The Brink lounge – Chicago, Illinois.

A martini bar. The kind of place that you can enjoy some piano music, pay too much for drinks, and be alone with your thoughts if you so choose. There were no rowdy kids taking whiskey shots just to get drunk, there were old men taking whiskey shots because they thought it tasted good.

This is where we find Carrie Midthun.

She isn’t so much to look at, but you get the idea that she used to be. A few kids, a few divorces – she wears these things like make-up. Which is not to say that she isn’t also wearing make-up, and plenty of it. But there is a certain elegance to her, a sex appeal that still catches the male eye, that thing that a prom queen or a head cheerleader never loses. It sits behind these other characteristics, almost like a spectator. But if you look close enough, its all you can see.

We find her now, three days after her 38th birthday, dressed in a black dress she had been tired of keeping in the closet. She was supposed to meet up with two friends from work for a cocktail, but they never showed. Four apple martinis later, her head is foggy and her eyes are glazed.

It is at this time of the evening that she usually goes through her contacts list, finding reasons to be upset with people.

Yes, it was almost obnoxious phone call time.

And then…

“Ma’am, the gentlemen in the corner wanted me to give you this.”

The bartender, Phillip she thought his name was, slides her an apple martini. And a note. The bartender immediantly turns away, seemingly embarassed.

Carrie glances to the corner booth, where a younger man with reddish hair is drinking a blind russian. As a SCCW fan, you might know him as Lane Stevens. He tips the drink in the air, as if to cheers across the room. She smiles politely at him, and then reads the note.

Will you have sex with me for five hundred dollars?

She looks up, her face showing signs of revulsion and confusion. And then the bartender hands her a second note.

Okay, two grand. I’m not even asking for anal here!

A moment later, she is handed a third note.

Unless you’re into that, in which case I’m asking for anal.

She actually laughs aloud at this note. Is this how absurd her life had become, she wondered, that it took a creepy guy like this to bring back those old feelings, of being desired by every boy in school? Carrie puts a hand through her long blonde hair, and tries not to look at her admirer. She thought of her credit card bill, and how she thought hse had seen a friend of her ex-husband’s in here earlier. Maybe he was still here. Maybe he would see her going home with another man.

As it turns out, four thousand dollars will be her price.

Such is life.

“It’s done.”

“I’d fuckin’ hope so. Not exactly rocket science.”

Reginald Sharnell leaned back in his chair, and put his feet up on his desk. His office was dimly lit, cluttered with art he did not understand. He was dressed in Minnesota Twins t-shirt, and jeans. His outfit seemed to directly contrast with his environment. A cell phone was pressed to his ear. On the other end of it, Walter Halvorson sounded uncomfortable. But then again, Walter almost always sounded uncomfortable.

“Miss Pierce would like the money deposited in the usual account.”

“That’s not gonna fly this time around, got a little more heat than usual, don’t want to do any electronic shit, if ya feel me. Gonna be cash. I’ll call in a few hours to arrange the drop. Oh, and give her my regards. And a slap on the ass,” Reginald said, and smiled to himself.

Walter paused, unsure of how to proceed.

“Thank you Mr. Sharnell.”

Click.

In Carrie Midthun’s defense, waking up hung-over in a hotel room with a strange man was not how she typically spent her Wednesday mornings.

But, it is how this one is shaping up.

The first thing she sees upon opening her eyes is a dresser directly in front of the bed. Bottles of Kahlua, Absolut vodka, Southern Comfort, Bombay Sapphire Gin, Maker’s Mark whiskey, and chocolate chip cookie liqueur sit on top of said dresser.

What she says is: “Ugh”.

The second thing she sees is a man clad only in Scooby-doo boxer shorts sitting on a chair to the left of the bed. He is staring thoughtfully at a blank wall. She briefly notices his biceps, and admires it. Carrie has never been into super buff guys, but she appreciates a good physique just as much as the next gal. His face is badly scarred from encounters with Amy Campbell and Dusk, and she enjoys the mystery of this, even though she would never admit such a thing.

