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Lacklan · (02-03-2023)

Todd grimaced with determination as he slid into his cubicle. For all of his work during the weeks leading into Snow Job, for all of his editing prowess, he was unable to bring home the Employee of the Month plaque (and preferred cafeteria seating!), as that instead went over to Billy. Freakin’ Billy and his Mark Flynn duty. How was bingo supposed to contend with talk show hosts grown from a test tube?! The unfairness of it all. At least he got a consolation prize: He had a great new coffee mug that stated “World’s Best Camera Guy,” a gift from the Chuckles Salt Mine Company. Nice people over there. He wasn’t so sure about their sister company, Chuckles Plastics Production, as he felt their straws were a touch too thin to grasp correctly, but the salt from the other side of the group always tasted good.

He started at the sound of a loud sob from the cubicle next to his. His heart reached out to that sob, a sob filled with sadness, regret, and the eternal dull ache of oblivion. Susan’s sad sob was understandable:

She had drawn Raion Kido Duty.

It had, indeed, been a case of same shit, different day.

Todd shook away his empathy and settled into his work. Having drawn Sarah Lacklan Duty again, he knew that his target would be ever difficult to pin down. In the end, he was right, but his ID (the Mark V, this time) did it’s best to follow the Tag Team Champion across some of her various adventures.

Beloved! I swear to god!

Your mother is embarrassing me at work!

Are you even listening to me?

Bingo! I've got bingo!

Damnit!

So, this is that raw meat bar, huh?

Yep!

So, like, tartar and such?

The tartiest!

I....is...is that a live dolphin?

Sure is! It's what for dinner!

GAH!

Gimme!

Hey, Noah. 'Sup?

..............

..............

Cunt!

DAMNIT!

Hey, Vinnie, I'm still the Anarchy Commish, yeah?

Snort

...yeah?

hahaha

hahahahahahahaha

hahahahahahahahahahahahaha

Just...just don't, bb

Oooooooohhhhhhhh........oooooooHHHHHHHHHH

OOOHHHHHHHHHH....Buraddo Purinsesu!

Raion-chan! Stop abusing yourself in there!

I knew it!

“What is a ‘Mary Sue’?”

“SIGH”

Todd was happy to FINALLY get into a good place. After sending multiple IDs after his charge throughout the week, which included that astonishing array of adventures (including a time jump to mid 2000s, apparently?), he had finally gotten into the Egg itself. It had taken more of his patented sneakery, as he had hidden his drone in a package marked “Shoes for Sarah” and delivered to the Hollywood Hills estate, but it had worked. Thankfully for him, the package had been accepted by Kenzi Grey, the far more talented, beautiful, popular, and successful half of the Grey-Lacklan duo, and had been tossed into this room without a thought. Carelessly tossed, too. He had heard her mumble something about “...freakin’ shoe slut…” as she did so, and it reminded him that, if he had been giving Kenzi Grey Duty, his desires for winning Employee of the Month would be met without question. Indeed, everyone in the home office of the floating XWF headquarters had been grumbling about how with three videos of Sarah already since her return, the amount of Kenzi content had been relegated to just a few sentences.

“THIS is a Mary Sue, doctor.”

After having been carelessly tossed into part of Sarah’s inner sanctum, Todd’s piloting skills had seen him master the lower floor of the Egg until he found Sarah’s wrestling room, featured more than once on XWF media. Two computers with a wealth of dvds, tapes, and hard drives; a multitude of notebooks filled with handwritten notes; a large mat on the floor with a boxer’s punching back hanging from the ceiling, and more. But most importantly for this particular moment, the woman in question standing before a large whiteboard, marker in hand, with a copy of the official March Madness brackets. Somewhere in the world, Todd knew, the offices of Warstein and Son were giving deep exhalations of relief.

“RIGHT HERE!”

Secured in the safety of a cabinet within the computer desk, Todd’s camera takes in Sarah Lacklan circling the name KIDO several times with a black marker.

“A Mary Sue is someone who never, ever has to struggle. They’re just BOOM! Great at everything!”

“Hmmmm….”

Todd positions his camera to look downward. On the computer through the ever-popular SarTime computer application, is an older man with thinning gray hair and a face so gaunt as to seem skeletal. It was not the first time Todd had seen Dr. Reznik, a New England psychiatrist often in the employ of the Lacklan family, and he was familiar with the everpresent scritch scritch sound of his constant writing.

“What are you ‘hmmmming’ about?”

Sarah, too, seemed to notice the writing. The doctor responded without looking up.

“I assume Mary Sue is a noun. Odd usage from you, Ma’am.”

“Oh no, I use it as an adjective.”

The doctor looked up and raised an eyebrow, but Sarah waved it away with pure nonchalance.

“Oh pish posh. I turned ‘shut up’ into ‘shit up,’ ‘Canada’ into ‘Canda,’ and just yesterday I saw a screen of Atty using ‘axly’ online. Hell, I once turned Shining Wizard into a verb! Before you know it, peeps all around the world will be all ‘Listen here, Vinnie Mary Sue Lane,’ and ‘Don’t you Mary Sue me’ and ‘that bitch is SUCH a Mary Sue.’”

Sarah turned away from the computer and back to the brackets.

“And that dude is SUCH a Mary Sue. Unstoppable child basketball star who transitions into amazing wrestling trainee like it’s nothing? Honestly, who in the world has so much incredible success as a child?!”

