring to a local regional company. “The owner owes me, and I know for a fact he’s a fan of yours.”
Wendy bit her upper lip, thinking. It wasn’t an ideal situation, especially compared to what she had been used to before her injury. But the situation had changed, and she was now facing the very real possibility that her workouts and her in-ring training would have to be in separate facilities. Either that, or add two hours of commute time...
Either way, it wouldn’t hurt to see what all her options were.
“Alright,” she said, sighing. “Let’s check out this ‘club for beautiful people’.
From the moment the two entered the doors, Wendy was stunned. Speed City wasn’t exactly primitive, but it certainly went for a more spartan appearance- a wide open area with cardio equipment lining the walls, with speed bags and heavy bags and a sparring mat in the center, with a ring dominating the entire setup. Aphrodite & Apollo was much more brightly lit, with partitions separating various groups of equipment, and mirrors covering nearly every surface they could. Even the front desk had changed, going from a simple wooden table with a sign in sheet, to a massive lit up glass cabinet stocked with health bars, protein drinks, and various other odds and ends.
How did they manage to renovate this and reopen, all in less than three months?
“Is that Lynn St. Carmichael from WISH?” Pollaski whispered, and Wendy looked up. Twenty feet away, speedwalking on a treadmill, was the blonde Channel 8 Weathergirl, wearing a sports bra and shorts so tight Wendy wondered how various parts of her were even getting bloodflow. The woman didn’t even notice the newcomers, as she was watching television on a crystal clear high definition television. Wendy realized each machine had its own television. Speed City had only one- an 27 inch box so old it had wooden cabinet paneling that was exclusively used for boxers or wrestlers to review match tapes.
Wendy swallowed hard, her mind racing. She had come through the doors, expecting to dislike- no- despise the place. But everything was just so new, and shiny, and state of the art and...
Beautiful.
She could sense Pollaski was looking at her, expectantly. She swallowed hard.
“I suppose taking a tour wouldn’t hurt,” she finally managed to say.
Pollaski snorted, and Wendy cringed inside. She hated it when she was that transparent... which seemed to pretty much be all the time.
“Sir! SIR!” came a female voice from across the way, and Wendy looked up to see another woman, this one barely in her twenties and brunette, but no less attractive than the weather girl still on the treadmill, came briskly walking towards them. “You can’t be in here, sir!”
Pollaski blinked, taken aback for once in his life. Wendy, despite her startled disbelief of the woman’s treatment of a prospective customer, smiled as friendly as she could muster.
“Oh, he’s with me. I’ve come to see about membership in this gym.”
The brunette looked her over, then glanced at Pollaski, cringing slightly, then looking back at Wendy. “Well, that may be ma’am, but he’s still going to have to leave. While you might be Aphrodite & Apollo material, HE definitely is NOT.”
Neither Wendy nor her manager said anything, simply staring at the brunette with their mouths open. The young woman continued on, undeterred. “You see ma’am, when people come to A&A, they expect the best, and we believe they deserve the best. And part of that means that our customers not have to be forced to look at... the more homely members of our society. When you come to Aphrodite & Apollo you see what you are- gorgeous brilliance.”
“So the people who are out of shape... the one’s who need to be working out the MOST.. aren’t allowed in a HEALTH CLUB? How does that make sense?” Pollaski scoffed.
The woman looked at Pollaski, cringing as if she couldn’t even stand the sight of him. “I’m sure there’s a 24/7 Fitness SOMEWHERE around here you could go to.” She said smugly.
“Yeah, you know what? Fuck this place,” Pollaski said, rolling his eyes. “Come on, Wendy, I’m sure we can find a better-”
“Hang on, Pollaski,” Wendy snapped, feeling the heat coming to her face. She turned back to her brunette. “What you have just said to my mana- my FRIEND here is completely unwarranted, unkind, and uncalled for, I would like to speak to your manager, please.”
The Brunette simply rolled her eyes. “I’m just doing what my manager told me to do, MA’AM. She replied, her worlds dripping with acidic sarcasm. “She doesn’t want THOSE kinds of people in here distracting people who are here to simply work out and enjoy beauty.”
“Then perhaps she and I need to have a little talk about the importance of things other than aesthetics,” Wendy replied hotly. “Such as maybe treating other people with respect!”
The Brunette sighed, looking up at the ceiling as if Wendy had just said the dumbest thing ever. “Okay, if you REALLY want to talk to her, I’ll go get her,” she said, acting as if Wendy had completely ruined her day with the request.
“Please do.” Wendy said, her smile very strained as the woman slowly sauntered away. It wasn’t often she gave someone this much of a piece of her mind, but if anyone deserved it, it was whatever callous woman set up a health club, and only let people in whom she deemed beautiful enough!
“Well, I’m gonna go wait outside,” Pollaski said, grinning at her. “Give them hell, Wendy.”
