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It would be Jill McKill vs. Alicia Winthrop in a no-disqualification street fight. The week had somehow dragged and raced by at once, but on the morning of her grudge match, the part-time wrestler moonlighting as a full-time office assistant found herself ahead of schedule for her blood feud.
Alicia woke at 6:30 AM sharp, knocked out her morning lifts, showered, ate breakfast, threw away her mail, and packed an extra Vegemite Brekkie Square for work. Into the trunk went her gym bag alongside a chipped wooden hockey stick with tape on the handle that had nearly given up. Whereas most of her teammates went with graphite or carbon fiber, Alicia preferred the weight of wood. If she was going to go to the penalty box for high sticking, she wanted it to count.
The workday faded into the bright lights of skyscrapers against the night sky and the growing silhouette of an arena on the horizon. The engine of her gravely ill French automobile squealed to a stop in the back lot of the Plunj Drain Cleaner Arena. Maybe when Queens of War started paying her for matches, she could afford to get it fixed. Focus.
Alicia took the combination lock she bought at Things 'n More and popped the trunk, piling out of the freezing car and into the even more freezing night air. She grabbed her stick and gym bag and strode through the talent entrance with purpose, making her way through the corridor until she stood between the two locker rooms. Decisions, decisions. For a moment and a moment longer, she considered standing her ground. What was another $14.29 plus tax?
No. Save it for the ring--and anywhere else the fight spilled.
With a final, angry glance over her shoulder, Alicia pulled open the door to the other locker room. The first locker to the right was vacant. Alicia slung her bag into the open space and finally got around to that double-take she had been putting off.
No question, that was definitely a title belt laid on the edge of the bench by the door to the showers. It wasn’t the Queen of Queens Championship, but she couldn't tell if it was the TV or Tag Team Championship from at a distance. She resisted the urge to take a closer look and changed into her new ring gear. Tonight called for something more than her usual red singlet. She had originally gone with the red and blue jersey from an old off-season league, but decided on one from her high school varsity years instead. White with yellow accents. If she was going to bleed, she wanted everyone to see.
Now dressed for the occasion in a pair of torn jeans and an old hockey jersey, the first-time hardcore wrestler took a seat on the bench beside her locker and clutched her hockey stick tight in both hands. Where is everyone? Then she remembered tonight's opening contest was the annual six-way, Falls Count Anywhere match for the promotion’s coveted golden ticket: the Queen’s Decree, redeemable at any time for a title shot of the winner’s choosing. No doubt the entire roster had gathered backstage to watch.
Who's even in the match this year? Shieldbreaker Mazenda, Party Girl, of course--she's always in these things--Kendra Terminus, um… Phenom, I think? No idea about the other two. Alicia wished she could hang out in gorilla and watch. Maybe she could, but Sabrina said someone would come to the locker room to get her if she was on the main card. She wasn't about to mess up this debut.
What time is it? 7:05 PM. Had they forgotten? The collegiate MVP stared at that championship belt miles away just 30 feet across the room and gave in to temptation. Alicia rose from the bench and hoisted the Division II trophy high above her head as she took another lap around the ice. There was Zack. That meant her parents must be sitting somewhere else. Guess he did amount to something, huh, Mom and Dad?
The star carved another wide loop around the rink as Rachel and Kris skated up behind her and threw their arms around the soon-to-be graduating hat-trick artist. There was Julia in the goalie pads. Back to center ice. The multiple record-holder passed Ashley the cup, who then gave it to Kris, who then handed it to maybe Ingrid. One by one, the team passed the trophy around.
Alicia joined her teammates swarming Coach Ellering as the slender, rosy-cheeked fortysomething in the Langston University Athletics windbreaker shuffled onto the ice. They had pulled off the threepeat. Without Kelly Beardsley. Without Spinelli. Without Jana Hirsch. They did it. Not the names. Not the national team hopefuls. They did it.
Alicia approached the belt. It was the Queens of War TV Championship. When was the last time it was even defended?
Coach reached center ice and wrapped one arm around Alicia, her "captain-from-the-bench," beaming with unmistakable pride. "Any chance I can convince you to flunk all your finals?" she asked.
Alicia noticed something tucked under Coach's right arm as she returned the hug. "Believe me, I've thought about it," replied the graduating senior.
"You left behind a good example to follow. Kris really grew this season under you. She'll be ready to lead next year," said Coach, presenting an engraved wood and gold plaque. "This is from the whole team. Everyone."
