(OOC Disclaimer: This is strictly character development and something I did for fun and is in no way a competitive RP- hence why I put it here :D)


The Caribbean sun hung high in the sky over the Caribbean paradise that was Great Inagua. It was mid afternoon, heat of the day, and humidity was already cloying at the air around Privateer's Bar, a laid-back backpacker/expat-style bar built straight into one of the crystal-blue bays on the island and spreading out onto the white sands of the beach and lush green palms of the island. The crowd was a mixed one - the odd family, but by and large this was the domain of suntanned backpackers, hippie types and Hawaiian-clad ex-pats, all scattered around at various straw-umbrellas, the odd hammock and more than a few tables. "A La La Long" by Inner Circle seemed to play on an endless loop, with the clientele making more than a few poor attempts to sing along.

Seated at the bar, decked out in a green palm-print shirt and olive chino shorts, was Steve Jason.

Or at least as he appeared nowadays. His dark hair was grown out and now had touches of gray around the temples, a few more lines had been added to his brow and around his ice-blue eyes- at least what was hidden underneath his smoky rectangular sunglasses- and his face was now adorned with a short beard. He was certainly a little more weather-beaten than people remembered - but that had the advantages of letting him slip into places incognito, and so it was he sat virtually undisturbed, a snifter glass of the local rum in front of him. Every so often his eyes flitted to a flatscreen TV behind the bar, where a local cricket match was airing. That was one thing Steve and the people of the West Indies had in common - a love for watching a game that mostly involved people standing around in the sun while one tried to hit a ball with a bat.

"Awww yeah, hit it for six," Steve pumped his hand into a fist, turning to face the man at the bar, a local Bahaman man in a bright bowling shirt, "Your guys are pretty good."

"Well we've got to find some way to entertain ourselves, my man."

"Doubt you'd have much of a problem with that here. I've only been here a couple of days and I don't want to leave."

"The islands have a way of doing that to you. What brings you here? You don't seem like you're here for business."

"Nah, vacation. I've been working fairly hard back in the States."

"You, the States? You sound Australian."

"I am, but let's just say I've built most of my life up in America. I'm *technically* retired, but I've taken up a bunch of philanthropy work. Gotta keep places like this from sinking, you know?" Steve paused to take a long sip of the sweet rum, savoring it slowly, "I'm gonna have to go back to reality eventually, I'm sure. But for now, I'm just going to soak up as much sun and hit as much surf as I can." Steve chuckled, shaking his head.

"Surfer boy, eh? Well you're in the right place, my friend."

"Oh I know. Believe me, I know. I've wanted to hit these breaks since I was fifteen."

Suddenly the conversation was punctuated as the phone began ringing - with a tone Steve hadn't expected to hear in some time, a custom tone that only a few people had assigned to them - the heavy drumbeats of the introduction of Faith No More's 'Midlife Crisis'.

Midlife Crisis. It had been, of course, Steve's most well-known theme song, and had punctuated his career for the better part of a decade. At the time, the rationale Steve had used for its inception wasn't so much any connection to the lyrical content as the fact that, well, it simply sounded cool. Now, however, that song was beginning to take on a much more personal meaning - his own midlife crisis.

Forty-two wasn't that old by most people's standards. In wrestling terms, though, it was definitely approaching the end of shelf life. In X-Treme Wrestling Federation terms, where a target as lucrative as Steve could expect to be thrown off scaffolding, hit with vehicles, stabbed, had an X-Tron dropped on him, set on fire and thrown off a parking ramp, not to mention the odd murder attempt? It was damn near ancient, and Steve had the scars and the aches to show for it.

But why the hell was that song ringing on his phone? He looked down at the phone, eyeing the caller ID. XWF Home Office.

"Really? Now of all times?" Steve rolled his eyes and rejected the call. The bartender raised his eyebrows again.

"Work trying to ruin your holiday, uh?"

"Ex-work." Steve corrected, "I wouldn't say ruining, but if it's that important they can leave a damned message."

"Exactly, my friend." The barman flashed him a pearly grin, "We don't come here to talk about no work, former or otherwise."

