[Jet City]

(*This is the second part of the team’s story for this show. It would make more sense if you read  Eiley’s half first.*)

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Locked In
Kaneohe, Hawaii
1 June 2023
OFF-Camera

The two of us haven’t talked since the argument. That’s not to say that we haven’t been in the same place at the same time. I think we both know that there is too much at stake to keep the stalemate going on too much longer, but there is no way either of us want to be the one to make the first move. We were both content to make that everyone else’s problem everywhere we went. There weren’t a whole lot of places where we could get away from one another on this tiny ass island. Before Sin City, we both spent significant time in Hawaii. We knew the same hangouts. We liked the same places. We were both training at Mikah’s gym. To their credit, Kris and Mikah seemed determined to get us back on the right page, even though they had both laughed off the idea of us teaming with each other a couple of weeks ago on Climax Control.

Since returning from the dead, Kris was all-in on making sure those of us using his or his wife’s name to promote ourselves needed to start pushing ourselves a little bit harder. I’m sure that some of it had to be because Court immediately won the Bombshell Championship after publicly shitting all over him and his gym. We were the easy punching bags. Eiley and I were the next two possible bright spots for the gym, so the fact that we had been booked as partners gave Mikah and Kris something to be invested in. That made Eiley and I the first two in the gym, and usually some of the last out, despite the fact that we never came within ten feet of one another.

Today I was lucky enough to be the one a few steps ahead. I decided not to change clothes. I just collected my things and made my way to the door. Most of the lights in the place were already switched off from the lack of activity to trip the motion sensors. A small section near the door was still lit up, with Kris standing just on the outside. He was probably still waiting on Mikah and Eiley to wrap up. I wasn’t going to hang out and find out. However, when I got to the door, it wouldn’t open. I looked out through the window just to the left of the door to see Kris still standing there. I tapped twice to get his attention before pointing to the door.

OZ: Yo, the door’s locked, ya know? It won’t open.

He looked back and forth between me and the door, and then tried to pull it open from his side. It was of no use. The thing didn’t even budge. I wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of trying to force it open from my side. He started silently mouthing words at me through the window like it wasn’t just normal glass.

KRIS: (What? I can’t hear you through the door!) 

I pointed at the door again, unamused. He mouthed a few more words that I didn’t quite catch. I didn’t have time for the game though.

OZ: Don’t fuck with me Kris. Open the door.

He pointed at his side of the door once more as Mikah came around to the front side of the building. He looked back at her with a smile, and I could hear them talking to one another. When he turned back to me he was back to miming the words to me.

KRIS: (It’s locked! It looks like someone put a big ass lock on it! That’s crazy!) 

I saw Mikah say something about it not just being this door either, but somehow all the doors. I don’t know what kind of game the two of them were playing, but I hadn’t signed up for it.

OZ: Not funny. I know you can hear me! Let me out of here!

Mikah joined him at his side, and frowned at me before shaking her head. She started to lead Kris away towards there car, and all he could do was shrug at me.

KRIS: (We’ll send help! Probably tomorrow! Don’t break anything!) 

I balled up my fist like I was going to put it through the window, but I knew exactly how bad of an idea that would be. On one hand, I would definitely end up paying for the thing. On the other, I had heard stories that he had done something similar to Court and she ended up breaking her hand as part of some lesson.

OZ: Don’t! God dammit Kris! You better come open this door!

He didn’t stop or even look back at the door though. The two of them got into Mikah’s jeep and took off out of the parking lot. I didn’t even need to check the other doors to know that Mikah had gone around the outside and gotten them all. For some reason they wanted me stuck here. I didn’t realize why until the ceiling lights started illuminating their way towards me from across the gym.

EILEY: Did Mikah already come through here? 

Suddenly it all made a lot more sense.

OZ: I’m going to seriously hurt that guy…

I didn’t say anything else before storming off. This had been their plan all along. If Eiley and I weren’t going to talk of our own free will, apparently they were willing to imprison us to get what they wanted. It wouldn’t take Eiley very long to figure out the situation that we were stuck in. She would probably even check all the doors for me. That was one less thing to worry about.



