Post by Ash Blake on Mar 13, 2022 12:27:52 GMT -5
The sound of the bell echoed in Ash's ear as she dragged herself back up the ramp, drowning out the Tacoma crowd. She stumbled, barely able to keep herself aloft as blood-stained sweat dripped down her face and into her eyes, blurring her vision. Each labored breath she took stung her bruised ribs worse than the last; in the sensory overload, she was numb to the ten pounds of leather and gold that'd been affixed to her since October. When she closed her eyes, she couldn't remember if it was still her's.
No time for that, anyway, she thought to herself as she wiped her blurry vision clear and forced a smile to her face. Eyes ahead, always.
Olivia Adler winced as Ash stumbled through the curtain back into Gorilla hunched over, her pale skin dyed red. Rising from her spot in front of one of the monitors, she rushed over to her erstwhile employer, slipping one of Ash's arms around her shoulder.
"I'm fine," Ash muttered through gritted teeth. "Really, I am."
Olivia rolled her eyes as she led Ash through the narrow, labyrinthine hallways of the backstage area towards whatever corner the training room was tucked into in this venue. Ash's head rolled to one side, lips brushing with Olive's earlobe as she whispered, half-delirious:
"Don't know what I'd do without you, Trav."
Olive swallowed hard as the pair approached the training room, catching the nervous glance of Doctor S. Larkin as the door swung open.
Show me a hero, and I'll write you a tragedy.
I feel like I've said those words a million times since I let the world know what I did for a living back in October 2020. I've said it in every action I've taken in those seventeen months since, with every grand paragon, every crusading hero who'd dare to step up to Philidor winding up crippled, marginalized, or forced to stoop to our level.
(Hello, Corey. I do hope you beat Winston; I can't wait to re-visit that saga.)
There's a twisted, perverted sentimentality to this business. One I've done my best to avoid from the day I was thrust into it like a newborn foal who took to walking just a little too easily. That's how you get complacent, engorged on the weight of moral victories and petty accolades. It's different for everyone, I'll admit: sometimes it takes the shape of beating your chest over your well-earned title of 'baddest bitch'. Other times, it's receiving the pro-wrestling equivalent of the 'most likely to succeed' superlative and treating it as your World Series. Hell, sometimes it comes when you just can't help yourself but to whine in a press conference about feeling replaced, when the word you were probably looking for was 'outclassed'.
Or maybe, it comes when you hear me say that old refrain and you wind up thinking you're the hero of this story. Groping hands reaching out from the abyss, desperate to pull themselves into the light. To make this their moment.
All the world's a stage, and maybe I should pity the poor players strutting and fretting their hour upon it.
But, I definitely should lay off the theatrics, because calling what's about to happen a tragedy is a misnomer:
Tragedy implies there was a chance it could've gone any other way.
"Do you have any ibuprofen?" Ash asked, eyes clenched shut to keep out the burning fluorescent lights overhead. "I just have a little headache."
"You have a concussion," her companion shot back.
"Stop being dramatic."
Larkin's trembling hands wrapped the bandages tight around Ash's ribcage as Olivia Adler stared daggers into him. The similar bandaging wrapped around her skull had already begun to stain.
"Look, I don't think sending you out there like this is a good idea," he said, rubbing the back of his neck as his gaze darted between his patient and his supervisor. Ash's expression soured, hopping off the cot onto unsteady feet.
"I've never felt better, Doc," Ash said, a pained smile on her face as she licked blood off her chipped incisor. "Seriously, I'm good to go."
His gaze fixed itself on her; she reciprocated, taking a step closer.
Behind her, Olive held her breath and bit her tongue. There wasn't anything to say — she wasn't going to talk Ash out of this.
"Am I cleared or not?"
Larkin's gaze wavered, eyes shooting to the floor as his patient turned away, towards the door.
"I'll take that as a yes."
Because this is it: this is Battlebowl, huns. There are no moral victories here. No one's going to pat you on the head for being the youngest participant in the match's history, Serenity — not even the shaved gorilla you've slapped a collar on and christened the love of your life.
The lights are too bright for that. This is the litmus test, the moment that separates the wheat from the chaff — the Havoc contenders from the pretenders. And forgive my lack of experience with the process, I was too busy being the prize at the end of the rainbow last year to really get it down.
But I do have a hell of a track record with beginner's luck, don't I? First title shot? Signed. First world title shot? Sealed. First person to pin Johnny Bacchus? Delivered; I even have a couple souvenirs from that one.
I've stumbled backwards into a resume that most of the field would kill for. Maybe that's why I have such little patience for that sentimentality — there's no time for reminiscing in my world. Hell, I barely have time to sleep. Eyes forward. Focus on the task at hand. Always and forever.
