Post by asmalltable on Dec 19, 2023 17:01:53 GMT -5
They hadn’t been home since they signed. Just a few days after the contract went in, they were on the plane, over to the States, then just a few months from nobodies making their competitive debuts to the top of the Duos roster, golden belts around their waists. Fresh faces to queens of the division. Not much time to travel when you’re ruling your own kingdom.
The flight wasn’t easy, either. Ava spent most of it watching Christmas movies, unsurprising to anyone who knows her, Alessia tried her best to sleep. But just as they came in to land, they flew right into the first snowstorm Birmingham’s had for years.
Honestly, it was almost eerie, stepping out the airport into the dead quiet night. Just a couple of inches, nothing to the Americans, but enough to shut down most of the city services and leave most families huddling inside round fireplaces. A few underpaid council employees were trying to keep the streets clear with shovels, but the buses were out, the trams down, and several angry travellers were crowding around the information desk. Pretty much the usual start to a British family holiday.
No-one recognised them, either. Not that they had particularly expected it, though Ava had taken to keeping a Sharpie in her pocket in case anyone wanted a signature - she’d warmed to the feeling of being liked, at least a little bit. But here, everyone was heads down, eyes down, just trying to get home. Ava shivered, asked her partner why they bothered to fly over at all.
Alessia knew, of course, though she didn’t say. It was her, it absolutely was. She’d seen her in the crowd, when Ava was busy beheading the Party Bros with her lariats. And back at the hotel, once more, in the lobby, just stepping out of sight as soon as her head turned. Then, after the chair shot to the head on the last Friday Night Fury, she got the voicemail. And though she hadn’t heard the voice on the other end in years, she knew from the very first word.
She told Ava she just needed to clear her head - get away from the doubters, from all the talk of weak links and losing streaks. Reconnect with the place that made her. And for her part, though Ava wasn’t happy to take the time off training, she knew when Alessia’s eyes had that little flicker of steel, it was something she needed.
It did feel good to be home.
City of a thousand trades. Built on the sweat and blood and backs of workers, raised from the ground with steel and smoke and clay and crime and wealth and misery. A sprawling, confused, heaving thing, like a great heap of scrap metal sprawling across-
BAM!
Alessia’s cheek stung as the snowball exploded across her face, dusting her Aston Villa matchday scarf and settling inside her hood. Her head whipped round to see Ava, whistling.
Oi! I’m freezing! Get in the cab!
Dickhead.
Ava just grinned. And fine, at last, Alessia did… though not before scooping a heap of snow and shoving it down the back of Ava’s jacket. ‘Cause even TPW’s Duos Champs could be childish, sometimes. You should’ve seen Ava’s sixteenth birthday - ask Alessia about the banana boat and the canal.
But that’s for another time - back to now, and the champions finally warming up. Alessia tells the short, squat, smiling man in the flat cap the address, Ava settles back and sticks her earbuds in, and thumbs through her phone. She needs to make sure she’d had it right.
Of course, she was never going to tell Alessia. It’d kill her to know what the message said. But on the very same evening, Ava had had a call too, and now she pulls it up, and, with a deep breath, plays it.
Remembering to turn down the volume first.
Hello. Arthur. You know who it is. You probably already know what I’m going to ask.
WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?
You know I always thought you were hot-headed. Your parents told me you were a brat. But letting yourself get jumped?
You moron.
You take a Rumble all the way to the end. Angelo and you get yourselves the straps by beating the Gosh Dang Malvados. You were looking good. Then you two got complacent, and the next hot young thing jumps you, beats one of you straight up, and now you’re staring down dropping the belts to a better, faster, newer team. Is that what you think you were meant to do?
You made the same mistake you always do. You got overconfident, you underestimated your opponents, and you found yourself down for the count. You’ve been doing it since you’re fourteen and you’ll be doing it ‘till you’re a hundred and four.
Meanwhile, Jeremy the Wicked and Superunknown will be the front of the company. And they’ll have earned it. Superunknown’s never lost one on one. Jeremy’s a hell of a fighter, and keeps getting the drop on you.
What happened to my girls?
You never used to give in so easily. Arthur, you took on twenty-nine others, living legends like Page and JMont and beat them all. My Lights Out broke the longest streak in the company’s history, back to back. Where are they now?
