All Alone
Las Vegas, NV
20 July 2020
OFF-Camera
It was the early hours of Monday morning, and Kristopher Ryans had already had about as much of Sin City and Underground shenanigans as he could handle. Mikah hadn’t bothered to show up for Climax Control. Coby had come running to him for help before turning the backstage area into an adult game of tag with the masked GRIME idiots. All he wanted to do was head back to the hotel, where Mikah would hopefully be. In the back of his head, he knew that it was going to be an argument. At least he would be able to make sure that nothing horrible had happened in the hours since he last saw her. As he makes his way through the parking structure to find his car, someone darts out between two cars, startling him.
Kris: What the fu---
Kris jumps backwards with a fist raised to defend himself, but his eyes spot his would-be attacker and cause him to relax slightly. GRIME had been chasing Coby all over the arena for most of the night. The fastest member of Jet City was still in one piece, even though he was breathless.
Coby: Sorry. I wasn’t sure that you weren’t them at first...
Kris rolls his eyes and moves around Coby. He takes his keys out of his pocket and unlocks the doors to his car. He pulls open the back door on the driver’s side and throws his bag inside.
Kris: Well, I’m not. They wish that they were as good as I was. That’s why The Nobodies are going to be shutting them up for good. Glad to see you have been wearing them out though.
Coby shakes his head, having followed Kris to the car.
Coby: You say that now, but they outnumber The Nobodies too. It’s only a matter of time before that catches up to you.
Kris doesn’t seem even remotely bothered by the idea that the group would be targeting him.
Kris: Well, they haven’t really gotten their hands on you yet. I think I’ll be able to manage. Plus, I have back-up.
Coby does not allow Kris to escape after the jab. Instead, he tries to flip Kris’ argument back to him.
Coby: Oh really? Where was Mikah tonight then? For that matter, where are The Nobodies? Tim and Alexis seem to be doing their own thing and really don’t need you. Mikah can’t be bothered to actually show up. For all the backup you have, you’re standing out here all alone.
It wasn’t a conversation that Kris was prepared to have. Not with someone who had abandoned him and went running back to Seattle. The two of them were supposed to have each other’s backs. Even if he was right about The Nobodies and Mikah, he wasn’t any better than them either. At least not in Kris’ mind.
Kris: Look, I don’t have to explain anything to you. You bailed. You took your opinion with you. Now you expect me to jump at the chance to help you? I’m gonna pass. You’re still standing. You can clearly take care of yourself. Don’t worry about The Nobodies. Don’t worry about The Black Sheep. You’re Jet City. That’s your place. Unfortunately it’s just not mine anymore.
Coby laughs at his friend, but it is more sarcastic than joyous.
Coby: That’s the attitude problem that landed you out here all alone. Everything is always everyone else’s fault with you. You’re always the victim.
Kris fires back without a second thought.
Kris: Well that’s what happens when everyone treats me like the villain. I shouldn’t have expected you to be any different than the rest.
Kris pulls open the driver’s door and sits down in the seat. He starts the car, but before he can pull the door closed, Coby grabs it by the top of the frame. He looks down at Kris blankly, and tries to force all of the hostility out of his voice in the hopes of getting through to his friend.
Coby: When you spend all your time acting like the villain, people are going to treat you that way no matter how you feel. I asked you for help today, and you blew me off. What would you call yourself if not a villain?
Kris shakes his head, and pulls the door free from his friend’s grip. The car roars to life, and Kris pulls out around Coby, leaving him alone in the parking area without another word.
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Here we go...yet again...
The Grand Slam Champion is sitting behind his desk with his feet propped up on top of it. He doesn’t look like he is happy to be in front of the camera, which is a shocking change of pace. It could just be that he was getting tired of speaking about this particular opponent. It seemed like no matter what he did, Bill was constantly in his way. Maybe it was finally starting to grate on The Miracle. Although, it is entirely possible that his exasperation was caused by his tag team partner. The two had spent the majority of the last two weeks at each other’s throats after Mikah pulled off the victory in her return. It didn’t seem like Kris was going to poke at that wound though. Instead, he keeps his focus on his upcoming opponents for now.
You know back when I was making my big return I didn’t give Bill Barnhart the credit that he deserved. I paid for that. The guy shocked the world when he spoiled my return. For a night, he validated all the horrible things that people say about me on a weekly basis. You know what? I’m kind of glad that he did.
Kris laughs, and sits back in the office chair, causing it to lean dangerously. He is wearing the bright orange shirt ‘villains’ shirt that the designed team had released to social media earlier in the week even though it was not scheduled to be released until Summer XXXtreme. He had ruined more than a couple of people’s days in order to get one for himself early. He wasn’t going to lose any sleep over it. The company was making money off of his talent. It was the least they could do. He continues on, pondering the alternate timeline that winning his debut would have put him on.
