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Extremely graphic descriptions of blood and extreme violence
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Alicia wasn't sure which of the three Black Violets was the one swinging the chair, but at the last possible moment, she dove to the floor with a grunt to avoid all three. CLANG! The deafening smack of steel against steel battered Alicia's headache-addled brain hard enough to feel like an impact. The champion took a moment to regain her balance after missing a night-ending swing while Alicia threw one arm in front of the other, using the moment of peace to drag herself away and create some separation.
Rather than flee, she used her position on the floor to wrap her legs around Black Violet’s ankles. With a sharp twist, Alicia executed a Drop Toehold, sending Black Violet face-first to the ground. It looked like another chance. Alicia threw herself at her prone opponent, braving the overpowering, ripe aroma somewhere between sweaty athlete's foot and a clogged butcher shop drain.
She wrapped one hand around the scuffed, worn-through blue heel and the other around the ragged, barely white toe of Black Violet's secondhand wrestling shoe. Alicia struggled and yanked at the ratty material to little avail as blood poured down her face, but she had neither the power nor leverage to pry it free.
Black Violet stood up and dragged Alicia headfirst into the steel staircase with a clang that blurred her vision further. When the champion grabbed another fistful of french braid to drive her bloody foe's head into the steps again, Alicia threw a back elbow that struck her attacker on the point of her nose yet again, causing the champ to squeal in pain and let go. Alicia scampered on her hands and knees up the steel steps and spilled into the ring through the bottom and middle ropes. The damp wheezing grew louder in her ears as her monster closed the distance behind her.
Just five more feet, and the former hockey player would be reunited with her favorite weapon. Four feet, and a vice grip clamped onto her right ankle. Three feet, and Alicia felt nails like ice picks in her left calf through her jeans. Two feet, and two sets of claws dug into her back. One foot, and the rabid champion sat her full weight on Alicia's shoulders. With half an inch to go, a pair of contorted, ivory hands lanced past Alicia's grasping, outstretched arms and snatched away her hockey stick. In one violent motion, Black Violet slipped the stick under Alicia's chin and dug the lumber into her throat.
Alicia dug at the weapon with callused fingers, trying to pry enough room to steal one more breath before her wits returned. Once again, she reminded herself to stick to the gameplan and called upon her fast-depleting reserves to push herself and Black Violet up off the mat. The challenger took a moment to steady herself before crawling toward her offensively green nylon gym bag. Darkness encroached on her vision as she starved for oxygen behind the inflexible wooden hockey stick.
Alicia reached into her gym bag and grabbed a white hockey helmet with yellow lightning bolts on either side. She whipped the helmet behind her, cracking the hard plastic into what by now had to be at least a bloody nose. The ghost of Plunj Arena cried out hurt and loud as she recoiled, permitting Alicia enough slack to escape the choke. She dropped the helmet and took three rapid, greedy gulps of the good stuff before rising to her feet and pulling Black Violet up with her in a waistlock.
Alicia folded the TV Champion's left calf back and hoisted her high in the air before throwing her down knee-first onto the helmet. A primal scream filled the arena as Black Violet reached with both hands to protect her damaged knee. Alicia used the diversion to snap up Black Violet's right ankle in her hands to lock in a tight Figure Four. Alicia couldn't afford to let the fight drag out any longer. Unfortunately, she had not consulted the champ before revising the timetable.
As much respect as Alicia had given her opponent's upper-body strength, it hadn't been enough. Black Violet sank her talons into the canvas and crawled for the ropes while Alicia secured a two-handed grip on the remaining shoe and gave it a hard pull. Nothing doing. Two pale arms in shredded straitjacket sleeves stretched for the bottom rope and grabbed hold. With a deafening shout and an equal surge of strength, Alicia yanked the second shoe free. Lunch rose in her throat in protest at a rancid, overpoweringly sour stench like onion compost. The foulness would cling to her memory for life.
