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When I was told that I drew the assignment to follow around an outsider, I didn’t know what to make of it. Sure, everyone in XWF knew Sarah Grey-Lacklan, she had made herself a fixture in a very short span of time, but Kenzi Grey was a completely different animal all together. She was probably as close to the opposite of Sarah as one could get in a lot of ways, but those differences complemented one another well and they advanced with ruthless efficiency though the tournament brackets, in spite of the chaos that seemed to surround them.
Sarah was ruthlessly pursued by a ‘Hooded Man’ with a vendetta against her, plagued by a series of attacks against her property and her character. As for her wife, and chosen partner, Kenzi Grey was dealing with her own issues, namely a nagging knee injury she had sustained after she had vowed to help the fiancée of XWF’s very own Vinnie Lane, successfully retain her championship. For her trouble, she got her knee shot out from under her.
Both members of the 5’2” Mafia brought baggage galore, but they had found a way to stay focused, even as the demons that dogged them, intensified their attacks…
In the face of such chaos, it would be easy to throw up your hands in frustration and quit, but neither of these women did that. They managed to reach the finals at the end of a long and grueling road. Sarah managed to outpace an obsessed ‘fan’ and Kenzi had fought through a nagging injury caused by Vinnie Lane’s own girlfriend. A better story couldn’t have been written if you tried, and I was along for the ride…of course, the ride wasn’t over…but the ride was in serious jeopardy…
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FOLLOWING SATURDAY NIGHT SAVAGE
Atlanta, Georgia
Another night and another improbable win by the 5’2” Mafia against a team that many didn’t give them a chance to get by. Kenzi and Sarah pushed on to a title opportunity at Relentless against the new champions, The Arm Collectors…but not before dealing with another piece of business. The duo was assaulted after the match by several Hooded Men, before it was revealed to be a ploy by Vita Valenteen, looking to get the upper-hand in her upcoming Anarchy Title match.
I found my way to the back, hoping to learn the status of the team following the assault. I found Kenzi Grey pacing back and forth with a slight hitch in her step outside the Trainer’s Office. I made a cautious approach, unsure of the woman’s mood, following even more acts of violence perpetrated against her wife.
“Kenzi, can you give us and update on Sarah?”
Kenzi’s glare was filled with malice and her words echoed that same sentiment. I had seen this anger rise up in her anytime someone dared to lay hands on her wife outside and sometimes inside the confines of a match.
“HAS VITA BEEN BEHIND THIS SHIT THE ENTIRE TIME? ALL THE FUCKING HOODED MAN BULLSHIT?! MEE GETTING SHOT?! I SWEAR TO GOD, I’M GONNA…”
“No! There was actually video of the Hooded Man in the rafters, watching everything. This was all Vita’s doing tonight.”
I could tell by the look on her fact that this gave her very little solace. I repeated my question, hoping to dial down her anger a bit.
“Can you give us and update on Sarah?”
Kenzi finally stopped her feverish pacing and ran her fingers through her long black braids. This actually seemed to calm her a bit.
“She’ll be fine…I think. She has to go through the protocol.”
Kenzi leaned against the wall and slid down, holding her still injured knee. I could see that it was still bothersome for her.
“What about you? Is the injury holding up?”
Kenzi shook her head, stretching out the wounded appendage and rubbing it to get the blood flowing.
“It’s shit…no thanks to whoever this hooded asshole is! Did you see the rumor last week? Now they are thinking that I was shot by the Hooded Man, instead of Roxy Cotton! It’s a miracle that I have even managed to hold myself together this long, but I tell you…if I find out that Vita really is the one that has been behind this the entire time…”
Kenzi rolled her eyes and gave a heavy sigh.
“What in the hell kind of operation is Vinnie running around here? I mean…isn’t this supposed to be professional wrestling? Where is the professionalism? I haven’t seen it…have you? Nothing but criminal activity, everywhere you turn!”
I could understand her anger, but I knew that she was no stranger to post and sometimes pre-match physicality.
“Well, XWF is where the action never stops…so...”
She stared at me and I immediately regretted parroting the company tag line. Her eyes fixed on me with deadly serious intent.
“So…XWF is where people destroy your personal property, dump shit on you, try to burn down your goddamn house, and then try to stomp your fucking head through a metal briefcase? Is THAT the action you are talking about? Is that what never stops?”
“Well…maybe.”