"Won't hear any argument from me." Steve smirked and finished his glass, turning his attention back to the TV. After a few moments, the commentary was cut off by the sudden whirring of an outrigger engine roaring in the background. Looking over the back of his shoulder, Steve made out the tell-tale stirring of ocean water that indicated an incoming speedboat.

"Another one?" the bartender asked, "Better get in fast, we're about to get our afternoon rush by the look of it."

"May as well. Hit me." Steve grinned. The bartender poured out another glass of rum, sliding it across the bar to Steve, who caught it deftly, took a sip, and peered back over his shoulder again.

It was indeed the 'afternoon rush' - the speedboat was packed full of a mix of tourist guides and tourists themselves, waiting to pull up at the dock leading into the bar. As they got closer, Steve's eyes narrowed. One of the people standing on the boat was familiar - a man Steve hadn't seen in years, but who he'd known for almost half of his life and just about all of his career. The awkward stance, the goofy glasses, the XWF interviewer shirt...

Well I'll be damned, he thought, Steve goddamn Sayors. In the middle of the damned Caribbean, on one island of hundreds, and he somehow shows up here.

Sure enough, it was in fact the XWF interviewer himself who stood at the fore of the boat, almost looking like Washington crossing the Delaware. Then the boat suddenly lurched to a halt and Sayors suddenly wobbled, spun on his ankle awkwardly, then suddenly tumbled off the side of the boat, crashing down into waist-deep water with a sudden splash. Laughter roared out from the crew of the launch as Sayors struggled to a sitting position in the water, spluttering and coughing, his interviewer's shirt streaming water.

"18 years and still a walking disaster," Steve muttered dryly, "I guess I'll be right back."

With that, Steve hopped out of his barstool, scooping up his glass in his free hand and surged into a power walk across the bar, hopping onto the small dock attached to the bar where the spluttering Sayors still coughed and vented seawater everywhere. He sighed almost melodramatically with a roll of his eyes, then stuck his hand out to the struggling interviewer.

"Come on, Sayors. Grab on before some poor bastard has to resuscitate you."

Sayors took the offered hand, and with a surge of strength Steve hauled the interviewer out of the water onto the dock. Sayors coughed out one last blast of seawater, then looked up at Steve in shock, his eyes slowly focusing behind his glasses.

"Is that..."

"Yeah, yeah, Steve Jason, as you live and breathe, what a surprise to find me here, yadda yadda. Nice to see you again, Sayors. It's been what, two years?"

"I think so." Sayors finally worked his way onto his feet, "Home Office heard you might be hiding out here, so they sent me out to see you. Things were going really well until I fell off the boat."

Steve eyed Sayors with a mixture of pity and amusement, then he clapped Sayors on the shoulder like an old friend, leading the interviewer along the dock amidst the crowd of holidaymakers disembarking.

"I'm sure. Come on, I'll grab you a drink. Probably need to get the taste of motor oil out of your gob."

"Hey, that drowned rat with you?" the bartender shouted out as Steve led the way back to the bar.

"Something like that. Get the man a..."

"...a strawberry daquiri please." Sayors finished. Steve couldn't help but laugh quietly at that, shaking his head.

"Should have known. Sixteen years and your drink tab hasn't changed a bit."

"I like them, okay?" Sayors was a tad defensive at that.

"Hey, I'm not judging. You want to slam down candy-water, be my guest." Sure enough, the pink concoction found its way into a glass and over towards Sayors, who tasted it before breathing out a sigh.

"That's the stuff. "So how have you been, Steve? We haven't heard from you since Reunion. Still running that nightclub?"

"Nah, sold my shares in that a while ago. I'm a bit old for all that now and I'm no mogul like Talia was. I don't really have much business in LA any more to be honest. Not much to really keep me there after my career wound down."

"Did you go back to Australia, then?"

"No, I'm still in the States. I've got kids to look after- my oldest is a teenager now, and the twins are not far behind. They're gonna need their dad to look out for them and be there for them. So I set myself up a nice place only an hour's drive away from Heather and the kids."

"Sounds awfully out of your element, if you don't mind me saying so. Aren't you a beach man?"

"Why do you think I'm here?" Steve smirked, "This is my week off, man."