I stoked a fire in you. Has it finally burned out?
And it’s only as the voicemail cuts out that Ava notices she’s gripping the door handle so hard her knuckles are white.
———
They don’t speak much for the rest of the ride. Ava turns the heating all the way up - the note Alessia got told them to both be in their gear, so they changed at the airport. So even the heavy puffer jackets layered over the top of the lycra isn’t doing much to keep out the cold.
Bless him, the driver does try to talk to them a couple of times. They do know it’s closed, right? Closes at 5. And besides, it’s more for kids. Are they staying nearby then? There’s a Travelodge next door-
Alessia cuts him off with a nod, then turns back to the window. She doesn’t mean to be rude - or, not that rude, at least - but now really isn’t the time. At least the A-roads have been cleared, so it’s pretty quick.
The Skoda headlights cut through the still-drifting flakes, winding out past the city centre as Ava counts off the exits. Up there for Perry Barr and the old athletics track, now the shining new stadium, where her brother ran in those inter-school meets in the driving rain and her family huddled under the largest umbrella they could buy. That way to West Brom’s stadium, where she bought her custom shirt just to piss Alessia off by wearing rival merch. (That was before they became friends. Though she’d still do it today.)
And Sandwell Hospital, where her mum had the operation. Next right and they’d cut up towards Walsall and in thirty minutes she’d be home again, in the old childhood bedroom, on the top bunk under the peeling paint, with her brother below playing his guitar. (Badly.)
But no. This is no time for memories They cut south, and round the corner, and soon enough the car drops them on the pavement outside the canvas sign hanging from the iron fence. The Black Country Living Museum.
They’d both been here as kids - every child in the West Midlands did, eventually. About a street and a half of reconstructed historical buildings and shops and forges and foundries, with overqualified actors in period costume wandering around giving tours or answering questions, pretending to be a real, living, replica of Birmingham As It Was.
Neither Ava or Alessia would ever admit to enjoying it - obviously, that would be social death even for the smarter kids - but the factories, with their giant crucibles of molten metal, and the showers of sparks on the shirtless sweating workers shovelling in ever more coal… yeah, Ava liked those. She loved to stand just a little too close, and feel the heat on her skin, and the fire burn…
Alessia checks her phone. Yep. 10pm, front gates, was what the note said. And with a nod to Ava, who still pretends like she didn’t also know who waits on the other side, Alessia hops the barrier and walks in.
———
In the daytime, the brightly-painted shop signs and gleaming metalwork could almost pass for cheery - the museum’s curators wanted to get across the rampant misery of Victorian and Edwardian life, but not so much that the kids wouldn’t still want to buy something at the end.
In the night, though, and with the period-appropriate gas lamps turned off - this was the England of Jack the Ripper, of Mr Hyde, and eighty years later of the First World War and the Peaky Blinders. Narrow streets and broken bricks and soot-stained windows, curtains drawn, shutters up. No sounds but an owl, somewhere - a thick circle of trees and shrubs surrounded the site, and even the roar of the cars sweeping by on the main road was muffled into obscurity.
Ava squats by a sign, peering close.
Next right. Lessi, is this a joke, ‘cause I’m really not in the mood for-
No.
Jeez. Okay. Just a question.
Eyes open, Ava.
Wow. You never use my name. You must be serious.
I am.
But the hotel better be good. I’m gonna catch frostbite at this rate, then how’re we going to wrestle? Four stars minimum. I want the bathrobes, the king size beds, the minibars, you know-
Here.
Ava looks up - and up, and up, at the towering brick facade of the Lyons Chainmakers Factory (established 1810, it said, though really established 2014 with a new donation from the city for education on Birmingham’s industrial past.)
Though it took a moment for her eyes to adjust, because while every other window was cold, dark black, in this one, right at the top, a single fire blazed. And inside, lit from behind, a familiar figure.
And before she could stop herself, Ava blurted out-
Of course she’s here.
Alessia spins on her heel.
You knew?
Lessi-
Why didn’t you tell me?
‘Cause you would’ve asked how I did. Why did you lie to me?
Why didn’t you tell me this was about her?
Because-
Because I didn’t know if you’d come.