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Not Much of a Team
Kaneohe, Hawaii
1 June 2023
OFF-Camera

I was thinking that in the best case scenario, I wouldn’t see Eiley for a few hours and that would mean that she found a way out. Then all I would have to do was find what she found and go home. That didn’t happen though. I’m sure she probably looked around for a while, but I took the time to get myself cleaned up and changed into fresh clothes. It didn’t take long to open up the vending machines in the place so that we could have free run of them. If Kris and Mikah had the audacity to lock us in, they were going to foot the bill for it. They did have a point though. If Eiley and I were going to figure out a way to work as a team, we were going to have to work together. Despite the fact that the two of us had gotten compliments on our Blast from the Past performances, we hadn’t even made it to the finals. Part of that was because we both largely ignored our partners and somehow expected that to work. If we wanted a different outcome this time around, someone was going to have to take the first step. Luckily I managed to convince myself that meant I could take all of the credit for it later.

OZ: Since we’re stuck here I cracked open the vending machines. We can just pretend to be teenagers again. Maybe try to act like we don’t hate each other.

She could have been anywhere, but had settled in the center of Mikah’s six-sided ring, using her bag as a pillow behind her head. Maybe I gave her more credit than she deserved. She didn’t look like she had even considered trying to find her way out of the gym. I expected my words to startle her, but she didn’t even flinch.

EILEY: You do whatever you want. 

It was as much of a non-answer as she could possibly give. Apparently the fact that we were going to be stuck here together hadn’t changed her mind about not talking to me. I should have expected as much. She had been pretty good at holding a grudge as a teenager. I should have assumed by now that she would have perfected that into an art form.

OZ: I want to leave, but I don’t think that is going to happen. I will settle for figuring out whatever it is we need to do to make this work. We have been partners in other ventures. We should get back to that.

She rolled her eyes, and I couldn’t blame her. I didn’t even believe the words coming out of my mouth. They sounded foreign, and disingenuous. Maybe that kind of thing worked with strangers, but she knows me too well, and for too long. I needed to adjust my approach.

OZ: Fine. This was all good last week when this team wasn’t a real thing. We still could have pulled out as a team. We’re kind of past that point now. So I don’t care how mad you are at me anymore.  I don’t think the cold shoulder shit is going to improve our chances of winning.

I was hoping to shift her focus off of personal feelings for me, and onto the match we were tasked with winning. She didn’t look swayed in any way though.

EILEY: You were the one that came up to me about the team, not the other way around. And as for figuring things out… 

For the first time, it seems like she at least considers the idea, but it doesn’t last long. It looks like she shakes the thought away. I haven’t ever given her any reason to trust me, and expecting that to change overnight was asking a whole lot.

EILEY: We either will or we won’t. 

Another non-answer. Maybe she knew that her ambivalence annoyed me, and this was all just to punish me. Maybe she actually thought that she could win the whole thing alone if she really had to. I was hoping it was one of the two, because the only other option was that she really didn’t care. If that was the case, this whole thing was going to blow up in my face sooner or later. I wasn’t about to let that happen.

OZ: That’s not going to work for me.

I slid into the ring and rolled over to her before getting up to my feet. If she just wanted to lay there and look up at the ceiling, fine. I would go put  myself into her field of vision. Looking down into her eyes, I made a final pitch.

OZ: Like you said, people already think I am just a punching bag. We can both put in all the work we want, but if we don’t get on the same page it’s not going to work. If it doesn’t work, it makes me look worse than everything else already has. I’m not willing to risk that.

There wasn’t an apology anywhere in there. Every part of it was carefully worded because I had rehearsed it as a last ditch effort over the last week. I thought maybe she would get up and walk away, or at least turn her head to avoid me. Either of those would have shown some kind of effort. Instead, she simply closed her eyes to avoid me with a shrug.

EILEY: I didn’t realize that you can’t compartmentalize. I can separate business from personal shit; I’ve been doing it for almost a month now. The only “same page”  that we need to be on, is that we want to win. That worked for Mikah and Kris three-ish years ago. 