“Oh, you bet I will,” the redhead said through clenched teeth.
=================
Wednesday March 13, 2013
The Nest- Kitchen
Indianapolis, Indiana
4:16 PM Local Time
“I’m such a sucker!”
The words were muffled, considering that Wendy’s head was cradled in her arms, resting on the kitchen table. Wendy had felt more miserable plenty of times in her thirty-one year old life, but she couldn’t recall any of them that came through self-inflicted means.
At least not at the moment.
Her husband sat across from her, still in his coveralls from a day at the garage. He casually was browsing through a brochure, looking fairly unimpressed. “Supreme Platinum Executive Recurring Membership,” he read, shaking his head. “$900 a month for a health club.”
“I know, its ridiculous,” Wendy said, looking up from her arms. “It’s expensive, and ostentatious, and they’re not even that friendly.”
“Yeah, didn’t they throw your manager out for not being good looking enough?”
“Yeah, they did-”
“And you still signed up to give them over ten thousand dollars a year.”
Wendy nodded.
“Would this be why Pollaski is protesting on our driveway right now?”
Wendy’s head fell back onto the table with a soft thud. “Yes, Terrence. This is why Pollaski is picketing our driveway right now.” She paused, sighing. “I was going to complain about the way they treated him, but then one thing kind of led to another, and the next thing I knew, I’m scoring ninety four percent on some beauty recognition program and signing a contract,” she finished miserably.
“They were dangling the S.P.E.R.M. right out there, and you swallowed it.” Terrence commented, holding up the brochure again. Wendy looked up, disgust slowly turning into horror as she read the membership plan’s name again, and then her head went right back into the table. Terrence chuckled, and shook his head as he looked back down at the brochure. “It must have been a HELL of a sales pitch.”
“You should see the place, Terry,” Wendy said, looking back up. “Each individual workout station is climate controlled. They have individual steam rooms and exfoliating showers, and... my god, the equipment! They have Star-Trac treadmills! And Tour De France simulation exercise bikes! And...”
“How good’s the ring?”
Wendy paused in her excited rambling to stare guiltily at Terrence. “They, uh... don’t have a ring. Or sparring mats, or punching bags even. Muffy says they’re undignified.”
“Muffy.” Terrence blinked, nonplussed.
“She’s the owner,” Wendy replied, waving away Terrence’s stunned look. “And besides, this will just be for cardio conditioning. Pollaski says that he can get me usage of Crossroad’s ring for the sparring work.”
“Was that before or after you stabbed him in the back over a climate controlled exercise bike that can simulate the Tour De France?” Terrence asked.
“Before,” Wendy confessed.
“So just to let me sum it all up, you just bought a nine hundred dollar a month gym membership from a woman named Muffy that doesn’t even cover half of your training regime and completely pissed your manager and friend off.” Terrence said.
Wendy nodded grimly, and flashed a weak smile that was dripping with guilt. “Pretty stupid, I know.”
“Not one of your finer moments,” Terrence agreed. “So now what?”
“Well, I’m locked into A&A for six months,” the redhead said with a sigh, “so I might as well go. It’s the closest place to us anyways, and if Pollaski can get me enough ring time with Crossroads, I should be okay. But I guess the first thing to do is to get my manager to stop protesting outside my house,” she finished, standing up.
“Want me to get the garden hose?” Terrence asked, standing up as well.
“Terry, it’s fifty degrees out,” Wendy said as she began walking towards the front door.
“Yeah, so that’ll get him back to his nice, warm, dry apartment pretty damn quick.”
“I’m just going to talk to him,” Wendy said, rolling her eyes. She reached for the door, and swung it open... and froze.
Her daughter had joined the protest.
In fact, it seemed like half the neighborhood kids were outside her yard, carrying signs that said “UNFAIR” and “BACKSTABBER” as they marched back and forth. Around them, on the ground, lay a bunch of candy bar wrappers, no doubt the bribery Pollaski had used to get the kids to join the demonstration. Of all the children, though, only Theresa seemed to be approaching her task with any form or enthusiasm, yelling out something about embarrasing daughters during school.
Wendy sighed, rolling her eyes and calling out. “Theresa, please come inside, okay?”
In response, her daughter spun around, raising her fist in the air and screaming. “THE REVOLUTION WILL OUTLIVE ANY TYRANNY!” Her proclomation was rewarded with cheers.
Wendy’s jaw dropped. It wasn’t very often that Theresa flat out defied her, and she was certainly old enough to know that it wasn’t going to end well at all for her if she did. She opened her mouth, ready to give a much more stern order to get in the house, when she heard her husband turning around behind her.
“That’s it, I’m getting the hose,” he muttered, marching towards the side of the house.
Wendy froze, torn in between putting an end to this nonsense, or simply stopping it from getting any worse. With a sigh of resignation, she spun around, and ran after her husband.
“FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, TERRENCE, NO!”
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)