“I want to know where my confidence went
One day it all disappeared…”
Earlier This Week
Calgary, Alberta, Canada
Where had it all gone so wrong?
For the longest time, Lachlan Kane had been on top of the world. Ever since he had come to the US to wrestle one year ago, his career had taken off like a rocket. Starting with Division, and extending into SCW, he had been riding the biggest high of his life. Even when he had his inevitable losses, he took them as learning opportunities and never really let them get under his skin.
So what had changed between then and now?
After the (quite frankly, shocking) loss to Gamers Inc. for their Mixed Tag belts, Sierra and Lachlan decided that maybe it might be beneficial for them to focus a bit more on their singles careers. And while Sierra had flourished, Lachlan found himself struggling. He picked up a couple of wins over the likes of Blade Alexander and Jack Asher, even earning himself a shot at the Roulette title. But then, that was where the slide began. He failed to pick up the win over Griffin Hawkins at Into The Void. Before that, when Division Wrestling made its comeback, he went 0 and 2, missing out on an opportunity for the Division World Championship. It was all starting to build up inside of him, and for quite some time now, he was starting to wonder if it might be time to consider his career finished.
He never said any of this to Sierra, however. Especially now since she seemed to have her heart set on the two of them entering the tournament set up to crown the new Mixed Tag Team champions, after the belts had been unceremoniously stripped from the AWOL Gamers Inc. He didn’t have the heart to tell her that he was considering leaving wrestling for good, not when she was so excited about the prospect of them teaming up once again...
“Hello? Lachlan? Anybody home?”
Jerking out of his melancholy thoughts, he shook his head and looked over at Sierra, who was staring at him with a concerned look on her face. They had been spending the last week at their shared home in Calgary, before they had to head down to Las Vegas for Climax Control on Sunday night. They were currently out in the backyard, seated on the covered patio while Sierra’s two daughters played in the grass. Sierra had been flipping through some bridal magazines while Lachlan had been watching the girls, before his thoughts had gotten away with him.
“Sorry, drifted away for a moment there,” he said, smiling a bit sheepishly. He stretched his limbs out, hearing the satisfying pop they made and settled back into the cushions of the loveseat he was sitting on.
“Is everything OK?” Sierra asked, flipping the magazine closed and rising from her chair. She walked over and sat next to him on the loveseat, taking his hand in hers.
“Everything’s fine love,” he said, careful to keep his tone light and carefree. “Why do you ask?”
She gave him one of her famous ‘Really?’ looks. “Lachlan, we’ve been together for a year now. I know when you’re not OK, and I know when you’re lying to me. Right now, it’s both. Now, out with it.”
He let out a sigh, running a hand through his hair. “Alright, alright. But let’s take this inside.”
She nodded and after telling the girls they would be right back, they rose up from the seat and walked in the door. They stood near the back window so they could still see the girls, and Sierra folded her arms across her chest. “Alright, what’s going on? You haven’t been the same since Into The Void. Hell, I’d even say you haven’t been yourself since Division started back up.”
Lachlan looked at her, a lump catching in his throat. He didn’t want to do this to her. Despite their night-and-day personalities, he was madly in love with her, and wanted her happiness above anything else. But he knew that he couldn’t be the same person that she had teamed with before. How could he, when his own mind was telling him to just give up? He didn’t want to saddle her with the useless shell of a man that he had once been. It was better to let her down now and spare her the disappointment of a loss in the ring. “Si, I can’t do this anymore,” he said quietly. “Ever since we lost the belts, I just…” He let out a slow breath, resting his hands on his hips. “I just feel like it’s been one failure after another with me. I just can’t seem to get it together long enough to make a difference anymore.”
Her face fell as she realized what he was saying. “Lachy…”
He paced the floor in front of the window, dragging his hands down his face and letting out a growl of frustration. “You deserve better, Si. You deserve to be at the top of this company, not to mention Division. Hell, if I could give you the world, you know I would in a heartbeat. I know that you want to enter this tournament and you want to destroy everyone they place in front of you, and you want to claim back those belts that we never should have lost in the first place…” He turned back to look at her, his blue eyes sad as they gazed at her before he hung his head. “But all I’ll do is hold you back.”
She reached out to him, taking his face in her hands and making him look at her.
“Listen to me, Lachlan. You’ve always been the most resilient person that I’ve ever known. You’ve never let a loss get to you like this. I know that you had your heart set on becoming the Roulette champion...but you will get there in time, I know it. I just thought in the meantime that you and I could do what we do best...together. Like we used to.” She ran her thumb along his cheek. “I don’t want...no, I won’t do this without you. And I know that despite what you may think of yourself right now, you’re one of the greatest wrestlers this company has ever seen. And on Sunday, you’re going to prove it. We’re going to walk into Las Vegas, we are going to beat Liam Ryan and Evelyn Welch, and then we are going to go on to eliminate everyone else in this scam of a tournament until we are holding what we never should have lost in the first place. And the world will know that you and I are the greatest thing going in the world of professional wrestling. End of story.”