What would have happened if I won that match? What would I have gained? Look at what I have been able to do since coming back to Sin City. Sure, I lost that first one, but I won the right to control my destiny. I beat Griffin Hawkins, the man challenging Ben Jordan for the World Heavyweight Championship in a little over a week. And to make sure NOBODY thought it was a fluke, I went ahead and did it a second time on the very next show. I managed to step over a handful of people that were supposed to be the new up and comers set to pack me up and send me back to 2017. I beat O’Malley, the Underground Champion. I brought back a mixed tag team that is undefeated, and continued our winning ways against the Trenton Tigers.
A wide smile comes across his face as he mentally runs through all of his highlights. At this point, everyone in SCW knew that Kris’ most favorite thing in the world was Kris. It didn’t surprise anyone that he was wasting time propping up his own ego before talking about the defeat that not only got under his skin, but stayed there for more than a month.
So how did losing to Bill Barnhart really hurt me? When I re-signed with SCW, I was confident that I was going to be able to stroll through the roster and do whatever I wanted. I didn’t think that I had to put the work in. I thought that I was going to be good enough to slide by based on skill and muscle memory. Bill Barnhart proved me wrong right out of the gate. I lost cleanly in the middle of the ring, and the world was shocked. Of course, Bill would go on to botch the championship opportunity that he was given for pulling off the upset, and I would go on to win every single match they put me in, but that can’t change the fact that Bill won all those weeks ago. Then again, when Bill was given the opportunity to seize his destiny, he found himself with his shoulders pinned to the mat by yours truly.
Kris had felt a weight lift off of him the second that he managed to avenge his loss against Bill. He hadn’t even realized how much it had been weighing him down until after the match was over. Sure, he had walked away from it with a chance to challenge for any championship he wanted. Even better, he had walked away with back-to-back victories over Griffin Hawkins. Nothing took the pressure off quite like being the one to pin Bill in the center of the ring though. It was like he had closed a chapter of unfinished business. He had brushed a smudge off of his record. He could move on.
You see, Bill didn’t win because he was better than me. Bill didn’t really win at all. I lost. It was my actions that put me in the position that I was in. It was my arrogance and shit work ethic that lost that match. It was a lack of preparation. I came in expecting to walk all over everyone, and Bill reminded me that if I wanted to do that, I was going to have to put the work in. In a way, he did me a favor. It is always better to get those stumbles out of the way early on. Otherwise you end up winning the small matches and choking in the more important spots.
He laughs, thinking about how Bill had done that very thing with the opportunity that he won. Kris was ecstatic to have avoided that fate for himself. He was on a roll that felt almost unstoppable since coming up short in that first match, but would it have ended up the same way had he won? If nobody burst his bubble in his return would everything else have fallen perfectly into place? Probably not. Mikah might not even have agreed to come back. They may not have had the argument that had derailed their last week, but maybe they would not even have been a team at all. It was a fork in the road that he was glad he never had to go down. His career has had more than one lucky turn like that.
Which is why I asked if I would have been any better off winning that first match. Really. Think about the way that the path in the road would have forked. If I beat Bill, I don’t adjust my behavior. There is no epiphany that pulls my head out of my ass. Maybe Finn Whelan would have walked away with a win. It’s certainly possible that Jack Washington would have really broken me like he promised to. Worst of all, I could have lost to Griffin Hawkins at Into the Void, or even failed to win my championship opportunity at the next Climax Control. Rest assured, the house of cards would have eventually come crashing down. That’s why I can say, without hesitation, I’m glad that my only loss happened on the night that it did.
The thought of being stuck near the bottom of the ranks after breaking the glass ceiling he was trapped under just a few years ago made him literally nauseous. He doesn’t allow himself to dwell on the bizarro world anymore. Instead, he shifts focus back to reality.
Since then, I have been looking pretty unstoppable. The calls to return me back to 2017 are slowing down, because people are realizing that it can’t be done. Everyone that thought I was going to flame out after just a handful of matches has been proven wrong. Everyone that saw me lose to Bill and wrote me off as a has-been is probably pretty upset to see me rise from the ashes. I don’t know why people are surprised though. I have made a career out of doing things that NOBODY thought that I could, and I have no intention of stopping until I get everything that I feel like I deserve.
He pauses like he is waiting for the audience to ask him what it is that he means. However, he is alone in the room and there is nobody available to push the monologue along. Kris turns his face away from the camera, and covers his mouth with a hand before responding to himself in a much more higher-pitched female voice.
”...but what is it that you think you deserve, Kris?”
He pulls his feet down off the desk when he turns back to the camera, and has a wide smile on his face. He laughs as his feet hit the floor and he sits up in the chair, more square to the camera.