Black Violet used her grip on the bottom rope to pull herself over the edge of the ring, dragging the challenger still applying the Figure Four along for the ride. Alicia threw her arms back and snagged the handle of her hockey stick with the tips of her fingers just as gravity took over and sent her out of the ring with a lurch. The impact on the floor jolted the Figure Four loose, but Black Violet left a wide-open target. Alicia jabbed the heel of her stick again into Black Violet's gushing nose, causing the Mother of Nightmares to howl in outrage and pain, but it wasn't a clean hit. Just as Alicia got to her feet, there was Black Violet. She needed to slow the champion down.
Too late. The champion grabbed a handful of braid and dragged Alicia towards the fishhook cocoon. Several stumbling, reluctant steps later, and there it was. A place hostile to the very notion of flesh. Bedlam for human skin.
Alicia slammed the hockey stick blade onto Black Violet's right foot, mashing her pasty, mildew-encrusted toes. The crowd noise paled in comparison to the screech of anguish that followed. Alicia raised the stick again and slammed it down onto the left foot, and then a second time for good measure. With a fourth brutal slam of the wood, the howling, wounded champion shoved Alicia hard to the floor and staggered away to find some respite.
Fishhook teeth raced to meet the challenger as she careened face-first toward the body bag. At the last possible moment, she let go of the hockey stick and caught herself with her palms. Her mouth instinctively went agape in a silent scream as rusted, razor-sharp metal sank hungrily into meat. Alicia gasped for breath, but she couldn't scream.
A quick
look back revealed her shrieking, straitjacketed opponent writhing
on the floor in pain. Alicia rose to her knees and then to her feet,
involuntarily carrying the body bag with her. She counted three- no, four hooks in her left hand and two in her right, plus one more in the tip of her right index finger
screaming for the most attention. She bent down and lowered her hands, allowing the body bag to touch the floor. Alicia grit her teeth as she stepped
on either side of the bag, pinning it to the ground. Breathe in, breathe out. She braced herself, then yanked both arms upwards as hard as she could, ripping her pincushioned hands free of all but two of the hooks. Those traveled with her.
At least the one in the heel of her right hand only partially sank in, just past the barb. Alicia brought her hand to her mouth and bit down on the metal with her right lateral incisor and cuspid--Dr. Pupe would be proud. The sour taste of rust did little to distract from the newfound, throbbing pain in her hand as she yanked the intruder out with her teeth and spat it on the ground. The final hook had burrowed deep in the side of her left hand but hadn't decided yet where it wanted to emerge. One more thing for the ER to sort out.
Alicia noticed eruptions of dark purple beneath Black Violet’s sickly, cracked yellow toenails as she reached for the ring apron to pull herself up. Alicia seized the opportunity to run in the opposite direction and took a hard right turn around the ringpost. There was the timekeeper's table and
the title belt, but she had one more stop to make first. Alicia reached under the ring skirt and gingerly inched
out a wooden folding table just enough to open one set of legs and lock them in place.
Black Violet loped around the corner in lukewarm pursuit. Rather than pull the table out further, Alicia turned and sprinted for the timekeeper’s table. With trembling, bloody fingers, she lifted the heavy leather strap high above her head and locked eyes with its owner. The timekeeper stood up from his chair, raising his hands to indicate a lack of involvement as an audible gasp rippled through the stands. Black Violet froze at the transgression as Alicia took a step closer.
“Uh oh!” said Alicia with another heavy step forward. “Sorry, is this yours?”
Champion and challenger stared daggers at each other. Eyes of pure hate, a gashed-open nose, and a screeching mouthful of thorns broke off at a run towards Alicia, who threw the TV Championship belt as high into the air behind her as her remaining strength allowed. For a moment, the void stopped staring back. Black Violet charged ahead, eyes trained on the object of her desire rather than contempt until the latter eclipsed the former. The belt clattered to the ground behind Alicia. Once again, the abyss stared into her soul.
