Professional wrestling is a weird business, bro. I mean, on a real basic level, it all makes sense when you think about it; two fighters walk out to a right, to duke it out and test which of them is the better fighter on the night, a noble but I guess kind of barbaric sport that can truly make a person’s name if successful enough… but this business isn’t like any other, is it? It’s not like boxing, UFC, any other combat sport in the world, really. It stands alone in a field of one, there is no competition for this business because there is nothing like it in the world of sport. Maybe that’s a good thing? I dunno if it’s the business that attracts people of a certain type, or it’s the business that forms people into the ilk that you see every week on television, but here I am, working in a business that I don’t think I will ever truly understand. I don’t think many truly do if I’m honest… but I don’t know if we need to understand it either. Maybe I’m talking crap, maybe this is just a whole load of disjointed thoughts kind of running out of my mouth, I dunno, but… well, I just think about the business in a different way at times, you know? Maybe it’s since returning, or maybe it’s since I’ve been working with my brother again. That may be it. I used to have an entirely different outlook on things when I was new to the business; I know that everyone comes in all full of piss and vinegar when they get started, but it wasn’t just my first couple months where I was that idealistic, it stuck with me through my whole run before the accident. I know that there’s every chance that ultimately, I’d have come to see things differently, similar to the way AJ did before he got hurt… but I didn’t look at the business in a negative light at all.
I guess I’m a little older, or a little wiser now, maybe… but the business doesn’t seem quite so rosy as it once did. Like I said, that’s probably the passing of time more than anything, maybe I’d have come to my senses in my first run if I’d not been involved in the unfortunate set of circumstances that I was… but that accident was kind of indicative of what this business is, why it’s never going to be comparable to boxing or mixed martial arts, any other combat sport. It’s one of a kind and as a result, it attracts people that want the freedom wrestling provides while still giving them an opportunity to beat the ever living fuck out of people. You’ve got to admit that we sure get some… unusual fucks in this business. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that every person that steps foot in a wrestling ring is off the scale when it comes to their psychiatric profile, but I definitely have some questions of what kind of background checks companies do before throwing out contracts. If this was the eighties or maybe the nineties, I’d understand; someone comes in and looks the part, well you’ve got the job bro, welcome aboard. Don’t worry about the head injuries, say would you like some cocaine and steroids, they’re free? But these days… in a world of traumatic head injuries, lawsuits and camera phones, you’d think that talent scouts and owners would ensure that the people they’re hiring don’t have a screw loose, you know?
I guess I shouldn’t complain really. I mean, to be fair, I suppose until a certain time period, I’d have been considered one of those people that wasn’t quite right in the head, right? The way I arrived in SCW, attacking Konrad while dressed as a bear, facing someone else dressed as a bear in a squash match for my first official match in the company? The way I attacked people, the trolling, the games… I’d bet dollars to donuts that my actions or even just the things I said - given that I was known to go too far on more than a handful of occasions - would leave at least a few people saying that SCW should have been more thorough with their investigation and profiling before offering me a job. Can’t say I blame them. I mean, I can hold my hands up bro, and admit that I did do some horrible shit to people, be it physical or just grinding people down mentally. I’m not exactly proud of some of the things I did for the first six to nine months of my career, but I can’t change any of that now, can I? All I can do is try and be better going forward, and I’d like to think a lot of what I’ve done, either inside a ring or out of it, has helped make up for being a douche of the highest order at times but time will tell on that one. I’d like to think nobody’s irredeemable, you know? And sure, maybe there’s a few people I owe a few apologies to in the grand scheme of things, and maybe I’ll actually become humble enough to find those people and say sorry for the shitty things I said or did, but I don’t quite think I’m at that level of adulting yet. Or maybe Dave just got all the nice guy genes from our folks and I inherited the bastard genes, who knows? I mean, I used to think our parents were saints until I found out about Dom so it just goes to show you never can tell something about a person deep down, huh?
“I’d say penny for your thoughts coach, but from the look on your face I’d say I’d probably need to offer a few dollars,” A voice said from behind me, dragging me out of my revery and I turned to see Niamh walking towards me, her hair wet from the showers I assume, as she had a towel draped around her shoulders to keep her vest top from getting wet too. I looked up at the clock on the wall and realised that class had ended fifteen minutes ago, no wonder she was out of her gear. Amy had given me a small space in BlackOut to use as a sort of temporary office now that I was technically on the teaching staff, and I’d been in there for at least an hour before the last class started. I guess time just got away from me, more or less. “Everything alright, coach? You were in a world of your own when I knocked on the door… when you didn’t answer I wondered if you just didn’t want to talk but I realised you were kind of staring into space, so I risked interrupting…” she told me; I didn’t even know she’d knocked, jesus how deep into a world of my own was I?
