Corey was rather proud of himself. It had been 1 hour, 2 minutes, and 22 seconds since he last checked his phone to see if Christian had replied to him. Of course, the current environs may have had something to do with that.

Jay had said it was called Nan Ciee’s Starport Cafe. Corey thought of it as “Cheers meets Your Wildest and Most Unruly Dream”. Corey sat back in his seat, which seemed to eerily fit the contours of his body. In fact, he could just make out the subtle sensations of the seat itself continuously molding to fit the shifts in his posture. Strange, but undeniably ergonomic! But the chairs were probably the least noteworthy aspect of the establishment, because the bar was replete with alien species of just about every form, function, and color.

Corey’s first reaction upon entering had been something akin to a panic attack. Surely he had seen strange things on par with this, and yet the enormity of what he was seeing overwhelmed him. Not only was it a refutation of the notion that mankind was the only life in the universe (a fact Corey had long suspected was not true but never had the tangible proof), but it was an aggressive refutation. The bar was host to a panoply of species, and so mundane was this oddness to them that they did not even seem to take much mind of Corey. And he supposed it was the casualness with which his prior concept of reality was deposed that “did him in” so to speak.

Jay Omega, the man who had been his opponent at Fire and Ice not even 48 hours ago, had helped him to a seat and encouraged him to breathe, doing his best impression of a midwife without recognizing it. When Corey finally found control of his breathing, he had even started to laugh.

But now, roughly an hour into the experience, Corey was finding himself shockingly at ease. Jay no doubt had a large role to play in that.

Believe me, I can sympathize with the whole “separate entity in the head thing”. Corey noted, nursing a strange green brew that he was reasonably sure was nonalcoholic but was still working up the courage to give it the ol’ down the hatch.

Jay had his hands splayed out in front of him as he continued his story. It’s a rare find, that. But anyway, neither of them were happy I backed out on the deal, so they roughed up my consciousness and dumped it into Carceri.

I know what most of those words mean INDIVIDUALLY, but… Corey chuckled.

I know, I know, nuts, right? But there I was. Or at least, my consciousness, trying to make my way across this hell. Like, LITERAL hell, playing peekaboo with demons and devils who would have liked nothing better than to shove a hot pitchfork up my unmentionables.

Oooohhhh, we’re getting to the real good stuff now.

After what seemed like forever I finally made it to the end and jumped through this portal with a whole horde of those buggers hot on my heels. Seems like things would get better from there, right? Well, just my luck I popped out in a place that didn’t take too kindly to the beings aforementioned portal upchucked into their streets. Thankfully I was able to convince them of my superior firepower with only one casualty.

Corey shook his head and marveled. Jesus… He leaned in. So, when and how did you get back into your body?

Jay canted his own glass towards Corey. That, my friend, is a story for another day. But, I think I’ve talked enough about myself for now.

Well, you’re certainly not short on entertaining stories.

Please Corey, it's hard enough as it is to halt my self disclosure momentum…

Right, right! Sorry!

I mean, I’m not a TOTAL egomaniac, but… he waved the suggestion away. How are YOU doing?

Corey shrugged, running his finger tip around the edge of his glass. I’m…fine.

That was not convincing. He sighs. Look man, I get it…

The night after my match with you I sat up until 2 am eating Chunky Monkey ice cream and sobbing while listening to our song on repeat on Spotify. A beat. It’s Ed Sheerhan’s “Shape of You” incidentally. We had so much ridiculous, torrid…

Jay holds his hands up in self defense. Whoa nellie!

Yeah. Corey replies with an awkward cadence before going silent for a moment.

He meant a lot to you?

Yes. Everything.

It’s perfectly natural to miss him.

I was going to quit the XWF for him.

Wow. Jay replies, genuinely impressed.

I was going to commit all my time and attention to him and running the commune. Give up the XWF forever. Now I don’t know what to do.

Jay takes a swig of his beverage, whether out of thirst or a desire to bolster his advice giving reserves is unknown. What does your heart tell you?

Corey sputters out a laugh. Dude, that is corny as fuck.

Shut up. What does your heart tell you?

It tells me…it tells me…he squints and seems to struggle with the query. It tells me I’m not done.

“Not done?”

I’m not done with the XWF. Not until I lose the Supercontinental Championship. Then, with a touch of spaciness to his tone. Not until I face him.

Well THAT is appropriately mysterious. Care to share with the class?

Corey looks like he’s about to respond, but then just…doesn’t. Jay takes the hint and nods in conciliation. It’s ok, a man needs things he keeps close to the chest. He takes another gulp of the mystery beverage and his attention goes to the beautiful scene just past the expanse of windows. Corey’s attention follows, and his breath is taken away all over again.