Lane Stevens is eating a banana.

“Hi,” she says, suddenly realizing her nakedness.

“Hi.”

The River Rat smiles, and takes another bite out of his banana.

“Look, I’m not…”

“I know, I know. You aren’t a whore. You usually hold hands and go on five dates before fucking,” Lane interrupts, mimicking a talking motion with his left hand.

She covers herself.

“You don’t need to impress me,” Stevens starts, “although last night you certainly did.”

There’s that smile again. Carrie is unsettled by it, to say the least.

“Just who the hell are you, anyway?”

“Just a guy in town on a job.”

“What kind of job?”

The Hand’s WMD tosses the banana peel over his shoulder. It lands on an empty Captain Morgan bottle. His gaze returns to the blank wall.

“Not my day one.”

Reginald closed his cell phone. When the other man in the room addressed him, he took his feet off the desk and sat straight up.

“Walter may be spineless, but there’s a reason why he’s been in her employ for as long as he has. He is smart. He is very fucking smart.”

Mr. Sharnell’s guest looked to be in his early fifties. He wore a brown trench-coat over a black suit. His face looked worn down, eroded, the way rocks could be. His voice had a certain gravity to it, a certain weight. It had the burden of secrets, terrible secrets.

“He’s probably figured out something is wrong,” the man continued, “but this has been accounted for.”

The man took a drag from a cigarette.

“Mr. Hayden,” Reggie said, his cocky tone and slang shrunk away, “what is the meaning of all of this, if I may ask? This seems like a lot of trouble just for…”

He trailed off.

With the absence of an ash trey (Reginald does not usually tolerate smoking in his office) Mr. Hayden dropped his cigarette to the ground, and put it out with his foot.

“I think once you get your cut you will realize that your ignorance is worth more to us on this project than your knowledge. I will be in touch.”

And with that, Mr. Hayden stood up to exit the office. He paused at the door, and turned back towards Reggie. It seemed to be a smaller, castrated version of his new business partner.

“Who did she use for the deed?”

“Wrestler named Stevens,” Reginald replied. “Another one of her thugs, word is he’s a real grade A cocksucker.”

“Oh, I know,” Mr. Hayden said plainly. “I was there.”

Mr. Hayden had a habit of ‘being there’.

“Then why did you ask?”

“Just making sure you are doing your homework. Goodbye, Reginald.”

And with that, Mr. Hayden closed the door.

“You’re a real cocksucker too,” Reginald said under his breath.

In the hotel room, Lane and Carrie had discussed a wide variety of subjects.

At this point he is zipping up her black dress, and she is drinking a mini bottle of apple juice from the mini-bar. Despite what happened the previous evening, she seems uncomfortable with his fingers on her. He feels differently on the matter, and smirks as his fingers trace over her back for entirely too long. After finishing the zip job, Lane grabs a half finished blind Russian off the dresser.

He takes a big gulp of it, and sets it down again. There is a bit of bailey’s liqueur left in his stubble.

“You regret last night?” Lane asks, his face scrunching together with curiosity.

She contemplates this for a minute, observing him out of the corner of her eye.

It begins to dawn on her now, the sort of man that she slept with. She can tell by watching him that he isn’t drinking because he’s depressed, or having a bad day. He isn’t drinking at eight am to prove that he’s a badass. He’s drinking because that’s just…what he does. And the way he talked. How could a grown person be this way? In her circle of friends, she had never encountered anything quite like it. There was a fierceness and openness to him that she could not resist, as vile as it may have been.

“Do you even care?”

“Nah, I guess not.”

She sighs, retrieving her purse from the floor.

“What do you care about?”

“You know, the way it feels when you quench a thirst. The way my body tingles after four vicodin. Stepping into an air conditioned house after a day in the Nevada sun. That first moment of penetration.”

He smiles broadly at the last comment, and this causes her to turn away.