The abyss should've been watching its step.
With a roar, Alicia tightened her hands around the table leg, yanking the upside-down table out from under the ring, presenting a wooden welcome mat of three dozen loaded mousetraps, all super glued in place and presenting eager, open jaws.
SNAPSNAP.
Black Violet's eyes widened in horror as she went rigid and fell to the ground, her mutilated feet unable to support her. She tried to break her fall with her hands. It was a bad idea.
SNSNSNSNSNSNSNSNSNAP.
The crowd fell silent as they beheld the gruesome aftermath, and Alicia permanently lost her appetite for chili dogs. She turned from the flesh and wire calamity, stomach revolting at the sight of Black Violet's futile thrashing among the web of destruction below, the image of crushed fingers and disfigured toes seared forever in her memory. Black Violet's primal, anguished screams still hadn't yet fully accounted for it all.
Alicia screamed at the frozen body in black and white stripes, "Count! What are you doing?! COUNT!"
It took a second, but the referee nodded and started a count that might've been a tad fast, "One! Two! Three! Four!"
Alicia threw the ring skirt aside and dug around for some insurance. A folding chair would do, and so it did. She wrapped her hands around the black steel legs and stepped into swinging range. The referee's count was completely lost among the raving, insane screams. What did you make me do?!
"Five! Six! Seven! Eight! Nine!"
Alicia hoisted the steel above her head as she towered over her pitiful, ruined opponent, ready to swing. Completely unnecessary.
"Ten!"
Paramedics had already gathered at ringside while Alicia remained trapped in the void of Black Violet's eyes. "Let them help you!" pleaded Alicia over the screams of agony and shouted medical jargon as hot tears streamed down her cheeks.
Black Violet thrashed violently on the table in her cruel improvised restraints as Alicia tried to reach her, "They don't want to hurt you! Let them help! Please! Please! Black Violet, they don't want to hurt you! I'm sorry! Black Violet, I'm sorry! But you made me. You made me do it. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry. You made me. You made me."
That porcelain face had turned beet red. Hysterical shrieking turned to frantic gasps and back again. Now the void was staring past her. Black Violet raised a handful of wilted, shivering fingers like an empty surgical glove drenched in salsa. She stabbed at the air, pointing at the white cloth bag in her corner. The hate in her eyes melted away and laid bare a canvas of pain and fear. Her screams rose another octave as Alicia obeyed her victim, retrieving the bag and lowering it before her. Two purpled sets of sagging, bloated digits peeled at the air, gesturing to open it. Alicia did.
Flat, twisted, hairy, smashed legs. A crust of pinkish-orangish-mostly brown smeared across the inside like dried jellies. Alicia recognized the remains of the massive, hairy arachnid bystander she fell alongside and onto that night in the boiler room. A pale, misshapen hand lifted and received the bag's strap around her less mangled wrist as the abyss of Black Violet's eyes welled with tears.
"Oh my gosh," Alicia whispered. She raised a trembling hand to her lips in realization. Silence. Guilt piled onto guilt, and more silence. "I killed your pet." Alicia staggered toward and up the ramp, past the referee and the belt. "I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I’m sorry," she repeated.
Alicia headed back up the ramp as Sabrina and Party Girl burst through the curtain, smiles beaming, lost in the moment, reveling secondhand in a glory Alicia hadn’t felt. She was walking on air, but with turbulence. There was Sabrina, in her dark, backstage-friendly attire, and there stood Party Girl, clad in her pink and yellow street clothes--a tank top and jean shorts cut high up on the thigh--with her tiny backpack hanging from her tanned, bare shoulders. She awaited the new champion with open arms, no doubt anticipating a close-up shot for the cameras. The new TV Champion noticed the folding chair still clutched tight in her hand and dropped it to embrace the ones who were with her through everything.
