Exiting the bar, Jacob McKail jammed both hands into the expansive pockets that his thin cotton jacket afforded and watched on with detached interest as his exhaled breath became visible to the naked eye and evaporated into the bitter easterly breeze. Despite his bloodstream still being laced with alcohol from a long day of severe liver abuse, the biting wind still cut into him like a damned machete and forced him to seriously consider turning his ass right back around and to re-embrace the stale beer stench of ‘Lou’s Sports Bar’ all over again. Truth be told, he didn’t know what the hell stopped him from doing just that, despite match preparations for his upcoming bout with Joshua Kosidlo menacing his to-do list at the back of his mind.

He continued along the street, head down and with his shoulder length unkempt black hair covering his face the best it could. Not entirely the pinnacle of illusive disguises, but the best he was willing to conform to. He had to at least put up the pretence of wanting anonymity, despite on a strictly subconscious level embracing his meagre notoriety -- not that he would ever admit it.

“You’re a real prick, ya know that?”

McKail didn’t even have to look up to know that particular sentence was directed at him and he didn’t, he simply continued to walk on; he’d found over the last two weeks or so that such a course of action managed to piss off his critics a lot more than actually responding to them ever did and that, of course, made McKail smile.

“You fuckin’ smiling’ under there, dipshit?” The man continued. His vocabulary and the tone he utilised suggested to McKail that this gentleman was African-American in race and wasn’t entirely well educated. The area of town McKail currently frequented, backed up his instincts. “Don’t you fucking’ walk away from me, boy.”

The man positioned himself directly in McKail’s path and stood there resolute. McKail glanced upward and found his instincts were right and, more importantly, discovered the man to be at least four or five inches taller than his respectable five foot eleven frame. He sighed.

“What? You too good to talk to me, mutherfucka?” The gentleman questioned, turning to his friends and shooting each of them a cocky grin. “Or you just too scared? Big tough wrestler who shits on his friends and his fans, is scared o’ me?”

McKail chuckled to himself. It had been only a matter of time before such a confrontation occurred again, hell, he’d spent the majority of the last two weeks being verbally assaulted by former devout fans or at least casual FUSE viewers alike, but none of them had ever come looking for his blood before.

He left that to loved ones.

Awake
Detroit, Michigan,
Some crappy motel room,
Then…

McKail was cruelly shook into life with the door being busted open and a voice that immediately followed it. “Jesus H. Christ!”

McKail groaned into life, sleep encrusted in between his eyelids and face, making seemingly impossible to open his eyes. Not that he wanted to. It took his brain a second or two to both analyse and identify the perpetrators voice, but once it kicked into life, it’s answer was absolutely correct; it was Caroline.

McKail groaned again. He swung his legs over the side of his bed and rubbed his eyes free from sleep. In retrospect, there should’ve been no real question as to the identify of the perpetrator; there was only handful of who’d go out of their way to locate him and only one that’d express concern, though he had no idea why. After all, it was only a few weeks ago since they’d had an argument in some damned dive bar up in Flagstaff, Arizona and she’d walked out of his life, he though forever.

Now, he met her with mixed emotions. On the one hand, he still felt something for her, even if he still hadn’t determined what, whilst at the same time felt that he was betraying his late wife for harbouring such feelings, for her own sister no less. Besides, the last thing McKail wanted right about now was another damned lecture and judging by her dramatic entrance, that was precisely what she had in store.

“What the fuck…” he murmured, still prising the sleep out of his eyes.

Caroline glanced around the place, arms folded and an expression of disapproval spread liberally across her face. Her eyes darted in between the empty junk food wrappers and the numerous depleted bourbon bottles and she sighed.

“Goddamn it, Jacob,” she began, wandering over the motel window and opening the chintz patterned curtains equally as dramatically as her entrance. “Look at the state of this place! Look at the state of yourself!”

McKail shielded his eyes from the light and groaned again. “What the hell are you doing here?”

“That’s nice, Jacob,” she responded. Hurt flashed across her face briefly, before she put it into check and established her strong demeanour. McKail almost regretted his words now, but with his sleep addled mind his first priority was to re-establish his motor functions, not the mastery of tact. “You treat all your girlfriends this way?”

McKail scrunched up his face confused. “Girlfriends?”

Caroline slumped down onto the lumpy motel room mattress right next to him and sighed. “Yeah.”

“Did I miss something?” He asked her, reaching for his cigarettes.

Caroline shook her head. “Nope.”

“But back in Flagstaff,” he responded, pausing as he placed a cigarette into his mouth and readied his lighter for action, “you walked out of my life forever. You remember that?”

“I never said it was forever, Jacob,” she told him. “I just wanted some time to think.”

McKail lit his cigarette and nodded in disinterred acceptance. “Done thinking yet?”

She shook her head. “Nope.”

“Then why--”

“I’m here because I know, Jacob,” she told him.

McKail exhaled cigarette smoke and shook his head, still confused. “You know what?”

“I know that you’re The Scourge.”

Just Deserts
The Bronx, New York,
The Streets,
Now…

Sat propped up against a boarded up shop window, McKail wiped the blood away from his mouth and chuckled to himself nonsensically.

“Are you okay?” A passer by questioned, extending his hand to issue assistance.

McKail glared up at the man, momentarily trying to determine by the look on his face whether he was about to find himself in a second street brawl in as many minutes. He took the hand regardless and assisted his ascent with the power of his legs. On his feet, McKail dusted his jacket off the best he could and then nodded a ‘thank you’ at the helpful citizen.

“What was all that about anyway?” He asked, quizzically.

McKail shrugged. “They think I’ve made the wrong career choice.”

The man nodded with acceptance at the cryptic answer. “I see.”

McKail glared at his attackers as they vanished into the distance. “Weirdest thing is, they didn’t even ask why.”