I didn’t know if you’d want to come back. After everything. With a new life, in a new country, and… why would you want to see her again? After it happened?
I don’t.
Aves, if you don’t want to do this-
But you do. And you’re my partner. So I’m coming with you.
And from the window, a shrill whistle rings out, and both women notice at the same time the sound of footsteps coming down the street towards them.
Inside! In in in in NOW!
Alessia wrenches open the heavy metal foundry door, and shoves Ava in, just as faces begin to appear in the dark behind them.
———
Alessia slams the thick wooden bar of the door shut and, leaning against it, pants for breath.
So I guess you got a message too.
Yep. What did yours say?
A test. Come back. Run the gauntlet, and I’ll start teaching you again. And then you’ll be unbeatable.
The mention of the Gauntlet makes Ava wince as the memory floods back. The final test before they graduated - line up on one side, every other trainee forms a corridor, with belts in their hands. Run through as they whip you. Make it to the other side without falling, and you were ready to go pro.
I didn’t think she meant it literally.
WHAM! A shoulder from outside thrown into the door. The bar splinters, but holds.
Why come back?
Can we have this conversation later, when-
WHAM!
Ava doesn’t need to be told twice.
The two women vault over the counter in the entryway, dump their jackets and run straight into the main hall, and suddenly they’re bathed in bright orange light. At the sides, the coal burners roar into life, and the sparks fly from a crucible tipping metal into a tool mould… then a chain snaps and it swings wildly, sending Ava diving and rolling to the side. It smacks into the bricks with a heavy thud, and Alessia throws her arm up to protect her eyes from the shower of sparks.
Above them, footsteps ring out down a steel walkway, and a face appears over the edge, thin-lipped smile framed with straight red hair.
Awareness, girls. That’s why you keep getting ambushed.
In frustration, Ava’s fingers curl around a spanner left lying on the floor and she hurls it up in the air… to clash uselessly against the bars and fall away, as the face disappears back into the darkness.
After her!
Two ladders in the far corners, leading up to the gantries.
Left one’s mine. Take the right.
Ava doesn’t need telling twice, darting forward. The heat is painful, enough to sear sweat off exposed skin, enough that for a moment Alessia stumbles back, but Ava shoots her a look of determination and they rush forward. Taking the rungs two at a time, eyes scanning for any sign of movement in the shadows in the upper building. Almost at the top…
LOOK OUT-
Ava leaps onto the walkway… straight into a right cross, snapping her head back and around as she pitches backwards. Straight out into the open air, thirty feet down onto steel. Alessia’s stomach drops, just like her partner does, back into empty air…
Until Ava’s hand snaps out to grab hold of a rung.
Above her, the woman steps fully out into the light. In her forties, maybe early fifties, red hair, rippling muscles, shaking her head.
Failure.
Behind, Alessia - now on the walkway - roars with anger, charging forwards… then the woman holds up a hand, and some instinct snaps into place, and she stops. The woman turns to her as Ava struggles for her grip.
Angelo. I knew you’d come. You were always so desperate for approval.
You- I-
Huh? Huh? If you have something to say, spit it out.
…
I thought not. You know as well as I do. Everyone’s right. You’re the weak link. The loser. I’m so disappointed. Do you know how much money I spent training you?
Alessia’s muscles twitch. Her face hardens.
You did nothing for me.
I MADE YOU! You were nothing when you walked through my doors. You left a fighter.
Then I walked through TPW’s doors a nothing, too, and now I’m a champion. On my own work.
You got cocky. You forgot to watch your backs. To stay alert. Now your partner’s going to pay the price for YOUR incompetence-
NO!
I believed you once, when I was young. I thought I was nothing, that you made me everything.
But I am a Gosh Dang fighter.
I put Hector Malvado on the mat. It was my strength that earned our titles. I stared down the most dominant team in TPW’s history, and I kicked out. I’m TIRED of not earning the credit I deserve.
You’re arrogant. That’s why Jeremy put you down-
Yes. I underestimated him. He’s a good fighter, and so is his partner. But they’re just not quite good enough. Two on two, no dirty tricks or steel chairs, they’ll break. And when I, when WE end their challenge, everyone will see just how strong we are. That Lights Out didn’t just come here and end someone else’s dynasty. We’re here to start our own.
