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Steve_Justice · (09-29-2019)

It was a dark and damp evening. The noise of the streets was deadened by a thick blanket of fog rolling in off the Atlantic. Steve Justice’s 1955 Bel-Air rolled into a rest stop off of the Trans-Canada Highway. The moon looked down from the cloudless sky onto the only other sole vehicle in the lot: a black GMC van. Steve stepped out of his car wearing a black leather jacket; faded blue jeans and worn Oxblood Doc Martens. He carried under his arm a blue duffel bag. Two large men loomed to either side of the men’s restroom as he approached. Both of them were heavily tattooed under their work shirts and leather vests bearing the colors of the Bacchus motorcycle gang. He set the bag on the ground between his feet as both men stopped him. He rolled his eyes, spread his arms and legs apart and allowed them to pat him down. They also took his duffel bag and examined its contents. Once they were satisfied, he was motioned inside the bathroom.

Inside, in front of a long line of sinks washing his hands was Heinrich Krieger; leader of the gang. He finished washing his hands and accepted some paper towels from one of his lieutenants standing beside him. He was a middle-aged man with salt and pepper hair tied back in a ponytail. His hands were heavy with gold rings and he wore a flannel shirt with his president’s vest over it and green camouflage cargo pants. He smiled, balled up the paper towel and tossed it into the trash.

“Good evening, Steve. Nice night, isn’t it? Did you have any trouble finding the place?”

Steve glared at Krieger and swallowed his anger. He patted the bag under his arm.

“I don’t want to waste any more time here. I have what I owe you. Thirty grand, all in cash.”

Krieger motioned to his lieutenant who took the duffel bag out of Steve’s hands. He opened the bag and examined the neatly bundled stacks of cash. With a nod to his boss, the lieutenant confirmed that the money was all there. Krieger grinned widely at Steve.

“That’s excellent work, Steve. I don’t know how you put it together so quickly but I don’t care.”

Steve swallowed a lump in his throat. He wasn’t happy about taking orders from someone like Shane

. Especially when it meant kicking his tag team partner and friend in the balls. He felt like the rotten bastard he was but being under the thumb of a dangerous man like Krieger made the difficult choice he made the lesser of two evils.

“So this is it, right? You and I are free and clear?”

Krieger motioned to the duffel bag.

“This makes you even on your loan. But before you walk away, I want you to do me one small favour.”

Steve held up a hand in anger.

“Wait a minute, my loan was thirty grand with interest included. You can’t just…”

Krieger’s lieutenant kicked Steve right in the stomach with a leather biker boot. He went down clutching the side of the sink trying to get breath back into his lungs. He glared at Krieger as he tried to reach out to him with one hand feebly.

“I can do whatever I want. You’ll do as you’re told and like it, Steve. Relax. You do me this one favour and we’re even. One of our brothers will bring you a bag next week. You’re going to take it over the border to Maine. There you’ll meet another one of our local chapter members and hand over the goods. It’s that simple. Nobody gets hurt and then we can let bygones be bygones, right.”

Steve coughed still trying to get his lungs to function again. He looked at Kreiger and nodded his head slowly.

“Sure. I do this one thing and we’ll go get matching friendship tattoos. I’m sure that you geniuses have this planned out so well that nothing will possibly wrong.”

Krieger smiled and helped Steve stand up. He gave him a heavy pat on the back.

“I’m glad to hear that. Because I want this to go smoothly. And if you fuck this up for me, you’re going to have a lot more problems than money. Understand?”

Steve nodded and made a thumbs up. As he started to walk towards the parking lot, he turned and smiled.

“Good talk, Krieger. You’re like the gold standard for motivational speakers.”

Steve walked past the two sentries outside the door and settled into the driver’s seat of his car. He punched his dash in frustration. First one favour and then probably another. And another. He needed to figure out a way to get out from under Krieger’s thumb for good or he would spend the rest of his life being an errand boy. He felt like everything he did was just building sandcastles and waiting for the tide to take them.

A few days later…

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Saturday night at the James L. Knight centre in Miami, Florida. The Glory Kickboxing promotion is holding a card of fights to a packed house. Steve Justice is there dressed in a red and navy Fred Perry shirt; black jeans and green Converse Chuck Taylors. He is seated ringside with a cup of beer in his hand and the XWF tag team title on his shoulder. He is joined after a few moments by veteran XWF reporter Steve Sayors. Sayors is dressed as usual in a conservative suit of grey. He folded himself into the seat next to Justice looking as awkward as always. He smiled at Sayors and clapped him on the shoulder.

“Hey Sayors! How’s it hanging? You’re just in time for a great night of fights!”

“Couldn’t you have picked somewhere a little quieter for an interview? Maybe outside the arena?”