Alicia looked at the award in her trembling hand: "Division II Collegiate Sports Cup MVP 1999 - 2000." The misty-eyed MVP embraced her mentor, leaned down, and took a closer look at the title belt. Worn, jet-black leather strap, rectangular silver faceplate inlaid with gold, "Queens of War TV Champion" stamped in red steel. The former hockey player pressed the palm of her hand to the faceplate and ran her fingers along the leather. Someday, she would hold something like it.
"Thank you," Alicia half-shouted over the cheers. "Seriously, thank you for everything."
"It's been a heck of a ride, hasn't it?" Coach E turned to face her star forward, lips curled back in a snarl, teeth bared, bloodshot, pitted, sleepless eyes staring pure hate from behind a filthy, matted black mane of greasy hair. Just beyond the doorway in a nearby shower stall, stood a tall, gaunt woman with a dark gaze and a pale, white complexion stained with violet tears. Alicia's breath caught in her throat as she stumbled, backpedaled, and inadvertently batted the title belt onto the ground with a clatter that caused the sneering menace behind the shower curtain to straighten.
"I, um-" Alicia gasped for an excuse while she tripped and landed on her backside.
"Alicia!" called a voice from the locker room entrance.
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!" replied Alicia with a silent scream.
"You're needed in gorilla," called the crew member. "You're almost up."
Alicia could only nod as she dragged herself backward. The Mother of Nightmares leered in similar silence from behind the curtain, her pallid, sagging features knotted in contempt. Alicia rolled to her hands and knees, scamper-crawled to the rugged wooden hockey stick leaning against her locker, pulled herself to her feet, and bolted out the door, past the waiting crew member, and into the hallway. Breathe. Breathe, breathe, breathe, breathe, breathe, that's too many. There was the black curtain, and behind it, the safety of a shadowy backstage area full of blind corners. She looked over both shoulders, scanning the darkness behind her as she clutched her hockey stick tight. Had she been followed? Alicia hurried past the table with the book and the format sheet. Wait. She doubled back.
"Allen, can you have Guy announce me as something else?"
The magenta-clad co-owner covered the microphone of his headset. "Yeah. Hurry up, what is it?"
"I'm Alicia 'The Goon' Winthrop." Allen gave her a quick nod as she pushed through a group of wrestlers in various states of civilian clothes and ring attire. Alicia took her mark and watched the action unfold on a nearby monitor.
Kendra Terminus sprinted across the ring holding a ladder, smashing into two of her opponents and sending them hard to the mat. Oh, right: Lillian Baxter and Texas Rose were the other two. Kendra dropped the ladder, clutching her forearm and chest, having not fully escaped the impact unscathed. In raced Shieldbreaker Mazenda from behind, who dropped low and threw her shoulder into the back of Kendra's knee with a chop block. The former Queen of Queens champion with purple and white hair dropped to the mat clutching her leg, writhing in pain.
Mazenda seized upon the opportunity by grabbing both Baxter and Rose off the mat and hurling them out of the ring before turning to face her remaining opponent. She reached down and grabbed Kendra by the nape of the neck when a roar in the crowd stole her attention.
On the stage by the curtain, Party Girl wanted to show the precariously perched Phenom her favorite party trick: folding chair-assisted dropkicks. With a hideous crash of metal and bone, Party Girl and the folding chair collided with Phenom's chest and skull, propelling both competitors off the side of the stage and through a pair of tables set up on the floor below, sending the already white-hot crowd into a frenzy. The jet-setter's motionless body lay sprawled atop Phenom among the splintered wreckage.
A second referee slapped the filthy arena floor as he counted the pin: "One! Two! Three!"
Falls count anywhere.
Ding ding ding.
"And your winner of the 2004 Queen's Decree: PAAAAARRRRRRTYYYYYYY GIRRRRRRRLLLLL!!!!!"
Alicia's main card debut would have to be delayed while medical personnel rolled out the stretchers. Anxious minutes passed in silence as the rookie paced in a tight circle around her mark while the crowd of wrestlers backstage filtered back to the locker rooms. She checked the monitor. It looked like everyone had been pulled out of the debris and the ringside area had been cleaned up. Alicia regretted finishing the entire bottle of H-Twenty on the drive to the arena. Then she almost really regretted it.