He blinked a couple of times, smiling at her before pulling her into his arms and hugging her tightly. “You always know just what to say.”
She smiled up at him, kissing the tip of his nose. “Now, if we’re done with the mental ass-kicking, let’s get some training in. We’ve got some titles to claim back.”
------
“I don't need a doctor to figure it out
I know what's passing me by
When I look in the mirror, sometimes I see
Traces of some other guy…”
“You know, it’s kind of funny…”
The distinct Irish brogue of SCW’s beloved Scrapper, Lachlan Kane, echoed through the scene as the camera opened up to show him leaning against a brick wall in a nondescript location, dressed in his signature leather jacket, a “Canadian Nightmare” shirt representing his fiancee Sierra Williams, slim-fitting dark wash jeans and a pair of Converse on his feet. His arms folded across his chest, his face was an unreadable mask, a far cry from the usual toothy grin he displayed for the world to see.
“So many of these teams in this tournament either straight up don’t even want to be involved, or they’re crapping all over the mixed tag division, saying it’s nothing more than a joke. Which begs the question...why the hell are you even bothering, then? When Sierra and I first got approached with the idea of joining the mixed tag division, I will admit that maybe we had the same mindset. After all, there really wasn’t much in the way of competition when we first started here. But we figured that maybe through our perseverance and hustle, maybe we could help make the division into something great. We promoted the hell out of the division everywhere we went. We extended an open invitation to any other teams to come test their mettle against us. We did everything that was expected of us, and then some. For six months, we were model champions. We became the benchmark of the mixed tag division. Where most people saw a joke, we saw potential. A proverbial diamond in the rough, if you will. We were ready to cut and shape it into the crown jewel of SCW. Of course, things didn’t really work out in our favour, but I’ll be damned if I let anyone shit all over everything that Sierra and I did for this division. We poured our heart into everything we did, because we believed it could be something incredible.”
He shifted his weight to his left foot, uncrossing his arms and sliding them into the pockets of his leather jacket. “And then, everything came to a screeching halt. Almost literally. By some god damn stroke of luck, Gamers Inc. managed to rip the titles away from us. Now, under any other circumstance, I would have been fine with it. But this wasn’t any other circumstance. Because almost immediately after they won the belts, they dropped off the face of the Earth. One little promotional video, and then POOF! They vanished. In fact, I would even go so far as to say they were holding those belts hostage. Because they knew that if Sierra and I were to get our rightly owed rematch against them, they would have been the shortest-reigning mixed tag champs in SCW history.”
He shook his head with disdain. “And while they were on their little ‘vacation’, suddenly we had all these mixed tag teams coming out of the woodwork, suddenly claiming that they were going to be the ones to save the division. Let me pose this question to you all - where exactly were you when Sierra and I were practically giving away title shots?” He looked down at the watch on his wrist for a moment, before fixing his cold stare back to the camera. “That’s right, nowhere to be found. You all knew that while we held the gold, none of you stood a chance in hell of defeating us. But then, when we inexplicably lost the titles, all of a sudden you all found some semblance of courage and starting talking about how you were going to ‘save’ the division.” He let out a derisive laugh. “Sierra and I had been the most talked-about champions that division ever had. We put eyes on the product, and asses in seats. We were the ones that saved the division...only to watch it nosedive back into obscurity once Gamers Inc. got their hands on the belts and fucked off back to their computer screens. Thankfully, Christian and Mark made the right call and stripped those . If I had my way, their ‘reign’ would be wiped from the record books.” He shrugged. “Sadly, that’s not my call, so the history books will forever be tainted with that worthless title run.”
He pushed off from the wall, taking a few steps towards the camera. “But, to be fair, there’s actually a few faces that are new to the company. Two of which are our opponents this week. Liam Ryan and Evelyn - my mistake, Ms. Welch. I can appreciate the fact that you wanna come into SCW all guns blazing, looking to make a name for yourself. But if you think for one single goddamn second that it’s going to come at Sierra and I’s expense, then you are sorely mistaken. Too many people before you have already tried to do that, and it ends now. We’ve been quiet about it for too long, and it’s made people forget just how dominant we are. Consider yourselves the example. When Sunday night rolls around, and Sierra and I punch our ticket to the next round of the tournament, leaving your broken bodies in our wake, everyone will sit up and take notice and they will know that we are back. We are back and we have only one thing on our minds - getting our titles back.”
With one last cold glare towards the camera, Lachlan turned on his heel and stalked off into the darkness, as the camera faded slowly to black.
Author’s Note: Sorry it got kinda emotional in the beginning. Had a lot of things to work through with Lach to get him back into ring shape.
Also, mucho thanks to Blue Rodeo for the song inspiration!