“I, uh,” I said, stumbling over my words a little before pulling my head from the clouds enough to actually string a coherent sentence together. “Yeah, I’m good… just thinking about some stuff that’s all, sweetheart. Nothing to worry yourself about…”
“Anything I can help with?” she asked, giving me a helpful smile; I wasn’t exactly sold on the idea of taking on a student at first, I mean I can’t exactly say that I’m a great role model for someone when you think about everything I’ve done, and it’s not like I was a name in the business either, beyond my surname, which only had anything attached to it because of who I was related to… but Niamh seemed like a good kid, if I can call someone that’s twenty five years old ‘kid’ anyway. I mean, she wasn’t that much younger than me when you think about it!
“I’m the coach, remember?” I told her with a smirk; didn’t want to drag anyone into the pit I’d descended into. “It’s me that’s supposed to help you… and I clearly didn’t do a great job of that today, because your class already finished and I didn’t even stick my head in the door to check how you were doing. Sorry.” I finished, kind of lamely, but hey, it was a start. I mean, wasn’t I just saying that someday I’ll maybe get around to apologising to people that deserve it? One down, christ knows how many to go!
“Okay, first off coach, I’m well aware of our relationship here, okay?” Niamh told me, smirking. “You coach, big famous wrestler. Me student, little nothing with ambitions… but that doesn’t mean that, as one human to another, I can’t offer to help a brother out, does it? So I’m asking again, is there anything I can do to help?”
She had a point, I guess. Just because our dynamic was a certain way didn’t mean that she couldn’t help me out, and if I’m meant to be taking this chick under my wing then should include letting her in to certain aspects of my life too I guess… at the same time though, I wasn’t sure she could do anything to help either. This wasn’t a problem really, more like me running through things in my own head, trying to put some pieces together, wasn’t it? Or maybe the pieces were there, I was just trying to get them to assemble the complete picture? “To be honest sweetheart, I’m not sure there’s anything to do,” I told her, moving the mouse to drag the cursor on my laptop screen over to the little x to close the web page I’d been reading. “I was doing research, that’s all…”
“Researching what?” she asked, and I saw no reason not to tell her.
Sitting back in my chair, I gestured to the only other chair in what was now my office and threw my feet up onto the desk. “I was trying to look into the background of the asshole I’m facing at the pay per view actually,” I told her, throwing my arms behind my head. “I know a lot about him but don’t know anything about him, if that makes sense? Gio is batshit crazy, but that’s all people know, pretty much… I wanted to see what I could find out about the guy behind the insanity. Like, there’s got to be something there that I can use, right?”
“Okay, I’m following,” she said, sitting forward to lean on the desk. “You know about the now, but want to know about the then. Learn about his past, see where he came from, figure out who he is away from the cameras, etcetera?”
“I mean, kind of,” I said, frowning. “But I’ve spent time with the asshole away from the cameras, so it’s not really that… but I want a lever or a button, something I can push or pull, get inside of his head, you know?”
“Are you sure you want to get inside the head of a guy like Giovanni Aries though?” Niamh asked me, clearly concerned for my well being. As questions go, it wasn’t far off the mark to be honest, do you really want to get inside the head of someone who’s clearly not right in there? Probably not… but I’d already gone down the rabbit hole anyway, so what difference did it make now? “I mean, I’m all for the idea of finding a lever or whatever… but he’s not exactly stable. Are you sure you want to find out more about the guy?!
“I’m sure,” I told her. Like I said, I’m already down the rabbit hole anyway, may as well flush the burrowing little bastards out. “I’ve got to be sure anyway, this stupid Wonderland match is already booked for the pay per view… me and my big mouth, huh?”
“It does have a habit of getting you in trouble,” Niamh told me with a smirk. “Like last week, with that Jersey Street Fight. The fuck were you thinking, coach?!”
“We won, didn’t we?” I told her, getting a little annoyed despite the fact that I knew she was technically right. My big mouth did put us in that position, and yeah, we won, but we all came away from that match with more than just a victory for our troubles. I think I’ve left as many matches bloodied as I’ve left clean at this point. “But you’re right, it was my temper that made that match, I got carried away… kinda like I did with this Wonderland match too, but I want this over with. When I came back, with Dave and Lucas, I wanted to try and make a run of things, you know? I held the US title before losing it to Ms. Bitchy Face… don’t tell Amy I said that… and I blew my damn knee out in a tag title match. Things were actually looking up, I was building my own legacy instead of relying on my name, then boom, injury. Coming back was supposed to pick things up where they left off… instead, I got Gio and his fanatics coming after me. I needed to end it, and one way or another, that’s what this match is gonna do.”