Alessia takes a step towards the woman, who grins.
Do it. Hit me, if you can.
I know you always wanted to, Angelo. When you couldn’t lift enough, or run far enough, and I called you a failure, like you were.
When you tried to run the Gauntlet, and you fell, and you hit the ground.
You never had the courage.
A silence.
A long silence.
Unbroken stares, steely-eyed…
No. I didn’t.
But she did.
And too late the woman turns… to see the silhouetted form of a furious Ava Arthur, eyes wild, halfway off the ground with a superman punch.
CONNECTS! Right to the temple and the woman staggers back, a hand on the metal railings. Ava immediately moves to follow up, grabbing her into a clinch, sinking body blows into her liver, but the woman fights back with an elbow to the mouth, pushing Ava back. Gaze broken, Alessia rushes forward too, and it’s two on one, but even then this woman’s strong - two hands shoot out and Ava and Alessia find themselves in identical chokeholds, lifted off the ground, and with a mighty roar hurled backwards against the wall. Ava’s back crashes against it, but Alessia’s balance is interrupted by a loose bolt that catches her toe, sending her tripping, head cracking into the wall as she slumps down, dazed.
The woman pushes herself up, dusting her arms off, and laughs, staring down at Ava, her mouth red from a split lip.
You always thought you knew best, Arthur.
You’re arrogant. Rogues’ Gallery are right about that. Ever since the very first day you walked in my door, I could feel it. You think the world owes you everything.
Ava spits blood in her face. The woman wipes it off and just smirks, but Ava rises unsteadily to her feet.
I do. It does. Because I’ve earned it.
Yeah sure whatever, I talk a lot. I can back it up. I was inches away from dethroning Peter Vaughn. I faced down the Cabal in a War Games cell and never surrendered.
Next to her, Alessia starts to stir. The woman just watches, impassively.
When you trained us, you taught us to be ruthless. That the only way to win was to be willing to bleed more than whoever we fought. To be the last ones to surrender. To be willing to reduce ourselves to dust, just so long as we broke the other fighters first.
You turned us against each other. Lied. Undermined. Beat and broken.
And for years afterwards, I thought you were right.
Ava’s right up against her now, face like thunder, jabbing a finger right into her ribs.
I thought you lit the fire in me. I burned so bright. Burnt friends, partners, enemies, managers, everyone.
Then I got to TPW. Without you. And I won. And won. And realised that you never knew anything. I was the fire all along. It’s been in me since the damn day I was born.
Alessia is on her feet, too. Just behind Ava. The woman, six foot one, towers over both of them, and still says nothing.
Jeremy and Duncan like to talk about the Shadow. This creature of darkness that makes them ruthless, unbeatable.
But when they let it out in the ring, at Winter Wrestleland, two monsters of the night will meet two burning torches, undimmed by our losses, our pain, the hits we’ve taken. Unbowed. Unbroken. Just like you’ve dogged our past, but you’ve failed to stop us.
And the darkness of the night will melt away in the light of a new, golden dawn. The champions will reign on. The demons will be banished back to where they came.
What’s a Shadow, against a righteous fire?
Ava breathes, hard. Silence in the air, as her words echo around the empty hall. And still, over them, the granite features of their former trainer, impassive.
Finally, she raises her hands, and claps. Once. Twice. Three times.
What a lovely little speech. You-
CRACK!
Dual superkicks to the jaw, and Ava and Alessia send her pitching backwards over the railing, and tumbling to the floor.
A sudden surprise on her face. A moment or two of silence… then a vicious, visceral crunch, as she hits the floor. Then nothing but the sound of their breathing.
Ava peers over the side, and after a couple of moments, Alessia joins her.
A long silence.
That felt… really good.
You know, Aves, I’ve never heard you speak like that. Not bad. I-
On the ground, the woman’s eyes snap open. She’s hurt, bad - probably a bone or two broken - but she starts to drag herself to her feet.
Goddamnit.
Right. I suggest we get going.
Ava doesn’t need telling twice. There’s a fire escape door at the end of the walkway - she shoulder-checks it open, and they slip out and down the stairs, vaulting the fence that surrounds the museum site, putting paces between them and the voices that begin to call out to each other in pursuit.