“Nonsense, this is the perfect spot. You work hard as an interviewer, Steve. I thought we’d try something a little less formal and have some fun for a change. You want a beer or something?”

Steve Sayors shook his head in the negative.

“Your opponents at Relentless have taken to the airwaves against you. They pretty much refute everything that you’ve stated about them.”

“Really? Everything?”

“Yes, everything. You said that Kenzi Grey was making her debut. That is of course false. You said that she was going to have trouble with the Xtreme nature of this match when she has held a hardcore title mutliple times. You also said that Sarah Lacklan had never encountered adversity when in fact she has made a triumphant return from a car accident two years ago.”

Steve took a swallow of his beer, nodded slowly and looked thoughtful.

“Yeah, it’s true. I haven’t dug into the past of these two deep enough. You’ll have to beg my pardon. I don’t keep up with what’s going on outside of the XWF. Just because you’ve had success in one place doesn’t mean anything in the XWF. Maybe if you actually had accomplishments inside this company other than propping up your partner in a couple of tag matches where even you said the talent was very weak, Kenzi, maybe I would sit up and take notice. As far as you not be even the tiniest worried about being in front of tens of thousands of people? Well either you’re completely crazy or you’re a liar. This isn’t an acting gig. It’s like comparing giving a speech in front of a handful of people to juggling chainsaws on a unicycle while reciting the pledge of allegiance. There aren’t any rehearsals or second takes. But of course you know all of that. Again, I’d love nothing more than to sit here and roast your ass on a live broadcast, Kenzi, but you’re just not that interesting. Oh! You did a parody of me and Hanari! That’s, like, so funny!”

Steve rolled his eyes and rubbed his temples with his free hand. Both of the participants for the first match are introduced and they take their places in the ring.

“That still doesn’t change the fact that you’re more worried about whoever the masked man is than who you’re facing. You people sleep on Hanari Carnes like he’s just some punk fresh off the boat. That’s going to be your tough luck. You’ve pissed him off to the point that he is going to beat the hell out of both of you. He is a proud Dominican warrior and he is going to be hunting for that armlock all night long.”

“As for Sarah Lacklan? My bad. I didn’t know you had been in a car accident. Because I wasn’t around two years ago and, frankly, I don’t really care that much. Congratulations! You took your broken, feeble self and put yourself back together just in time to get yourself smashed to pieces all over again! But hey, I did take a dip into the old XWF archives and pulled out a chestnut like you suggested. From your revolting podcast on March 9th, you said:

“And from what I have been able to tell, this company is FULL of people who need to be brought up to speed with the NEW way of wrestling, that of people like me who don’t give a flying FUCK about what you did three years ago or something equally as irrelevant.”

So you see Sarah, like you, I don’t give a flying fuck you were in a crash two years ago. Because it’s not relevant to the beating I’m gonna give you on Sunday. You seem to think this is some kind of debate club where you can score points on me and I’m just gonna pack up and go home. Well I’m not leaving just because I made a couple of mistakes in my research. Because, you see, the nice thing about this is that it’s a fight. We’re not going to have a war of words Sunday night, we’re going to have a fight. I may have not gotten your biography nailed down to the finest details but my main premise is still true: You’re a rich, annoying shit. You walk around here spouting the same made-up,

word vomit like a brain injury victim EVERY. FUCKING. WEEK. Stop trying to make “axly” happen you fucking muppet! Nobody gives a shit! You think because you surround yourself with a bunch of teeny-bopper fans and you pay people to put up with your

that you’re a somebody? Well I’m going to demonstrate to you first-hand that you are not shit. You are a rail-thin albino with bones slightly sturdier than a fucking toothpick that will probably shatter just getting into the ring.

Steve smirks and takes another mouthful of beer. There is a knockdown in the ring that brings everyone to thier feet.

“Whoa! Did you see that punch Sayors? Amazing. Anyway, as I was saying, Sarah Lacklan is taking a one-way trip through a burning table stack straight to Hell. Lacklan can be beaten and I know that I’m just the man for the job. Sarah has performed amazingly so far but she’s about to run into a brick wall. I have not been pinned or submitted for a reason and that’s because I am the line in the sand. The last of a dying breed of Punk-as-fuck, take no prisioner ass-kickers.

Steve slaps the XWF tag team title.

“I know you’re used to getting your way, Sarah, but it’s not happening this time. You and your dull-ass partner are going to get smashed by the greatest tag team walking the XWF. All you can do is watch as we hoist the cup over our heads and celebrate as you and your old lady get carried out on stretchers with your arms shattered. In life nothing is certain, Sayors. But one thing you can always count on is that Justice will be served!

Fade Out

Threaded Mode \| Linear Mode DQ My War - Disqualified. Posted 50 minutes after the deadline.
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