The girl struggled to her feet after the door cracked open and the Trainer told her it was okay to come inside. I started to help her, but she pushed me away, clearly none too happy with me or the XWF at the moment. As she walked inside the room, I called out to her…
“Can you let us know about-”
The door slammed in my face as I finished my sentence.
“…Sarah?”
I deserved that…
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FOLLOWING UNIFIED GLOBAL WRESTING COALITION
Chicago, Illinois
I knew that Shane
and those he mentored wouldn’t much care about the goings on inside of an ‘obscure, lower level, borderline-Special Olympic style company’ but the fact of the matter was I was forced to go where the action was. A little over 48 hours after Savage, Kenzi and Sarah were back in action. Neither had bothered to check in with me or XWF management to update us on their status, so I took the initiative to see what I could learn about this team that would be facing our new champions in less than two weeks.
Both were scheduled for individual competition, with Sarah at the top of the card. If she was, in any way, injured and unable to compete at Relentless, I’d never know. Kenzi, who would be on an absolute warpath all night, wrapped a chair around Sarah’s opponent’s head and left her as easy pickings with little, to no effort at all.
It was following this exchange that Kenzi would find out who the hooded shooter was that injured her, but it wasn’t something that was revealed outside her circle of friends. Was it Vita Valenteen? Was it actually Roxy Cotton? Was it someone else entirely…maybe someone from that ‘obscure, lower level, borderline-Special Olympic style company?’ I’d get to the bottom of things, soon enough!
One match later, and Kenzi was again assaulting another of her co-workers. Maybe he was the hooded shooter? She brutally beat the man with a steel chair and kicked his testicles so many times that every man within eyesight of it, left holding their own groin. It was an orgy of violence that she topped off by winning the ‘obscure, lower level, borderline-Special Olympic style company’s’ aptly named Chaos Championship, in brutal fashion.
I knew that no one in XWF would care about Kenzi’s title win, but they would want to know about her wife’s true status…they would want to know about the identity of the shooter, if it was indeed someone associated with the Hooded Man and XWF. Luckily, my Special Olympic credentials got me into the backstage area, one on one with one of their newest champions.
Sarah Grey-Lacklan stood next to Kenzi while she got the side of her head cleaned up, after being struck by a pair of pliers which had been hurled at her during her match. While the wound did appear to be quite painful, the expression on her face was one of complete and utter disbelief…
“Kenzi, congratulations on the victory toni-.”
She raised her hand to stop me from finishing my sentence.
“One question Steve. All I want to know is…did you know who the Hooded Man was the whole time?”
I blinked, as I was certainly not prepared for this question at all.
“Why would I-.”
“DID YOU KNOW WHO THE FUCKING HOODED MAN WAS STEVE? DID YOU FUCKING KNOW?”
I blurted out the answer, but it certainly wasn’t a lie.
“No…of course not! ”
She continued to fume, but I could tell that she believed me…both of them did. I waited a beat, then I asked the obvious question.
“Who did you see on the video? Was it Vita Valenteen?”
I didn’t know if she was just so angry that she didn’t hear me, or maybe she heard me and she just didn’t care.
“You know Steve…I’d always looked at XWF as the place that Sarah had to go to get her mojo back. I mean, I knew that it wouldn’t be easy…but I knew that it was something she had to do. I could have made the jump when she did…she asked me, but I said no. I knew she needed this…I knew she needed to build something of her own. I wasn’t worried…because I had friends here…I knew she’d be okay without me. At least until this tournament came…”
Kenzi reached over and took her wife’s hand and I could see that she gave it just a tiny squeeze. In that moment, I saw something pass between them, but I had no idea what it was.
“…it felt good…it felt right to be tagging with you again. My knee was totally fucked, but nothing would have stopped me. Even though that first match against Fuzz and Noah was one that no one thought we would or should win, it didn’t matter because it was going to be the two of us! Then…this Hooded Man bullshit escalated!”
She let go of Sarah’s hand and turned her focus back to me.
“I asked management to step in and do something! I BEGGED for someone to figure this shit out and fix it! No one in XWF did a fucking thing! Then a house was burned down…and still…nothing! Yeah…sure, a few jokes were made and ratings popped…but still, no one did a fucking thing! Life just went on…or…as you like to say, ‘the action never stopped’ huh?”
Obviously, I was never going to live that down. I said it one time…JUST ONCE!
“We kept our heads down and we focused on the fight…we took the toughest road to get to where we are! We didn’t get creampuff teams that we could land one big move on and pin with our pinkies! We got the cream of the crop…we got legends and world beaters! We got the top picks in the company…and we beat them all…then what?”