Todd allows his camera to move throughout the room. There are, as everyone knows, dozens and dozens of trophies placed throughout the room. Half a dozen Lacklanland Spelling Bee Champion trophies, numerous Lacklanland Best Smile awards, at least a score of the Lacklanland Merits of Outstanding Citizenry medals hanging along a wall.

“...yes, who indeed…”

Todd shared Dr. Reznik’s unnoticed humor. In fact, Todd’s camera panned down to look at what the psychiatrist had written: “Self Awareness – Still needs work”

“And it’s not like I’m even the first person to bring it up! Hell, Mark Flynn, who is currently spending time with my Universal Championship, took him to task over it. Here’s Flynn, recovering from both a broken back AND mental break from reality…though that latter seems to still be unchanged…calling out Mr. Never Has to Try Hard, and did the murderhobo’s give HIM crap? NOPE! Just ol’ Miss Hurt Your Feelings, because I came up with a more biting way of phrasing it. But hey, jobber’s gotta job, I suppose.

“Something that Kido doesn’t yet understand, and any of my, like, bajillion detractors are too afraid to acknowledge, is that it MATTERS when I’m here. This is a great example of what I said before, about how Kido’s style of giving a sterile read-through of wins and losses, of opponents fought, without factoring in any bit of context whatsoever, gets the job done technically but without any of the understanding. And why? Why does it MATTER when I’m here? Because I create change.”

Even from in his cubicle, Todd could feel the heat in that word. She turned around to face the doctor and her red eyes were full of fire.

“This company was a Chuckles Amateur Production's wet dream of insanity, stupidity, and laziness when I stomped my heeled boots onto their throats. Dummy Kido wants to talk about me not winning a title I didn’t challenge for in my first year here? HA! I came here for THIS!”

She pointed at the bracket behind her.

“Mama Tournaments was hungry, I stormed in and KABOOM! Idiot XWF representative after idiot representative fell before me as I mocked alien parentage, exposed lazy theft and terrible covers, and gave truth to the lie of Lux. Trying to compare his accomplishments to mine is the tactic of fools because, no matter how hard it still makes some of those people cry, I AM a winner of this tournament.

“And another thing! That idiot wants to talk about winning the Universal Championship on his own merits…when he won it at THE WEED SHOW?! In a match CHOCK FULL of interference and chicanery?! HA! He may cast off my history-making cash-in as opportunistic, but to do so he missed the entire point…which, again, is his issue with only looking at the surface, only looking at the words on a page, and not understanding the context and depth of the work involved. The entire XWF existence changed when I punched Fuzz in the face and took his championship. And! OH MAN! To THEN try to act like ol’ Fuzzy was a less formidable champion than Alias?! Where’s the peanut gallery jumping into the halls, arms waving, with screams of ‘OMG WHAT DID KIDO SAY?!’”

Sarah shook her head hard enough to make her braid whip and snap.

“Listen, Kido might well end up being very good in that ring. He has the chance, THE chance, of fighting Sarah Lacklan, the Universal FUCKING Champion, in the main event, and so has the opportunity to change how not only I perceive him, but the entire company. Right this second, he hasn’t earned my respect, but to be fair, very few around here have.”

She raised a hand and ticked off her fingers.

“Ruby. Fuzz. Noah. Bourbon. The only people to send me to the Loser’s Window, and they have earned my respect because of it. People like Alias, and Main, and Corey…sorta…and perhaps even Flynn, though we shall see how stalwart he is able to become. Does Kido have the ability to be counted in their number? Possibly. But not if he doesn’t change. This face he presents to us, the stoic blandness of perfectly acceptable but hardly preferable slice of white bread, is why he has been floundering, regardless of his record, in Jenny’s dreaded Midcard Hell. Because no amount of ‘solid work’ or ‘dependability’ is going to compare to the shine and glitter of my diamonds. I show up and the entire company goes ‘Oh Snap! Time to remake our Championship Contender’s Brackets!” while Kido’s there, every week, without fail or complaint, and they pass him by in favor of even a modicum of flavor!”

“Besides all this change, how do you feel about your other stated goal so far? Being a better…friend, was it?”

Sarah shrugged.

“Comme ci, comme ça. Winning the taggie titles WITH Angelica…and not dragging her along, like SOME PEOPLE intimate…was obviously a prime objective. And I’m working on my relationships with some others, like Jenny. Getting freakin’ NOWHERE with Vita, unfortunately. Apparently, it's TOTES more important to get put through THREE TABLES on a show seven people watch than return my texts. And Dolly…well…we’ll get there.”

“Interesting dynamic with her. Almost as if you were trying to mother her.”

Sarah’s hand made a small motion to her stomach as she shook her head.

“We make do with what we have, Doctor. Anyway, I-”

“Do you wish to talk about-”

“NO!”

Sarah’s face was red with anger and…was that sadness? Todd was startled by the sudden outburst, as did Dr. Reznik, who’s pen stopped writing after a moment. Curious, Todd allowed his camera to go do and see-

Oh.

“Hysterectomy - Not ready to talk”

In his cubicle, Todd’s mind brought together a few threads. Sarah’s extended time off after being stripped of the title, that oft-repeated 657 days, that she didn’t want to talk about, but had let slip wasn’t because of wrestling. Her change of clothing, always hiding all of her skin, wherein she used to show various amounts of flesh. The movements of her hands, perhaps unconscious, towards her midsection.

Oh.

Oh damn.

Leaning back in his chair, his face fallen, Todd decided that this was enough for one night, and shut down his drone.

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