“Just moments, really. Because everything else is fleeting. People, relationships, jobs, but a moment can last forever in a context free zone. You can’t take away a moment. Some cunt aborted my kid like ten years ago…cooze didn’t even tell me she was pregnant. But I still remember the exact second when I realized that she was into me. We were at this grill your own steak joint, and she had me cook hers for her, cause she didn’t know what the fuck she was doing. And I felt like such a man, you know? Just the way she looked at me. A great fucking moment.”

Carrie nods. She can’t help but look upon her mistake again.

“Well I’ve got to take a walk, see if my car has been towed. You need a ride anywhere? To work?”

“My job here is supposedly done,” Lane replies, a bit of apprehension in his voice.

The day before.

Picture a large white house, all by its lonesome in the small gap between the suburb of Wheaton and the beast that is Chicago. It is surrounded by tall Bald Cypress trees. If you would have been taking a walk on that morning what might have caught your eye is a rusted out red van was parked parallel to the garage door, blocking the way to the street.

”Supposedly?”

”The kind of people I take orders from…”

The garage door opened slowly, and a BMW began to emerge, but stopped suddenly. Its driver noticed the van in his rearview mirror. An older man with white hair and a white goatee stepped out of the car, and walked into his driveway. His head was on a swivel, looking everywhere around him frantically. Finally he noticed, written in the dust of the backseat window on the van, these words: “Tough break”.

His brow furrowed.

“…shit has a tendency to get complicated.”

Out of the bushes that lined against his driveway, a man with a gray hooded sweat shirt and gray sweat pants lunged, and struck the older man in the back of the head with a brick, sending him tumbling to the ground. Without even pausing to admire his handiwork, a rare thing indeed, Lane Stevens hopped into the rusted van’s driver seat and in a moment was on his way.

The older man laid there, unconscious but still breathing.

In the bushes on the other side of the drive way, a man in a brown trench coat put away his camera. Mr. Hayden did not smile, because he was used to things going his way. He simply retreated into the shadows that he found such comfort in, and lit a cigarette.

Flash.

An hour later.

Picture a board room. Several older men and women sat around a circular table, and one by one they cast their vote. Except for one empty chair. A measure had passed that day, by one vote.

Flash.

The old man was being helped into an ambulance.

“I have to be somewhere!” he screamed. “For god sake, I have to be somewhere!”

One of the ambulance workers rolled her eyes.

“So what’s your day job, then?” Carrie asks, on her way out the door.

“Motivational speaker,” The River Rat replies, and slams the remainder of his drink.

She laughs, lingering in the doorway for an extra second, and shaking her head.

His actual day job: sending a message.

What you are about to witness is the contents of an unmarked DVD that was handed to SCCW’s travel manager, with instructions to deliver to Phillip Kennedy once he arrived in town.

Static.

And then…nothing.

And then, audio feed.

“When I was a kid, used to be fascinated with bugs.”

Fade up.

It was an uncharacteristically breezy night in Provo. The sun was setting into a mountain range. Far below the camera’s view, cars honked and people walked. Straight ahead, Lane Stevens leaned back in a white chair, sitting behind a white table. He wore a white suit as well. If it wouldn’t be for the company, it vaguely resembled a description of heaven.

Welcome to the outdoor balcony of the Stamm House, one of Provo’s pricier supper clubs. In front of The River Rat was an empty plate, and a glass half full of wine. He looked out of place here. Having money was just starting to fit him again. Most of the places Lane went when he left the hotel were restaurants, he didn’t do much else other than eat, drink, fight, and play video games.

He waved at us briefly. The camera was stationary.

Lane continued.

“I would catch all kinds of them. Grasshoppers, ants, beetles, wasps, even throw a spider in there. I wanted to see nature up close and personal, but thing of it is…that wasn’t really nature. It was unnatural. All these things, so up close, so confined. All of ‘em were freaked out, losin’ their shit. Made for some entertainment, but it was just chaos I came to realize.

We got so many wasps, and spiders in this fed, for fuck sake. No one can relax anymore. Look at all this crazy shit going on.