And as they run, Ava turns, looks over her shoulder at Alessia, and smirks.
Okay, it REALLY better be a good hotel.
The flight wasn’t easy, either. Ava spent most of it watching Christmas movies, unsurprising to anyone who knows her, Alessia tried her best to sleep. But just as they came in to land, they flew right into the first snowstorm Birmingham’s had for years.
Honestly, it was almost eerie, stepping out the airport into the dead quiet night. Just a couple of inches, nothing to the Americans, but enough to shut down most of the city services and leave most families huddling inside round fireplaces. A few underpaid council employees were trying to keep the streets clear with shovels, but the buses were out, the trams down, and several angry travellers were crowding around the information desk. Pretty much the usual start to a British family holiday.
No-one recognised them, either. Not that they had particularly expected it, though Ava had taken to keeping a Sharpie in her pocket in case anyone wanted a signature - she’d warmed to the feeling of being liked, at least a little bit. But here, everyone was heads down, eyes down, just trying to get home. Ava shivered, asked her partner why they bothered to fly over at all.
Alessia knew, of course, though she didn’t say. It was her, it absolutely was. She’d seen her in the crowd, when Ava was busy beheading the Party Bros with her lariats. And back at the hotel, once more, in the lobby, just stepping out of sight as soon as her head turned. Then, after the chair shot to the head on the last Friday Night Fury, she got the voicemail. And though she hadn’t heard the voice on the other end in years, she knew from the very first word.
She told Ava she just needed to clear her head - get away from the doubters, from all the talk of weak links and losing streaks. Reconnect with the place that made her. And for her part, though Ava wasn’t happy to take the time off training, she knew when Alessia’s eyes had that little flicker of steel, it was something she needed.
It did feel good to be home.
City of a thousand trades. Built on the sweat and blood and backs of workers, raised from the ground with steel and smoke and clay and crime and wealth and misery. A sprawling, confused, heaving thing, like a great heap of scrap metal sprawling across-
BAM!
Alessia’s cheek stung as the snowball exploded across her face, dusting her Aston Villa matchday scarf and settling inside her hood. Her head whipped round to see Ava, whistling.
Oi! I’m freezing! Get in the cab!
Dickhead.
Ava just grinned. And fine, at last, Alessia did… though not before scooping a heap of snow and shoving it down the back of Ava’s jacket. ‘Cause even TPW’s Duos Champs could be childish, sometimes. You should’ve seen Ava’s sixteenth birthday - ask Alessia about the banana boat and the canal.
But that’s for another time - back to now, and the champions finally warming up. Alessia tells the short, squat, smiling man in the flat cap the address, Ava settles back and sticks her earbuds in, and thumbs through her phone. She needs to make sure she’d had it right.
Of course, she was never going to tell Alessia. It’d kill her to know what the message said. But on the very same evening, Ava had had a call too, and now she pulls it up, and, with a deep breath, plays it.
Remembering to turn down the volume first.
Hello. Arthur. You know who it is. You probably already know what I’m going to ask.
WHAT WERE YOU THINKING?
You know I always thought you were hot-headed. Your parents told me you were a brat. But letting yourself get jumped?
You moron.
You take a Rumble all the way to the end. Angelo and you get yourselves the straps by beating the Gosh Dang Malvados. You were looking good. Then you two got complacent, and the next hot young thing jumps you, beats one of you straight up, and now you’re staring down dropping the belts to a better, faster, newer team. Is that what you think you were meant to do?
You made the same mistake you always do. You got overconfident, you underestimated your opponents, and you found yourself down for the count. You’ve been doing it since you’re fourteen and you’ll be doing it ‘till you’re a hundred and four.
Meanwhile, Jeremy the Wicked and Superunknown will be the front of the company. And they’ll have earned it. Superunknown’s never lost one on one. Jeremy’s a hell of a fighter, and keeps getting the drop on you.
What happened to my girls?
You never used to give in so easily. Arthur, you took on twenty-nine others, living legends like Page and JMont and beat them all. My Lights Out broke the longest streak in the company’s history, back to back. Where are they now?
I stoked a fire in you. Has it finally burned out?
And it’s only as the voicemail cuts out that Ava notices she’s gripping the door handle so hard her knuckles are white.