I know she didn’t actually believe that. She was usually much more perceptive than that. That was why we had worked so well together in the past. It was the reason that we got along during the times that we did. She had an innate ability to size people up almost instantly, so there was no way that was what she saw when she looked at those two idiots.

OZ: You see the way that the two of them are now? I have a hard time believing that they weren’t always like that, even if not everyone got to see it. It couldn’t have all been just about winning. If it was they wouldn’t still be teaming up to lock us up in here.

Granted, the two of them made our past hook-ups look trivial in comparison. That wasn’t the point though. People didn’t need to be married to be a functional team. In fact, some of the worst teams in tag wrestling were married couples. The personal bleeds over into the professional and they never go anywhere. I didn’t understand how she didn’t see that was the problem I was trying to avoid. I was out of options.

OZ: I was wrong to unload on you like that last week. I can blame it on alcohol, a head injury, or just getting my ass kicked in front of the world but I still did it. You were an easy target to vent at.

There was a chance that she still wouldn’t believe me. I wasn’t the apologizing type. She opened her mouth like she was going to say something, but didn’t. However, she did open her eyes and look up at me for the first time.

EILEY: I...okay--. 

It looked like it was a serious internal struggle for her to give it up and actually hear me out. I took it as a personal win, even if I could tell that she was immediately about to start walking it back.

EILEY: Fine. But you’re not forgiven. You’re still an ass, and I know that you are really just out for yourself. If you didn’t have anything to gain here, you wouldn’t be apologizing. You’re only doing it because you don’t have any other options. 

She brought her knees up to her chest and rocked herself forward so that she could sit up. I offered my hand to help her up, but she slapped it away. It was another simple way of making sure that I knew that she didn’t need me. Once she was up on her feet, she turned so that we were face-to-face.

EILEY: Does that work? 

It wasn’t the best case scenario, but it was about as good as I could have hoped for. Realistically, I thought there was a chance that she would keep ignoring me until the place opened up in the morning. I certainly wouldn’t have been surprised. Not that I could let that show.

OZ: I mean, not really. It’s a start. Ideally we need to be able to trust each other on Sunday. I don’t want you standing on the apron enjoying the fact that I am getting my ass handed to me. I don’t want you to ignore a tag at a shitty moment just because you are pissed at me. If you just want to set all that aside for now, cool. But eventually that’s going to be something we actually have to work out.

She didn’t seem overly eager to tackle our bigger issues. I have a feeling that won’t change for a while either. It was possible that a little bit of success as a team could speed up that process, but I wouldn’t have bet on it.

EILEY: If we have all night, I’m sure we can figure something out…what that is? I’m not sure. I can at least point out all of the little things that you are still doing wrong since you refuse to listen to anyone.

On one hand it was insulting. On the other, it meant that she had been paying attention to my workouts during all that time she was pretending to ignore me. That was a good sign. I had to admit, I was curious about what she could have caught that was wrong.

OZ: Like what?

Confidently, she closed the distance between the two of us with her fist raised. I took a step towards her to get into a position to defend myself, but it brought a smile to her face. She flinched like she was going to throw a right hand and when I moved to defend it she kicked my right foot out from under me. I stumbled back, and caught my left foot on the bag she had been resting on before toppling backwards to the canvas.

EILEY: When you square up with someone, you’re not balanced. 

As I laid there on my back, staring up at the same ceiling she had been so captivated by for most of our conversation, I started to realize that the night was probably going to be a lot longer than I thought it would be.



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>Holding It Together

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As the scene opens, the camera is racing along a two lane road. The sun is already starting to fade over the hills on the horizon, leaving pockets of shadows cast over parts of the forest. Up ahead, the road veers right, but the camera continues straight, going right over top of Coronado National Forest sign. As the shrubbery thickens and eventually gives way to the frontline of the forest, the camera rises higher into the air. The camera ascends with the trees up onto the hills that appear far off on the horizon originally. Near the top of one of the taller hills, we can see a small, relatively flat, clearing with a single dark spot at the center. As we close in, the spot becomes a little more defined. There is a blanket laid out on the ground, on top of which sits a single bar stool. Sitting on the stool, looking out at all the ground that the camera covered on the way here is Jet City’s Miracle, Oz. The camera circles him once, and then hovers just over his right shoulder so that we can see the same view as he does from where he sits.