Ten feet away, maybe less, a ragged figure swelled up from the darkness between a scaffold and an unused lighting rig. Alicia choked back a gasp and strained to make out the shadow. She didn't need to. A gurgled whisper carried in the dark. "Alicia…" Wild eyes, teeth bared, crooked grin. The tall silhouette leaned through the gap in the production equipment. "Alicia Winthrop." A shape somehow both dark and pale pointed to the side of her neck with one gnarled, trembling finger. The warped smile vanished as she opened wide, exposing a mouthful of cruel thorns. She snapped her jaws shut. The smile returned.
"Alicia," barked Allen.
"Haaaaahhhhh?" came Alicia's sound-like reply.
Allen held up his hand. "You're out there in five."
"Minutes?" asked Alicia.
"No." Shove.
Alicia stumbled through the curtain. For a moment, she felt alone. Her confidence evaporated under the heat of 8,136 eyeballs. She'd have to get used to it sometime. Breathe in, breathe out. The announcer began the introductions.
"The following no-disqualification street fight is scheduled for one fall-"
"One fall!" the crowd shouted back.
"-With no time limit. Pinfalls and submissions can only take place inside the ring, but there are no count-outs, no rope breaks, and no rules. Anything goes!"
Alicia stared into the crowd, clutched the lumber tight in her right hand, and slammed the butt end of the stick down on the stage, dispelling the silence.
Bang.
She lifted her stick and slammed it down again. Again, and again, and again, picking up speed, until a few fans, and then some, and then more clapped and stomped in time along with the quickening rhythm. "Approaching the ring first, hailing from Longstat, Minnesota and weighing 193 pounds, she is ALICIA 'THE GOON' WIIIIIIIIIIIIINNNNNNNTHROOOOOOOOP!!"
Her pulse quickened as cheers–actual, honest-to-goodness cheers–rippled through the crowd as the pounding reached a fever pitch. The former hockey player grabbed her weapon of choice in both hands, helicoptered it overhead, and slammed the blade of the stick onto the stage. She squared up to the ring, reeled back, and fired off a massive slapshot as a renewed swell of cheers rose from the crowd. Alicia stormed her way down the ramp towards the ring, reaching out and high-fiving screaming, enthusiastic fans the entire way. With a single, giant step, Alicia climbed onto the ring apron, vaulted up and over the top rope, and took her corner.
A brief hush settled over the arena--almost long enough to get comfortable--before a booming military march and the woosh of fighter jets blared over the speakers. The disciplined march transitioned to a guitar-heavy rock anthem. To the right of the entrance, then the left, the concussion and fiery backdraft of pyrotechnics rattled the building. Finally, through the curtain stepped Alicia's self-appointed menace: the five-foot-nine-inch mean streak known as Commander Jill McKill. The Two-Woman Army joined her on the stage. The comparatively tiny "One Shot" Jaime Carlyle carried a steel folding chair with a camo paint job while the muscular Bridget Slaughter followed close behind.
"Commander" Jill McKill turned a sharp about-face and gave her Two-Woman Army a crisp salute, dismissing them to the back. The sniper tossed the Commander her chair before following her squadmate back through the curtain. Jill, dressed in camo pants and a black crop top, reached for an imaginary hand grenade at her hip, pulled the pin, and lobbed the ordinance towards the ring. Another blinding flash of pyro exploded halfway down the entrance ramp as two parallel rows of squibs went off to the sound of gunfire.
"And her opponent, hailing from Santa Rita, Guam and weighing 156 pounds," shouted the announcer over the chaos. "She is the leader of The Reinforcements. She is the Mastermind. She is COOOOOOOMMMMMAAANDNNNDERRRR JIIIILLLLLLLLL MCKIIIILLLLL!!"
The woman in camo pointed at the ring before taking off at a sprint down the ramp. She threw the chair into the ring and slid under the bottom rope after it. The Commander picked up the chair and held it to her shoulder like a machine gun, emptying the magazine into the WarMachine video display as her name appeared in digital bullet holes. She brought the back-rest of the chair up to her lips and blew on it like a smoking barrel, then rose to her feet, removed her shades, and tossed them out of the ring. She marched to her corner and stopped, turned, and raised her hand high to her brow, saluting her opponent. Then she lowered her arm along with three of her fingers and gave Alicia a different kind of salute.
The goon smiled as she clutched the hockey stick in her hands. It felt good to be back.
Ding!
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