———
They don’t speak much for the rest of the ride. Ava turns the heating all the way up - the note Alessia got told them to both be in their gear, so they changed at the airport. So even the heavy puffer jackets layered over the top of the lycra isn’t doing much to keep out the cold.
Bless him, the driver does try to talk to them a couple of times. They do know it’s closed, right? Closes at 5. And besides, it’s more for kids. Are they staying nearby then? There’s a Travelodge next door-
Alessia cuts him off with a nod, then turns back to the window. She doesn’t mean to be rude - or, not that rude, at least - but now really isn’t the time. At least the A-roads have been cleared, so it’s pretty quick.
The Skoda headlights cut through the still-drifting flakes, winding out past the city centre as Ava counts off the exits. Up there for Perry Barr and the old athletics track, now the shining new stadium, where her brother ran in those inter-school meets in the driving rain and her family huddled under the largest umbrella they could buy. That way to West Brom’s stadium, where she bought her custom shirt just to piss Alessia off by wearing rival merch. (That was before they became friends. Though she’d still do it today.)
And Sandwell Hospital, where her mum had the operation. Next right and they’d cut up towards Walsall and in thirty minutes she’d be home again, in the old childhood bedroom, on the top bunk under the peeling paint, with her brother below playing his guitar. (Badly.)
But no. This is no time for memories They cut south, and round the corner, and soon enough the car drops them on the pavement outside the canvas sign hanging from the iron fence. The Black Country Living Museum.
They’d both been here as kids - every child in the West Midlands did, eventually. About a street and a half of reconstructed historical buildings and shops and forges and foundries, with overqualified actors in period costume wandering around giving tours or answering questions, pretending to be a real, living, replica of Birmingham As It Was.
Neither Ava or Alessia would ever admit to enjoying it - obviously, that would be social death even for the smarter kids - but the factories, with their giant crucibles of molten metal, and the showers of sparks on the shirtless sweating workers shovelling in ever more coal… yeah, Ava liked those. She loved to stand just a little too close, and feel the heat on her skin, and the fire burn…
Alessia checks her phone. Yep. 10pm, front gates, was what the note said. And with a nod to Ava, who still pretends like she didn’t also know who waits on the other side, Alessia hops the barrier and walks in.
———
In the daytime, the brightly-painted shop signs and gleaming metalwork could almost pass for cheery - the museum’s curators wanted to get across the rampant misery of Victorian and Edwardian life, but not so much that the kids wouldn’t still want to buy something at the end.
In the night, though, and with the period-appropriate gas lamps turned off - this was the England of Jack the Ripper, of Mr Hyde, and eighty years later of the First World War and the Peaky Blinders. Narrow streets and broken bricks and soot-stained windows, curtains drawn, shutters up. No sounds but an owl, somewhere - a thick circle of trees and shrubs surrounded the site, and even the roar of the cars sweeping by on the main road was muffled into obscurity.
Ava squats by a sign, peering close.
Next right. Lessi, is this a joke, ‘cause I’m really not in the mood for-
No.
Jeez. Okay. Just a question.
Eyes open, Ava.
Wow. You never use my name. You must be serious.
I am.
But the hotel better be good. I’m gonna catch frostbite at this rate, then how’re we going to wrestle? Four stars minimum. I want the bathrobes, the king size beds, the minibars, you know-
Here.
Ava looks up - and up, and up, at the towering brick facade of the Lyons Chainmakers Factory (established 1810, it said, though really established 2014 with a new donation from the city for education on Birmingham’s industrial past.)
Though it took a moment for her eyes to adjust, because while every other window was cold, dark black, in this one, right at the top, a single fire blazed. And inside, lit from behind, a familiar figure.
And before she could stop herself, Ava blurted out-
Of course she’s here.
Alessia spins on her heel.
You knew?
Lessi-
Why didn’t you tell me?
‘Cause you would’ve asked how I did. Why did you lie to me?
Why didn’t you tell me this was about her?
Because-
Because I didn’t know if you’d come.
I didn’t know if you’d want to come back. After everything. With a new life, in a new country, and… why would you want to see her again? After it happened?
I don’t.
Aves, if you don’t want to do this-
But you do. And you’re my partner. So I’m coming with you.