You and Aimzy looked like thunder dome. My boss and Lance Marshall, despite how civil they seemed pre-match, tried to basically murder each other. Dusk and I, we’ve only known each other for a month or so, and that was one of the most physical matches I may ever have in my life. That guy was willing to get his head caved in by a ring bell rather than quit. There were no belts on the line. I’m not even his goal. Imagine when he gets a match with Alex…dude will get decapitated, and the severed head will just keep flopping after her or something. Crraaaaaaaaaaazy.

The tone around here has changed, wouldn’t you say? It’s just a tad…different.”

The Director’s WMD makes the universal sign for ‘just a little’ with his index finger and thumb.

“But then again, this America has always been a mean spirited country. People tend to forget that. You go to an Applebee’s or whatever, and there’s all this retro shit on the wall. All these grand memories of a time where everything was peachy, a simpler time without worries, or what have you. A time that didn’t really exist.

Most people spend their whole lives trying to avoid the true nature of the world, how savage it is. Well people should turn on some of our fine programming, if they need a wake up call. You throw in pride, gold, some egos…these fuckers will do any goddamn thing.”

The River Rat chuckled, and took a sip from his wine.

“I don’t prefer it one way or the other. War or peace, whatever. I don’t make these kind of decisions, I simply have a knack for thriving in certain…environments.”

He smiled thinly.

“But there is a war coming, isn’t there Phillip? And we have been placed at opposite sides of this war, thanks to your ambition. Sounds like a good time, I guess. I’ll bring the snacks.”

He shrugged, taking another gulp of the wine.

“But what I want to know, before we really get into this thing. Just who the fuck are you, bro? What is it you really want? Because I’ve been watching this fed for the better part of six months, ever since Miss Pierce was kind enough to extend her offer to me. And I got to tell ya, I don’t have the slightest clue who you are. This is an advantage for you, to be sure.

You join The Hand, and proceed to spend your entire time in said Hand waving your dick around, trying to prove to everyone that you don’t need them. You constantly declare that you did everything that was asked of you, and Lauren says you were the perfect soldier. Which to me is funny, as all I’ve seen out of you recently is you carry on like some kind of whiney cunt at a shoe store that’s out of your size…because the resources of the stable you were in were going to protect the longest running champion in the history of the world. OH THE AUDICITY! And then when push comes to shove, and you step out there on the big stage to prove that what you’ve been saying all this time is correct…you pretty much just go down clean as a whistle.

Bravo, Phil. Bravo.”

Golf clap.

“But the good news is, Uncle Lane has a way to fix it. Just go ahead and hang out with Lance Marshall in some more backstage bits and talk about respect, and other fairytale concepts created by some of this federation’s finest loveable losers.

It didn’t have to be this way Phil. You could have just waited your turn. And eventually it would be my job to protect you, and make sure your title stayed safe. But now you had to go and hit my boss with a chair, and that’s unfortunate. We could have gotten drunk, made a lot of really cliché poker references. Shit man, would have been pretty sweet. You seemed like a cool enough guy at Homecoming.

You’ve got the hottest bitch around, guaranteed to be a mega-star, uber talented, can wrestle circles around most of the clowns in this place…goddamnit Phillip! Goddamnit.

It really didn’t have to be this way,” he repeated, this time lower.

The River Rat was quiet then for a minute. He shook his head, and then polished off the wine.

“But just the same, it is this way…isn’t it? Things are going to get nastier and nastier. Just because you had to be recognized, like some ten year old kid who needs their mother to acknowledge their social studies paper…here we are. And now you have to suffer. And Lauren has to suffer. And Kathryn has to suffer.”

He said it so plainly, so matter of fact.

“You’ll have to excuse me though, if I take pleasure in my work,” he said and smiled again, “its just the way the good lord made me.”

The River Rat gestured up.

“My boss wishes that I take the title off of you on Temptation. And for the first time in the wake of one of her requests, I do not know if I will be able to accomplish the goal at hand. You are physically gifted Phillip, an incredible wrestling specimen. You very well may beat me. But understand this…you can’t beat me.

We aren’t even playing the same game.”

Mischief danced in Lane Stevens’ eyes as he reached towards the camera.

Static.

Black.