“And if you lose?” she asked. It was a reasonable question, even if the lack of faith was a little annoying.
“It’s nice to know my protege has such faith in me,” I replied, deflecting. She saw right through it.
“Cut the crap, coach.” she told me, giving me a stern look. Jesus Christ, who’s the teacher and who’s the student here?! “I’m not saying I don’t think you can win, but I also know enough about the business to know that you may lose too… So what happens if you do lose? You say you want to end this once and for all, but if it ends with you being thrown down that hole, are you gonna be happy to just move on or is your big mouth going to get you in more trouble?”
I mean, I can’t say I blame the chick for asking, given my mouth’s penchant for getting me into mountains of fucking trouble… she might not have known me for all that long, but Niamh can see, hear, read etc, and it’s not like it’s much of a secret that I have a big fucking mouth. “I want to say that won’t happen, but… well, we both know what I’m like, so who knows. Far as I’m concerned, right now anyway, I’ve already won. I dunno if you’ve seen the promo’s he’s been cutting, but Gio keeps talking about how another week passes and another week, the Helms brothers didn’t die, words to that effect anyway… if that’s his aim, then they’ve dropped the ball each and every week. We’re still alive and kicking, and shoving me in a hole isn’t gonna change that. Even when they’ve won matches, we’ve been standing tall while they backtrack. The match is almost unimportant at this point…”
“And what if he does it this time?” she asked me, looking concerned. Did what, killed me?! Did she really think that Gio would kill me to prove a point about abandoning him, not believing in the wonderland?! “I know it sounds insane, I do… but we’re not talking about someone that’s known for their sanity and rational thinking, are we?”
I guess I can see what she meant, but I still couldn’t help thinking that she was going a bit over the top. “I know he’s unhinged, but he’s not a killer…”
“So you’re defending him now?” She asked, quirking a brow in surprise.
Was I? It didn’t feel like I was defending him, just because I wasn’t worried about the possibility of being killed by him during a match. I mean, death is a risk in any match we compete in anyway, right? It’s combat sports, it’s high intensity, it’s violent. Anything can happen out there in that ring… hell, I could slip from the top and break my neck and it’s goodnight Vienna! “I’m not defending him--” I started to say, trying not to sound annoyed by the insinuation but Niamh cut me off.
“Good, because you don’t know what he’s got planned for you in this thing!” she told me, flatly and with more concern than I would have actually expected. “But if he beats you, and again that’s only an if, but if he does beat you, you have to act accordingly… you say you’ve already won the war? Then prove it. Regardless of what happens at the weekend, when it’s done it’s done… promise me!”
“No offence sweetheart, but are you in any place to be telling me what to say?” I asked her, my temper flaring for a moment before snapping the lid shut on it again. “Look, I don’t mean to sound like a dick kiddo, but I’ve been doing this long enough to know what I’m doing… but you’re still--”
“I’m still a student, yeah yeah, but that doesn’t change the fact that I’m right!” Niamh told me, cutting me off again. “And you say I’m in no place to talk to you that way, but I’m supposed to be your protege or whatever, aren’t I? That means you took special interest in me over anyone else in this place and I’d like to think, or more importantly I’m just insisting, that that cuts me more slack than others… so yeah, maybe I’m out of place, but I also want to make sure I’ve still got a mentor when Cold Blooded is in the rearview!” she went on, and what did I even say to that?! “I believe in you, coach. I do. I think you can beat Aries at his own game, just like you beat The Wonderland in that street fight… but this Wonderland match needs to be the end of it, no matter what happens. You have people that care about you, coach; your wife, Amy… me…” And as she said that, she reached out across the table and put her hand on top of mine. Caught off guard, I looked down at her soft slender hand as it gripped mine, before slowly tilting my head back up to gaze at her, a brow raised. It made for an awkward moment bro, one that I can’t say I was comfortable with in all honesty. I’m guessing she picked up on that, because she moved her hand away as soon as she saw the look I was giving her, her face flushing with embarrassment. “Sorry, I should go,” she said, hiding her face as she went to stand up.