Beyond the windows is a stellar nursery, in the midst of which is a star being born.



It was a protostar, a contracting morass of gasses, slowly gathering in mass over hundreds of thousands of years before the nucleosynthetic process that would give birth to what we know of as a completed star. Corey marveled at the sheer enormity of what he was seeing, a 500,000 year process that would eventually give rise to a behemoth ball of energy that from an Earthly perspective was naught more than a nigh immortal pinprick of light in the night sky. What looked so tiny and effervescent from afar would be no less than a stellar giant in years time here, the end product of a gestation period that demarcated the equivalent of the rise and fall of man five times over.

He imagined they would one day, conceivably, have to move the bar. If it still existed. Which was doubtful.

It IS beautiful, isn’t it?

It’s frightening too.

Yes. It’s funny how so much out here has a tendency to both inspire awe and terror in equal measure. Space itself is an incessant reminder of our own smallness and mortality. Really puts things in perspective.

And here I am, looking at a celestial event, while pining for a man who doesn’t want me anymore.

Jay rapped his knuckles on the table, drawing Corey’s attention. Hey, this isn’t a refutation of your feelings. Those are every bit as valid.

How?

Because it means everything to you.

And nothing to the universe.

Jay sighed. You can’t think of it that way. That way lies madness. Depression. What we feel on a human level still matters. The universe may not think so, but…he paused. You ever hear the story of the child saving starfish on a beach?

I don’t think so.

Well, it goes like this. There is a child who happened upon a number of starfish who had been beached. Scores of them. Too many for her to possibly rescue them all. But she tries anyway. One by one, picking them up and tossing them back into the ocean to safety. An old man notices what she is doing and says, “But there must be thousands of them on the beach. I’m afraid you won’t make much of a difference doing this.” And the girl picks up another one, tosses it back into the water and says, “It made a difference to that one.”

Huh….

Yeah. The moral of the story is though the world, the cosmos, may seem terrifyingly vast, the individual still matters. Helping that individual matters. Jay looked at Corey knowingly, and suddenly the reason for the invite hit home.

Thank you Jay. It means a lot to me.

You’re quite welcome. And besides, anybody who somehow manages to kick my ass has got to be worth my time. He chuckles. You gonna be okay here for a bit?

Yeah, why?

Because I just saw a particularly attractive example of her species across the way, and I’d like to go make nice with her.

Corey smirked. Get your freak on.

Jay dismounted his seat and clapped Corey on the shoulder as he passed by him. The young man’s attention was once again drawn to the protostar as he started to speak.

Imagine looking at a protostar as you're about to address an opponent who calls himself “The Protostar”. That’s a little on the nose, even for me. But hell if I could resist.

So, Mr. Ishida, who the hell did you piss off? Like….WOW. Talk about being thrown right into the deep end with no floaties and a cement block tied around your ankle. And make no mistake my dude, you are in the DEEP END. First match in and it’s a championship match against a known main event performer. And that’s not ego talking, it’s just the fact of the matter.

So, I say again, who did you piss off?

Or maybe…maybe! You’re one of those guys who has an extensive pedigree in other promotions. Another Peter Vaughn. Granted, I don’t see any evidence of that and a quick Google search wasn’t particularly helpful either. And you'd think that if you were some big deal from over the fence the powers that be would trumpet that from the heavens. But no. Nada.

So just what in the devil's knickers is this match all about? Well my friend, I'm sorry to say, but it's looking like a burial to me. Yes, the brutal, merciless truth. You’re being fed to the Supercontinental champion.

Now, I know this sounds like a fair bit of narcissism. More than a fair bit. But look at the headlines here. Fresh newbie booked right out of the gate to face a dominant champion in the peak of his career? Yeesh.

And I’m not going to say you don’t have any talent. I’m sure you do. You wouldn’t have gotten this far if you hadn’t. To say nothing for the fact that this company once hired a paraplegic dwarf, of course. Is it ok to say dwarf? Sorry! But yeah, you got a flashy style that I can appreciate. And you’re different from the plague of terminally online hot chicks that seem to be the nouveau gimmick du juor lately. But if you truly want to be the greatest wrestler of all time…oh honey…you’ve got a long way to go.

I know, I know this must seem like its dripping with condescension. But it’s the truth. However, let me segue into a positive note, eh? I hope you DO manage to impress, Ishida. I hope you knock Vinnie and Theos socks off. Because you seem like the kind of nice affable new kid that deserves to go far in this business. And I hope, regardless of the match outcome, that you decide to stick around.

The match…the match? Corey drums his finger tips on the table top like he’s trying to will something from the ether of his mind. And then, suddenly, he’s got it. The match! I get to pick the stipulation! Now I almost forgot! He wipes the back of his hand against his brow as if to say “phew”.