”I’ve done a lot of traveling my whole life, but this is my kind of place. It’s quiet. There’s a stillness in the air that you can’t find almost anywhere else.”

It was easy to see why that kind of thing might appeal to Oz. From the moment he had burst onto the scene in Sin City, things had been unbelievably loud.

”Joining Sin City for the Unsolved Mysteries tour was a lot like being thrown into the deep end of the pool as a child. The venues were bigger. The crowds were a little more wild. I didn’t even realize how big of a shock it was until I finally got to compete at the Gold Coast Casino. That place is a lot more intimate, and the people there are so used to having SCW around, that it doesn’t create the same kind of atmosphere as being overseas did. It was a nice breath of fresh air to get me out of my head.”

He looks over at the camera for just a moment with a smirk on his face before returning his attention to the view in front of him.

”...and trust me, being inside my head hasn’t been all that great. Aside from the whirlwind of Blast from the Past, and having to step into the ring with one of the greatest competitors of all time, I have had my brains scrambled a few times. Kris Ryans took it upon himself to try to flatten and embarrass me in front of a crowd. Austin James Mercer decided to go full on crazy and attempt to give me brain damage with a chair.”

It would have been understandable if he were bitter about the way he won his last match, but it didn’t sound like he actually bothered him. To Oz, the result was all that mattered. People would eventually forget the way that the match ended, but the history books would always have him picking up the win.

”As always, I have been able to adapt and overcome. I got eliminated from the tournament, but managed to get myself a contract anyways. I got laid out by Kris, but I still showed up when it was time to square up against Austin. And Austin may have laid me out in order to make some kind of point, but I was the one that won that match. ME. AJM is a guy considered to be good enough to take on the top champion in this company, but lost his cool when he couldn’t put me down easily. I’ll take that as a compliment along with my victory.”

He raises his hand to his head and trails his fingers along the newly formed scar courtesy of Austin James Mercer. The wound had long since closed, and the stitches were removed earlier in the week. By the time Climax Control came around, it would be little more than a bad memory; albeit, a memory that would stick with him for quite some time.

”...a handful of stitches, a concussion, and two weeks to think about it feels like a small price to pay in comparison. The only conclusion that I can come to, is that Austin didn’t want to lose straight up. He saw the match getting away from him. He knew that I was going to be able to pull it out. The only way for him to save any face was to snap on me. From that standpoint, I can almost respect the hustle. In this business, it is all about making ourselves look better than the competition. He couldn’t get that done legit, and had to resort to getting himself disqualified. I would have done the same thing in his shoes, but I haven’t had to. Doesn’t that say more about what I am capable of inside that ring than anything he did with that chair? ”

He said it with a smugness in his voice that made it hard for the fans to agree with, even if he was technically the victim in the situation. It was a positive sign that he wasn’t going to wallow in self-pity over the fact that things hadn’t gone exactly according to plan in his first singles match.

”...and yeah, all of that is in the past now, but that doesn’t make it irrelevant. In just a couple of days I will be walking down to the ring where yet another member of Wolfslair will be in the ring waiting for me. And before that, I will probably get to hear all about how training with Wolfslair in New York gives everyone such a huge advantage. I might even hear about how big of a joke Jet City is by comparison. At this point, I expect as much. That has been the song each and every one of my opponents has been singing leading up to our matches.”

Oz’s most favorite part of the job so far has been keeping receipts of the things people said about him. It was satisfying when he could flip those words against the people with the audacity to speak them into existence. So far, each and every one of them has gotten it wrong.

”The problem is, none of their words have mattered so far. Teddy told me that there was no way that I was ready to step up to this level of competition. I made sure that his  team didn’t even make it out of the first round of Blast from the Past.  J2H said that Jet City hasn’t been the same since Kris went off the grid. In the time we spent in the ring with one another, I proved him wrong. He couldn’t beat me, and needed his partner to advance to the next round. Since then, I have beaten a literal ghost, and survived a  temper tantrum from Wolfslair’s most overrated star. Every single time people tried to tell me that I wasn’t good enough to get the job done. Every single time I rose to the occasion to prove them wrong.”