I didn’t even let her step away from the chair. “Sit down, dumbass,” I told her, and she looked up at me, doe-eyed and clearly uncomfortable, but she did as I said and sat back down in the chair. It was time to throw her a bone, in a completely innocent sense of the phrase. “You’re probably right,” I admitted, grudgingly. “Okay, there, I said it… you’re probably right about all of it, that if I lose my ego won’t let me let it go, that my big mouth will probably keep the war going, all of it.”
“Then promise me,” she said, folding her arms across her chest and while her cheeks were still flushed, it seems she was steeled by my admission that she wasn’t a million miles away from the truth with her assessment because she seemed to have gained confidence with it. “Give me your word that you’ll let it go no matter what happens and then we can stop talking about it and get back to what we started talking about…”
Fucking hell, she’s been my protege for a matter of weeks and she’s already pushing me around like we’ve known each other for years! Is there just something about me that draws in pushy or opinionated broads? I mean, I’m no misogynist but christ, Nia, Amy and now this chick?! But I nodded all the same. “Alright, you have my word,” I told her, making a promise that I hoped I could keep. “Win or lose, the war’s done with at Cold Blooded… just don’t be surprised if I ride your ass in training for a few days if I do lose and have to swallow my damn pride and keep my ego in check afterwards…”
She shot me a sly grin. “I didn’t realise we were that intimate yet, that we’re gonna talk about you riding my ass,” she told me, completely deadpan… I nearly fucking bit as well, before she laughed. That’s the second time she’s made that joke in the last few weeks, making a similar one when she text me after seeing me throw out the challenge for the street fight on Breakdown. “Alright, so now we’ve got you to see common sense, and established that you want to both go hard on me and ride my ass, how about we deal with the original problem from when I came in here… I take it you haven’t managed to find anything?” Niamh asked.
I slumped back in my chair and shook my head. “Have you ever tried to use google to find actual information about a famous person?” I asked, before laughing derisively. “The only hits I got were either wrestling wiki’s or dirt sheets with articles about him… and the SCW website obviously. Other than that though, I got nothing. Which means there’s either nothing out there or I just don’t have the means to find it…”
“That may actually be your problem,” Niamh told me, looking thoughtful. “I mean, it’s not like there’s a website out there that holds info on every famous person, is it? And the dark web may have some helpful sites but I doubt it’s going to just throw up the skeletons from Gio’s closet, because they’d be out already if it existed. Either extortion or just to expose him. Trolls love to do that shit,” she said before taking the towel from around her neck; her hair had apparently air dried enough to remove the need for it now. “But… I may be able to help out.”
How in the blue fuck did this chick plan to help out if she had literally told me that there wasn’t really anything I could do differently to get anything other than generic shit that I found myself in droves? “You got some magic wand you can wave that just conjures up the goods or something?” I asked her, doing a pretty shitty job of keeping the cynicism from my voice with it. What was I only saying earlier about being an asshole to people without meaning to be?!
“The only wand I have came from Amazon,” She told me with a shrug and another sly grin. I chose to ignore that one, it was too low hanging. “But I don’t need one anyway, not when I have connections that can help…”
“So now you’re part of some underground group of hackers or something?” I joked, imagining her to be some Lisbeth Salander figure, sending encrypted messages to her hacker friends, offering up a few dollars for someone to throw a dossier together on him. I burst out laughing. “Where’s your dragon tattoo then, huh Lisbeth?”
Either the reference was completely lost on her - which I find riduclously hard to believe given the popularity of those fucking books and movies - or she actually did have a way of getting dirt on him, and I sat up a little straighter in my chair. “First off, I have nowhere near enough piercings to be Salander, and I don’t hang around with overweight antisocial people online, trying to hack into computer systems, okay?” she said, finally cracking a smile. “But I don’t actually need hackers, I just have to make a call or two… I’m being serious.”
“Wh... how?!” I asked, genuinely curious now. How the fuck did some blonde chick from Louisiana have connections that could actually find dirt on someone like Gio?!
“See, that’s why you shouldn’t be such a judgemental asshole, coach!” she told me, laughing. “Ye have little faith, I’m actually insulted... “
“Can we get to the part where you explain how the fuck you can help in this situation?” I said, trying to move things a little quicker so I wasn’t clueless to what the hell was going on and how we went from zero to a hundred so quickly.
“I dunno,” she said, sitting back and leaning her head back looking up at the ceiling. “I mean, what’s in it for me, huh? You didn’t seem to want my help a few minutes ago, and now you’re begging me to get to the good part already… why should I help?” she asked playfully before lowering her head so that she was looking at me again, that mischevous fucking look in her eyes again.