"That makes sense," Sayors nodded, then suddenly tugged awkwardly at his collar, "Oh god. I didn't walk into your holiday and ruin it, did I?"

"Sayors," Steve pointed out, "Throughout the time we've known each other you've chased me for interviews while, in no particular order, I've been at house parties, been in business meetings, trying to play golf, trying to surf, trying to go shopping, in the intensive care ward, in my bathroom, aboard a flight, in the goddamn Himalayas, hell I'm pretty sure if I ever went to outer space I'd find you there asking for an interview. I think I'm used to you dropping by now. It's OK."

"Yeah... interviews..." Sayors laughed nervously, rubbing the back of his head. There was a sudden awkward silence settling in, punctuated by the pounding of the surf from over on the beach.

"Well that's what this is about, right?" Steve leaned back on his stool, turning to look Sayors in the eye, "I mean this is for some kind of 'where are they now' segment you can throw up on XWF99.com, right?"

"Actually, no. I'm not here to interview you at all."

"Are you feeling alright, Sayors?"

"Yeah! Yeah absolutely. Well. Kind of." Steve noticed again that Sayors' posture seemed awkward - even for him. He frowned a bit, drinking some more rum as he did so, then Sayors finally spoke.

"So... um... look, I know this isn't gonna go down well, but they wanted me to try and I really really think it's for the good of the XWF that I try. There's going to be a show coming up soon for the XWF."

"They're not down to one show surely."

"Oh no, no, not at all. If anything we've got shows coming out the ears now. But this is a special show. It's called XX."

"Bit early for X-Mas X-Treme isn't it, Sayors?"

"Oh! No that's not what I meant. It's called XX. As in, 20."

"Still not really following you."

"Let's look at this way. How many years has it been since the XWF started, Steve?"

"It'd be about..." Steve counted a few numbers off on his fingers, "20 years or so? So... oh." Realisation suddenly dawned on him, just before Sayors himself confirmed it.

"There's a show coming up for the 20th anniversary of the XWF. It's going to be a really huge commemorative event. Former stars from all over the XWF are going to come back for one more fight. Zach Rizza and Peter Gilmour are going to slug it out- two X-Treme juggernauts!" Sayors seemed more and more excited by the prospect, his hands fluttering, "New inductions into the Hall of Legends! So what better way to crown that off than... picture it..."

"Steve Jason back in the ring one last time." Steve finished dryly. Sayors grinned and nodded.

"Exactly! Exactly! Can you imagine it? The fans would explode, the *roster* would explode, you'd get a chance to relive the glory days and..."

"I'm sorry, but no." It came out as a polite but firm statement. Sayors' face fell as if he'd just missed out on something glorious, then spoke again.

"But Steve! It's been years since we've seen you in the ring..."

"And how did that go, Sayors?"

"Well you kind of l..."

"I lost, Sayors." Steve cut him off, "And not just someone else getting pinned, either- I took that pin."

"To be fair, you had to fight the entire Flatline Crew and even then you managed to S3 them all, so it's not like..."

"Doesn't matter." Steve cut in again, "Do you really think I'd have let Rigg's stooges get the better of me fifteen years ago? No. I'd have taken them on and still won. I've done it before. I didn't this time. The ultimate truth of the matter is, I'm not where I should be any more, and I don't want my legacy to be loss after loss after loss until I end up a pathetic shadow of what I once was."

"But everyone has bad matches," Sayors shrugged, "Maybe you just weren't prepared. It's twenty years, Steve, it's huge! Surely a show like that would inspire you to once again dig deep and for one night only, bring back the legendary Unkillable icon of old! Then the next night you can go home and we'll leave you alone for at least five years. But please, Steve, you've got to consider this."

"You might as well go home, Sayors," Steve took another long sip of rum, shifting his sunglasses back down over his eyes, "We both saw the writing on the wall last time. I refuse to become one of those guys who can't accept his best is behind him, and I just can't see anything that would get me back to that level."

Sayors' answer was short and simple, even quietly spoken, but it still caused Steve's eyes to widen, his sunglasses to raise, his head to jerk to Sayors, and his glass to drop out of his hand to shatter on the ground.

"What about The Brand?"