So I'm sure the field is licking their chops at the sight of me being double booked. There's the chink in my armor, isn't it? The wear and tear is gonna get me, pull me off my game, leave me too spent, exhausted, and pained to take yet another moment from the rest of you.
It's a quaint little fantasy; it's almost too bad that I live for moments like this. When my back's against the wall and I'm staring down the barrel of the matchup that I'm not supposed to be able to wriggle my way out of. When I'm due to be exposed.
Corey Black had all the chances in the world and couldn't do it.
Lissie Hope couldn't avenge herself against me.
And even when Daniel Fehl cracked the code, I still got right back up and proved him the anomaly, not the norm.
So yeah, I could come down to the ring in a full body cast and still have the biggest bullseye painted on my back. Because if anyone could ruin any of your grand coronations while barely functioning, it's little Ashley Blakesley.
Who else would it be: Adelaide Ainsworth? This match's poster child for withering when it counts? Those bright lights might as well be Regan Voorhees with the fire extinguisher the way they beat down on her, especially when she isn't stapled to the hip of her 'sister' — who almost certainly won't chuck her to the wolves when she feels she isn't getting enough attention.
The giant with the resume to match who can't help but grip tightly onto an industry that's passed him by? Maybe once upon a time, but that time's long since been up. It's fine, Pete Rose wasn't an all-star in his final season either.
Any of the debutants to this big stage? Rookie or vet, ask anyone who's sought to make their name at my expense how that's worked out for them. I'm no one's stepping stone, but I could be your white whale: you'll drive yourself mad before you even come close to killing me.
I've played coy with it to this point, but I guess there's no need for subtlety: are you gunning for me, Lissie? When that weight presses down on your chest again and you struggle to shut out the lights and focus, when you feel another opportunity start to slip from your fingers, are you going to beeline, hoping to take me with you?
You are, aren't you? So you can get your vindication, your moment in the sun, to fuel that sense of perverted sentimentality. To say for one moment, you beat the woman who replaced you.
Because that's what this all comes down to, isn't it? Beyond all your posturing and gesticulating, slouching towards Bethlehem — the second coming of Elisabeth Hope — it's always been about your ego.
This is where I should really let you have it, right? Dig those claws deeper into your skin, rip your beating heart out of your chest?
But ultimately, this isn't about you and me. This isn't even about you.
It's all about me, hun. It's about me standing on the precipice and calling my shot once again. It's about how I'm going to find a way to slither out of this predicament, like I've done my whole career.
I don't care much for self-mythologizing, and I don't think about legacies. But there's one thing about me that's always been true, from my debut all the way to the last syllable of recorded time.
It's about finding a way to win: nothing more, nothing less. And that's the difference between me and all of you — there are no spirited bouts in my vocabulary. There's no 'great effort' or 'tremendous showing' in defeat. You live for the moments, the highs, the sentimentality you get when you think back about how you could have been a contender.
I live for a living.
My world died around me and I'm still here. This is for me now, and none of you have what it takes to take it from me.
I'll see you at Havoc.
Y'know, if you make it long enough to watch me come out last.
"You don't have to do this," Olive whispered as the pair stood in Gorilla once more, awaiting the blare of Ash's theme music for the second time in the night. Ash shook her head, flashing an all-too-familiar smile at her compatriot — though with noticeably less strain than the one she tried offering in Larkin's office.
"Seriously."
"I have to do this—" Ash said, immediately backspacing as the words left her mouth. "I want to do this."
Her grin turned sinister.
"I'm ready."
Olive huffed, throwing her hands in the air.
"Y'know, for someone so fucking smart, you really are the dumbest girl I've ever met."
Ash's eyes narrowed for a moment, staring through Olive as if she wasn't even there. Shaking out the cobwebs, she blushed, a coquettish grin crossing her face.
"Are you worried about me?" she asked, voice dripping with irony.
"You're insufferable," Olive muttered in response, rolling her eyes. "Jenny, You're Barely Alive" by Rilo Kiley hit the PA system and Ash took a deep breath, her demeanor steeling instantaneously.
"Showtime," she whispered to herself.
"Yeah, don't fuckin' die."
Ash pushed her way through the curtains and down the ramp, eyes fixed on the ring ahead. Tinnitus rang through her injured ear, drowning out the sound of her entrance theme with a dull ringing.
She took another deep breath and steadied herself, shooting a glance up at the lights. Through the throbbing ache all she could hear was one thing:
"You can't start a fire, worrying about your little world falling apart."
"I love you," she whispered to the heavens, before diverting her gaze back towards the curtain.