And from the window, a shrill whistle rings out, and both women notice at the same time the sound of footsteps coming down the street towards them.
Inside! In in in in NOW!
Alessia wrenches open the heavy metal foundry door, and shoves Ava in, just as faces begin to appear in the dark behind them.
———
Alessia slams the thick wooden bar of the door shut and, leaning against it, pants for breath.
So I guess you got a message too.
Yep. What did yours say?
A test. Come back. Run the gauntlet, and I’ll start teaching you again. And then you’ll be unbeatable.
The mention of the Gauntlet makes Ava wince as the memory floods back. The final test before they graduated - line up on one side, every other trainee forms a corridor, with belts in their hands. Run through as they whip you. Make it to the other side without falling, and you were ready to go pro.
I didn’t think she meant it literally.
WHAM! A shoulder from outside thrown into the door. The bar splinters, but holds.
Why come back?
Can we have this conversation later, when-
WHAM!
Ava doesn’t need to be told twice.
The two women vault over the counter in the entryway, dump their jackets and run straight into the main hall, and suddenly they’re bathed in bright orange light. At the sides, the coal burners roar into life, and the sparks fly from a crucible tipping metal into a tool mould… then a chain snaps and it swings wildly, sending Ava diving and rolling to the side. It smacks into the bricks with a heavy thud, and Alessia throws her arm up to protect her eyes from the shower of sparks.
Above them, footsteps ring out down a steel walkway, and a face appears over the edge, thin-lipped smile framed with straight red hair.
Awareness, girls. That’s why you keep getting ambushed.
In frustration, Ava’s fingers curl around a spanner left lying on the floor and she hurls it up in the air… to clash uselessly against the bars and fall away, as the face disappears back into the darkness.
After her!
Two ladders in the far corners, leading up to the gantries.
Left one’s mine. Take the right.
Ava doesn’t need telling twice, darting forward. The heat is painful, enough to sear sweat off exposed skin, enough that for a moment Alessia stumbles back, but Ava shoots her a look of determination and they rush forward. Taking the rungs two at a time, eyes scanning for any sign of movement in the shadows in the upper building. Almost at the top…
LOOK OUT-
Ava leaps onto the walkway… straight into a right cross, snapping her head back and around as she pitches backwards. Straight out into the open air, thirty feet down onto steel. Alessia’s stomach drops, just like her partner does, back into empty air…
Until Ava’s hand snaps out to grab hold of a rung.
Above her, the woman steps fully out into the light. In her forties, maybe early fifties, red hair, rippling muscles, shaking her head.
Failure.
Behind, Alessia - now on the walkway - roars with anger, charging forwards… then the woman holds up a hand, and some instinct snaps into place, and she stops. The woman turns to her as Ava struggles for her grip.
Angelo. I knew you’d come. You were always so desperate for approval.
You- I-
Huh? Huh? If you have something to say, spit it out.
…
I thought not. You know as well as I do. Everyone’s right. You’re the weak link. The loser. I’m so disappointed. Do you know how much money I spent training you?
Alessia’s muscles twitch. Her face hardens.
You did nothing for me.
I MADE YOU! You were nothing when you walked through my doors. You left a fighter.
Then I walked through TPW’s doors a nothing, too, and now I’m a champion. On my own work.
You got cocky. You forgot to watch your backs. To stay alert. Now your partner’s going to pay the price for YOUR incompetence-
NO!
I believed you once, when I was young. I thought I was nothing, that you made me everything.
But I am a Gosh Dang fighter.
I put Hector Malvado on the mat. It was my strength that earned our titles. I stared down the most dominant team in TPW’s history, and I kicked out. I’m TIRED of not earning the credit I deserve.
You’re arrogant. That’s why Jeremy put you down-
Yes. I underestimated him. He’s a good fighter, and so is his partner. But they’re just not quite good enough. Two on two, no dirty tricks or steel chairs, they’ll break. And when I, when WE end their challenge, everyone will see just how strong we are. That Lights Out didn’t just come here and end someone else’s dynasty. We’re here to start our own.
Alessia takes a step towards the woman, who grins.
Do it. Hit me, if you can.