"Ho-ly shit it worked! We did it!" squealed Party Girl, jumping up and down with one arm around Alicia, seemingly oblivious to her shattered tag partner’s tear-streaked face and frayed nerves. She pressed her cheek to Alicia’s and flashed a Look for the cameras. "Mwa! I knew it would work!"
There was comfort in her friends' arms, but the screams still rang loud in Alicia's ears. Party Girl turned and sprinted down the ramp to retrieve the belt, leaving Alicia side-by-side with her mentor.
"You're crazy, you know that?" Sabrina couldn't help but tighten her arm around the new champ's shoulders. Alicia paid careful attention not to let the fishhook in her hand snag on anything. "Fuckin' mental. Hell of a way to win a belt."
"No more hardcore stuff," mumbled Alicia. "I'm done with no-DQ matches."
"Never say never in pro wrestling," Sabrina cautioned with a smile. She turned to look Alicia over and finally noticed the lingering horror in her former student's eyes. "But why for God’s sake did you go after Black Violet? Because she bit you? You touched her belt, right? That's what she does. It wasn't personal."
"When was anyone going to tell me about this?!" Alicia lashed out in frustration, her voice and hands trembling from the adrenaline dump. "And yes, it was personal. She bit me. She stalked me. She came to my house. She killed Party Girl’s cat," she said, half-whimpering.
The concern on Sabrina's face turned to confusion, "She left the arena?"
Alicia shrugged Sabrina's arm off her shoulder. "Did you hear what I just said? She stalked me!"
The stern reply met a pair of raised eyebrows as Sabrina again tried to clarify, "You saw her?"
Alicia shook her throbbing, gashed-open head in frustration. "No, but when Party Girl-"
Sabrina's expression turned to shock a split-second before a pink sneaker smashed into her jaw and sent her sprawling to the floor. Alicia turned just in time to get an up-close look at the ten pounds of silver, steel, and gold barreling toward her. The belt crashed into her blood-soaked forehead with a sickening smack, sending the new champion to the ground.
Party Girl knelt beside her former tag partner and swung a fistful of hot pink brass knuckles into her temple. The blow caused Alicia's vision to flash and go dark before blurring back into focus. She watched helplessly as Party Girl picked up the discarded steel chair and approached Sabrina as she attempted to push herself up off the floor.
"Bring back any memories?" asked Party Girl, flattening Sabrina with a brutal chair-shot to the back before tossing the weapon aside. "Hm. Here, let me remind you!" she spat, punting the former wrestler in the ribs.
Party Girl took a moment to admire her handiwork before driving those brass knuckles into the back of Sabrina's head. She rolled Sabrina onto her back and sat on her chest, hammering metal-reinforced haymakers down onto the veteran's forehead, opening a number of bloody, weeping gashes. Rivulets of crimson poured down the former wrestler's face and pooled on the stage as she fell motionless.
"No?" The fashion icon pouted. "Oh! I know!" With an impish smile, she wrapped the folding chair around Sabrina's cast.
Alicia struggled to sit up, to pull her mentor away, to do anything other than watch as Party Girl jumped on the folding chair, crushing the bone and hyperextending the trapped elbow. The horrific finale elicited no response from her victim. Sabrina was totally out.
"Hey bestie!" cooed Party Girl, turning to look at her former tag partner. "Don't worry, I didn't forget about you!"
She peeled the chair off Sabrina's arm and seemed to savor the moment as she hoisted it high above her head. She crushed Alicia's right knee with a massive swing as the new champion cried out in misery. Party Girl raised the chair and struck Alicia again, this time on the side of the knee. Searing pain exploded from the wounded kneecap and connective tissue as Party Girl hammered it a third time with the steel. Alicia screamed her throat raw, groping for her injury with heavy, barely responsive arms.
Party Girl reached into her backpack as she stood with the title belt on her shoulder above her former tag partner. Through hazy vision, Alicia could read the Look on Party Girl's face as she clutched the Queen's Decree in her hand.
"So," Party Girl chirped sweetly. "Let's talk about that title shot."
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