“Name your price… if it turns out you’re not full of shit anyway,” I added as an addendum. I wasn’t gonna let her get away with some bullshit answer like her second cousin twice removed is a tin foil hat wearing flat earther that hear from someone who knew someone who claims Aries is part of the illuminati or some shit…
“You can buy me lunch for a start, I’m starving!” She said, grinning. I nodded in agreement, thinking that was acceptable. “As for what else, I’ll think on it…”
“Alright, fine, get thinking, but first tell me what the fuck you know that I don’t!” I told her, not caring what it was she’d end up wanting. “Call in any favour you want, how’s that?”
“It’s a deal,” she said, smirking as she held a hand out and we shook on it. She took her hand back with a big shit eating grin on her face. “My brother works in the capital…”
“What, Baton Rouge?” I asked, confused.
Niamh laughed. “No dumbass, D.C! He works for the government! And I can’t exactly tell you what he does, but let’s just say that if he searches someone’s name he won’t just get a few google hits and the gosip columns…” she added, looking like she lost a nickel and found a Benjamin.
“Holy shit, he’s a fed?!” I asked, but she shook her head.
“Nah, nothing that glamourous,” she said, shrugging. “It’s an office job really, all behind a desk. But he’s got access to certain systems that might help, if you know what I mean?”
“And he’s use that position for something as pety as this?!” I asked in disbelief. “Come off it sweetheart, his ass would be fired straight away. No way he risks his job because you ask him to look up the details of someone I’m in an argument with…”
“Ha. They all fucking do it,” She said, laughing at me like I was the little naive kid who doesn’t see how big and ugly the world can be. “He looked up my last boyfriend when we started dating… turns out I have a pretty shitty choice in guys. Domestic battery among other things. Really dodged a bullet there…” she went on, and the more I thought about it, I guess it made sense that people would take advantage of their position in most lines of work, really. I mean, okay, it’s a stretch to see someone breaking the law like that just to get me dirt on the guy, but is someone in this guys position doing that any different to say, a construction worker asking to borrow a bobcat for some landscaping at home? I guess not. “So you want me to make the call?”
“Do I want you to make the call?” I asked, incredulous. “Sweetheart, I could kiss you right now!” I told her, and she smirked at me.
“Is that before or after you ride my ass?” she asked and I burst out laughing. “Alright, I’m gonna make myself look like less of a hot mess, if you’re buying me lunch. I’ll make a call to my brother while I’m at it… it’s been a while since we’ve spoken, we could probably do with a catch up. You may suck at googling, but how about you use that thing to pick out a place to eat?” she asked, nodding her head at my laptop as she stood up. “And no fucking seafood, alright? I know Coach Amy loves crawfish, but not every chick in Louisiana does. Prefer turf to surf…” she added with a wink before making her way to the door, and I swear there was a fucking glow coming off of her like a halo as she made her exit.
I sat there, shocked to the point that I didn’t move for several seconds. How in the blue fuck had I stumbled across a potential goldmine of information without even knowing about it?! If her brother could get me something in time to use it against Gio in some way shape or form, that could be the key to making sure he didn’t just get his ass kicked in ‘New Jersey’ but in his own empire too. Or better yet, for his empire to come crashing down around him, just like it did when he faced the original Judas, Ace Marshall. I dunno whether I should be annoyed that I was the new Judas because Gio didn’t even have a new shtick to use, or flattered because I was following in the footsteps of someone who really got under his skin… but if Judas the first got the job done, I had to try and do the same, didn’t I? I don’t dislike Ace, in fact I actually think he’s pretty cool for the most part… but I can’t let him outdo me with something he did two years ago, can I? Dave wouldn’t ever let me hear the fucking end of it! Whatever though, that wasn’t important. It didn’t matter what happened the last time the wonderland match was used, what mattered was this incarnation. And if I was gonna stick to the promise I made about this being it, win or loss, I was gonna make use of whatever the fuck I could get my hands on. All I needed was that one thing, something juicy I could exploit or use, something that would swing things in my favour. I already knew that the deck was gonna be stacked against me; this was Gio’s party, I was just gatecrashing; if he didn’t have a slew of tricks up his sleeve, he wasn’t doing it properly… so if I could find an equaliser, whatever that may be… it could be a fucking gamechanger! Pulling my laptop closer to the edge of the desk, I started looking up places to eat; now all I had to do was find somewhere to take Niamh out to eat, and hope that her brother came up with something I could use! So… no pressure, there then, huh? Ha...