I knew it was rhetorical, but after she just stared at me, I had to ask…
“What…?”
“I’M GLAD THAT YOU ASKED STEVE!! You know what we got? Instead of respect for putting up with people attacking us left and right and STILL managing to do what few…if any, could have done in our place…we were treated to a ‘BEGINNER & ASPIRING MAIN-EVENTER XWF TUTORIAL’ barely 10-minutes after the show was over. My wife was still in the concussion protocol when this bullshit was on!”
“Well, to be fair Shane is…”
The look on her face told me to ‘shut the fuck up’ and so, I did.
“I realized that Shane is just the latest obstacle thrown in our path. I mean, who can look at what Sarah has done in the company and be anything but astounded? Who can downplay and boil down her accomplishments and make them out to be anything other than stellar?”
She took a deep breath as the trainer finished putting her back together. She gave him a curt nod, but there were no words of appreciate for him. That wasn’t surprising.
“After that night…I started to think that coming to the XWF was a big mistake…but, after tonight…I have NO…FUCKING…DOUBTS!”
Kenzi got up, grabbing her newly won championship and tossing it over her shoulder, which was still splattered with blood from the vile wound she’d suffered. She started to limp out, but I still had one more question.
“So, that’s it? You’re finished, just like that?”
Kenzi and Sarah looked at one another and there were no words between them…yet, there was an understanding that was implicit.
“Steve, we aren’t going anywhere. Sarah and I have an XWF championship to win and faces to rub in it! Leaving? No…we aren’t leaving! WE AREN’T GOING ANYWHERE UNTIL WE OWN THOSE XWF TAG TEAM TITLES! By hook…or by fucking crook!”
I took a step back as she advanced on me, poking me roughly in the chest. The anger on her face was clear, but I could fathom what or who she had seen on the video that had made her so angry and determined.
“The Arm Collectors scored a huge victory last weekend and they dethrone a team that seemingly had a stranglehold on the titles. Now…two weeks after winning those titles, they are going to get the pleasure of handing them over to Sarah and I! Yeah, I know Carnes and Justice won’t be a cakewalk…they just took down the goddamn champions, but they were just fighting for a couple of pounds of gold. They weren’t fighting for each other….they weren’t fighting for survival…and they weren’t fighting an entire fucking federation! WE WERE!!”
She shoved me back, sending me stumbling and nearly falling over. Sarah tried to grab her, but Kenzi shrugged her off.
“We are, Steve! WE ARE! I swear to you, I didn’t come to XWF to piss and moan! I didn’t go there to gripe and complain…but I realize now, that is what I have done. I have given that asshole what exactly what he wanted…with no fucking regard for my wellbeing…my wife’s wellbeing!”
“W-What are you talking about? Who…who’s the asshole? The person in the video? The Hooded Ma-”
“SHUT THE FUCK UP! No…DON’T SHUT THE FUCK UP! I want you to go back to XWF and I want you to tell everyone that Sarah and I are coming to Relentless to collect on a SHIT LOAD of debts! All this bullshit that has been going on, well…that shit ENDS! Vita Valenteen? That bitch is getting her shit pushed in…ALL THE FUCKING WAY! Then…on Day Three…Carnes and Justice are going to cough up those tag team titles to the 5’2” Mafia…not because they suck and not only because we are better…but because I got someone to piss off!”
Sarah finally managed to usher her away from me as I was left wondering about her cryptic words and new found determination to not only win…but really rub someone’s face in it…
______________________________________
I have to say, I am relieved that Kenzi is committed to staying until the end, even in the face of all the attacks, the arson, and apparently the revelation that someone in our company is responsible for all of the chicanery that has surrounded them, including her knee injury. In spite of all the slings and arrows hurled their way, there is a LOT of merit in what she said about their road to Relentless. It was never easy…right from the start they faced a pair of the biggest stars in the company and that win should have cemented them as favorites and should have netted them respect. Instead, they get attacked and they get mocked for inexplicably advancing.
All talk of mysteries aside, I am looking forward to seeing Sarah and Kenzi in action against our new champions when Day 3 of Relentless kicks off. The 5’2” Mafia has taken on the best of the best, week after week and now they take on the team at the top of the mountain. The Arm Collectors beat a team that no one saw them having a chance in Hell against on paper, and now they get a team that is coming in hot and with a massive chip on their shoulder! This has all the elements of a classic battle in the making. I, for one, can hardly wait!
I’m Steve Sayors, and this has been The Sayors’ Report!
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