I know you always wanted to, Angelo. When you couldn’t lift enough, or run far enough, and I called you a failure, like you were.
When you tried to run the Gauntlet, and you fell, and you hit the ground.
You never had the courage.
A silence.
A long silence.
Unbroken stares, steely-eyed…
No. I didn’t.
But she did.
And too late the woman turns… to see the silhouetted form of a furious Ava Arthur, eyes wild, halfway off the ground with a superman punch.
CONNECTS! Right to the temple and the woman staggers back, a hand on the metal railings. Ava immediately moves to follow up, grabbing her into a clinch, sinking body blows into her liver, but the woman fights back with an elbow to the mouth, pushing Ava back. Gaze broken, Alessia rushes forward too, and it’s two on one, but even then this woman’s strong - two hands shoot out and Ava and Alessia find themselves in identical chokeholds, lifted off the ground, and with a mighty roar hurled backwards against the wall. Ava’s back crashes against it, but Alessia’s balance is interrupted by a loose bolt that catches her toe, sending her tripping, head cracking into the wall as she slumps down, dazed.
The woman pushes herself up, dusting her arms off, and laughs, staring down at Ava, her mouth red from a split lip.
You always thought you knew best, Arthur.
You’re arrogant. Rogues’ Gallery are right about that. Ever since the very first day you walked in my door, I could feel it. You think the world owes you everything.
Ava spits blood in her face. The woman wipes it off and just smirks, but Ava rises unsteadily to her feet.
I do. It does. Because I’ve earned it.
Yeah sure whatever, I talk a lot. I can back it up. I was inches away from dethroning Peter Vaughn. I faced down the Cabal in a War Games cell and never surrendered.
Next to her, Alessia starts to stir. The woman just watches, impassively.
When you trained us, you taught us to be ruthless. That the only way to win was to be willing to bleed more than whoever we fought. To be the last ones to surrender. To be willing to reduce ourselves to dust, just so long as we broke the other fighters first.
You turned us against each other. Lied. Undermined. Beat and broken.
And for years afterwards, I thought you were right.
Ava’s right up against her now, face like thunder, jabbing a finger right into her ribs.
I thought you lit the fire in me. I burned so bright. Burnt friends, partners, enemies, managers, everyone.
Then I got to TPW. Without you. And I won. And won. And realised that you never knew anything. I was the fire all along. It’s been in me since the damn day I was born.
Alessia is on her feet, too. Just behind Ava. The woman, six foot one, towers over both of them, and still says nothing.
Jeremy and Duncan like to talk about the Shadow. This creature of darkness that makes them ruthless, unbeatable.
But when they let it out in the ring, at Winter Wrestleland, two monsters of the night will meet two burning torches, undimmed by our losses, our pain, the hits we’ve taken. Unbowed. Unbroken. Just like you’ve dogged our past, but you’ve failed to stop us.
And the darkness of the night will melt away in the light of a new, golden dawn. The champions will reign on. The demons will be banished back to where they came.
What’s a Shadow, against a righteous fire?
Ava breathes, hard. Silence in the air, as her words echo around the empty hall. And still, over them, the granite features of their former trainer, impassive.
Finally, she raises her hands, and claps. Once. Twice. Three times.
What a lovely little speech. You-
CRACK!
Dual superkicks to the jaw, and Ava and Alessia send her pitching backwards over the railing, and tumbling to the floor.
A sudden surprise on her face. A moment or two of silence… then a vicious, visceral crunch, as she hits the floor. Then nothing but the sound of their breathing.
Ava peers over the side, and after a couple of moments, Alessia joins her.
A long silence.
That felt… really good.
You know, Aves, I’ve never heard you speak like that. Not bad. I-
On the ground, the woman’s eyes snap open. She’s hurt, bad - probably a bone or two broken - but she starts to drag herself to her feet.
Goddamnit.
Right. I suggest we get going.
Ava doesn’t need telling twice. There’s a fire escape door at the end of the walkway - she shoulder-checks it open, and they slip out and down the stairs, vaulting the fence that surrounds the museum site, putting paces between them and the voices that begin to call out to each other in pursuit.
And as they run, Ava turns, looks over her shoulder at Alessia, and smirks.
Okay, it REALLY better be a good hotel.
Wordcount: 3,495