Hmmmm…on one hand this is about me getting an advantage. On the other, I was honest about wanting you to look good. He looks contemplative. Now, I could just go the standard route here, but where’s the fun in that? I also don’t necessarily want to brutalize you in some garbage hardcore match either. Corey glances out the window, and a small smile appears. Oh, I got it. I think I got it.

He leans in towards the camera, looking pleased. I’m going to call it a Five Points match. Ishida, you say you’re a star. Well, then let’s prove it. I am going to request that a special ring be constructed in the shape of the star.

Quiet management, you’re the fools who gave me carte blanche.

Anyway, five pointed ring. And the winner is the one who manages to touch the corner in each of the five points. The winner is…a star. Not bad if I do say so myself!

Corey leans back in his seat, giving a little “oh” of surprise as it gooses him a bit, adapting to his posture.

Now here’s the kicker. Why am I, at least on the surface of things, being pitched a softball? Well, because management knows they can milk another big money match out of me on a paid live event. Of course, that would require a formidable opponent. Corey snaps his fingers. Lucky for ya’all, I do have someone in mind. Someone with pedigree. Someone with legacy. Someone who has amassed plenty of notoriety outside the walls of the XWF.

And that man is Bam Miller.

Corey looks completely serious for a moment, before collapsing into peals of laughter.

I’m just kidding, that guy sucks! Him and his Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Blandness self. Nahhhhh. I got somebody much cooler in mind than that. And I'm going to reveal it at Warfare.

Oh, you thought I was gonna tell you now? There’s that cheeky smile. Non mon, me petites. In time.

See you guys in my next bit. In the meantime… he taps the glass in front of him….wish me luck.

As the all seeing cameras click off Corey pinches one eye shut and considers the beverage in front of him like it’s some untamed animal. Finally, after willing up a requisite amount of courage, he brings the glass to his lips and takes a sip. Then, putting the glass down with an inscrutible expression, he finally says That’s what I imagine a hot dog made out of farts tastes like. The only reason I’m not spitting it out everywhere is because I’m a proper lady. Corey screws around in his seat looking for…looking for…ah! The waiter! Or the one we presume is the waiter. Mostly because he’s dressed like one.



Corey holds up the glass. Excuse me, I….oh. Shoot, I forgot. Corey reaches into his pocket and pulls out the Instant Translator unit that Jay had given him earlier. He clips it to the collar of his shirt and starts again. Sorry! But I’ve found this drink to be, erm, not to my tastes. Are you familiar with a “Virgin Shirley Temple”?

Translation: Many sorrows, but your face looks like a weathered scrotum named Virgin Shirley Temple.

Unfortunately for Corey, he has no way of hearing the results of his own translation, and can only hear the output of others. Who designed this shit, anyway? Evidently someone with some excellent comedic chops.

The waiter cants his head, narrowing his eyes. He responds in a kind of odd barking language that sounds perpetually angry even when it isn’t.

Translation: Sir, what have I done to earn your flagrant disrespect?

Corey somehow senses this isn’t going as planned. Oh! It’s ok if you don’t know the drink. Ya know what? Forget the whole thing. Can I just have a filtered space water?

Translation: The hole from which my wastes part calls out to your mother and youngest brood hatchling. Water.

The waiter starts to grit his teeth. There are a lot of them. They are very sharp.

Moments later!

Jay and Corey are pinned down behind an upturned table, the characteristic sounds and smells of blaster fire permeating the air. Jay pops off a shot blindly before wheeling around on Corey.

What did you do?!

I just tried to return a drink!

How in the the blue hell does… And then Jay notices something. He nips Corey’s translation device off his color and scowls. Whoops.

What do you mean “whoops”?!

Yeah, this one was on the fritz. It would take anything you said and turn it into…an errant blaster shot rips off a corner of the table…Jay cringes and ducks before proceeding….a disgusting abhorrent insult.

WHY DID I HAVE THAT?

Honest mistake! My bad! Trust me, I’ll get us out of here….another chunk of the table sizzles to death….probably! Jay pops off a trio of additional blind shots and pushes a side arm into Corey’s hands as he does so.

Corey inspects the weapon frantically. Does it have an “on” switch or something?

Just pull the trigger and SHOOT!

Okay, okay! Corey cringes and takes a wild shot around the corner of the table, but bucks back and gives a cry of fear as a shot impacts on the floor just in front of him.



With Jay Omega and Corey Smith pinned down, is there any hope for our intrepid heroes? Are either of them going to make it to their respective matches on Warfare?

And hey, wasn’t Jay supposed to have a kickass dinosaur partner?

To be continued?