He shoots another look at the camera with a devilish look in his eyes.

”I guess that makes me the anti-Miles Kasey. He has a much longer history than I do of being told that he isn’t quite good enough, or isn’t quite ready, but unlike me, he fails to cash in any of those opportunities when they present themselves. I mean, Mark and Christian had to go and add Mercer to the World Heavyweight Championship match, because nobody was going to pay attention to Miles vs Michael Harris. It was a massacre waiting to happen. They needed to stack the deck for Wolfslair to even give them a chance, and they still managed to come up short. The reign of awful continues. Wolfslair couldn’t get the job done, as per usual. I mean be honest, have any of them other than Alicia ever actually lived up to all of the hype?”

”...but I guess that is unfair, because he is not like a really real member of Wolfslair. They guy is a product of the Russow’s. I am sure they are a big deal somewhere in the world, but I have asked around Sin City, and most people don’t even know who the fuck they are. Apparently only one of them ever made any noise around here, and that didn’t last long. And if that isn’t a perfect summary of Miles potential, I don’t know what is. The guy showed up a couple of years ago with a chip on his shoulder that has only gotten bigger since. He gets opportunity after opportunity just to prove over-and-over again that he doesn’t have what it takes. It doesn’t matter what gym he trains in. It doesn’t matter what championship he is chasing. It doesn’t matter what opponent he finds himself standing across the ring from. All the guy does is fall short, albeit in an impressive manner.”

”So what does the guy do next? He goes out and gets himself a subpar partner in the hopes of making a run at the Mixed Tag Team Championships. Another opportunity. Another championship to chase. However, he probably couldn’t have picked any worse than he did. I get that maybe these two run in the same circles, and train with all of the same people, but this team doesn’t strike me as one that the oddsmakers will be putting money on. I’m not even sure that Alexandra Calaway has won a match in this company and if it wasn’t for that impressive resume that she was hyping up on her way into the company, I assume that Sin City would have already sent her packing. I mean, she boasts about being something like a 30 time champion across various promotions and divisions, but can’t seem to beat the likes of Bea Barnhart. Then again, maybe that makes her the perfect teammate for Miles, because he knows exactly what it is like to get beaten by an embarrassment with that last name. ”

”Yet Eiley and I are supposed to be intimidated? The two of us were the rookie highlights of the Blast from the Past tournament. The only team capable of eliminating the two of us went on to win the whole damn thing, and complimented us for the fight we put up on their way to the top. I think it is obvious to everyone, including the people that book the matches, that the only problems that Eiley and I could possibly have are self-created. We are both selfish. We are both inexperienced. We were both trained by narcissistic sociopaths that never learned how to play well with anyone other than themselves. We haven’t been around long enough to prove our worth to anyone individually, and have never worked together as a team inside the ring.”

Where some people found faults in the characteristics he was listing, Oz didn’t see it that way at all.

”...and I see all of those things as an advantage. Kris and Mikah may not have the greatest track record with students, but the two of them were absolutely dominant in the Mixed Tag Team division. Nobody could hold a candle to them, and their dominance literally killed the division the last time around. Laugh all you want at the gyms that Eiley and I come out of, but there is no denying their track record in matches like these. Add to that the fact that the two of us have known each other for most of our lives, and worked with one another on several different occasions, and you have the makings of a contending team.”

There was one small caveat that even the person that put the card together managed to call out.

”...assuming that we can hold it together.”

Although, the way that the words came out made it sound like he was plenty confident that the two could get the job done.

”...and I assume we will. It’s what we do. It’s what we’ve always done. The only people that are really standing in the way of Eiley and I taking home those Mixed Tag Team Championships at Summer XXXtreme, are ourselves. More than any other team that has thrown their names in the mix, we control our own destiny. If we can figure out a way to keep things together, I don’t think any other team in this division can hold a candle to us. But if the wheels come off, it won’t be because of anything Miles or Alexandra did. Eiley and I are always going to be our own worst enemies, and that is what makes us the most unlikely team. ”

”I believe in us though. All of you should too.”