Thank you audience! Have no fear, because that’s what I’m here to talk about!
The fake enthusiasm doesn’t last, and the smile fades off of his face.
Mark and Christian could have easily put us in the mix with Wolfslair and Bitch ‘n’ Moan for the Mixed Tag Team Championships. Mikah and I certainly have the resumes to earn the spot. I could have even cashed in my own shot in order to have our team added to the match at Summer XXXtreme had I wanted to. Instead, we find ourselves in what will undoubtedly be looked at as an informal number one contenders match should the champions retain their titles. So if you think about it, this isn’t really a contest, it’s an audition. Bill and Bea Barnhart are just a blip on the radar. These two are not some kind of grand challenge. I proved last time I was in the ring with Bill that I have taken his best shots, and overcome the disadvantage, and Mikah is literally the greatest Bombshell of all time. This match is as lopsided on paper as it is going to be once we all step into the ring together. The problem is, despite everything Mikah and I have done, we are still new as a team. And it doesn’t help that all the public ever sees us do is argue with one another either. The bosses clearly aren’t sold on our ability to work together, or even coexist with one another. Both of us are combative. Both of us are difficult to work with. Neither of us really like following the rules backstage or in the ring. In every possible meaning of the phrase, we are Sin City’s Black Sheep.
He shrugs his shoulders. The name was not originally his idea, but it was fitting. The Sweete Twins had been onto something all those years ago when they recruited Kris, Mikah and all of the others to their cause. Kris had been part of The Nobodies, and Jet City in SCW, but there was always something that just felt right when he was part of the Black Sheep. It was where he fit in, despite all outward appearances.
So instead of handing us the spot that we probably deserve, Mark and Christian are going to make us work for it. They want to see that we are willing to put the work in to get what we want. It’s almost like they have forgotten that they are challenging us to do the one thing that we have always been able to do. All they have done by delaying us is give both myself and Mikah another occasion to rise to. NOBODY thought that I was going to be able to win the World Heavyweight Championship. When I first arrived here as a drug riddled kid just trying to hustle people out of money, NOBODY thought that I was going to go on to be a Grand Slam Champion. For as much shit as all of the Bombshells give Mikah, has she not succeeded in literally everything that she set out to do? She is a Triple Crown Champion totally on her own. No group helped her win championships. She didn’t have friends. She didn’t have partners. Every single one of her accomplishments are of her own doing. How many other Bombshells have been able to do that in this company? Now her sights are finally set on becoming a Grand Slam Champion. Who could possibly hope to stop her when absolutely everyone else has failed?
It wasn’t normal for Kris to heap so much praise on another person. He was quick to build himself up, but wasn’t really good at sharing the spotlight. The fact that he would have so many positives to share about his partner was surprising. Especially given that they had not exactly been seeing eye-to-eye over the last couple of weeks. It was the truth though. As successful as he had been on the men’s side of the roster, Mikah had done more on the more difficult Bombshell side of things. That was why she was already in the Hall of Fame while Kris was still waiting for the honor himself. He couldn’t deny how talented she was, even if she was going to rub it in his face later. Sometimes they were too alike for their own good.
People are always going to point to the fact that we argue to try and discredit us. They think that teams should be on the same page about all things, at all times. They think any dissension in the ranks is cause for panic. The problem with that is Mikah and I can’t stand anyone. We may not like each other sometimes, but we hate all of you so much more. We are two people that should have never joined a team to begin with. Everyone would agree that we were doing perfectly fine on our own. NOBODY doubts that if Mikah had chosen to return and chase the Bombshell Championship, she would have it sooner rather than later. As for me, I have already beaten Griffin Hawkins twice, and Ben Jordan has never been able to beat me. I could have inserted myself into the main event picture, and likely walked away successful. Yet, both of SCW’s Black Sheep chose this path instead. Why? Because that is what we want to do. People don’t have to understand it. People don’t have to accept it. The Trenton Tigers didn’t think that we could work together, but everyone watched them get beaten two weeks ago.
He starts speaking more quickly, getting more excited as he goes. Now that he was getting further and further away from having to talk about the failure that was his return, he seemed more like himself. The arrogance that grates on most of his critics was back and on full display.
We were the ones that this division was created for. We are the chosen team. We deserved to be in contention for those mix tag team championships the moment that we announced that The Black Sheep were back. People can think of us as villains for saying so, but who’s to say that we consider that a bad thing?
He looks down at the words displaying across his shirt and smirks at the camera. The Miracle wasn’t sure if he liked it at first, but it had grown on him since. In a way, he was more fitting than any of SCW’s marketing had previously been.
Villains get shit done. Villains are the ones that are always driving the stories. Without us, there would be no heroes for all of you to watch fail to stop us. We are the ones making the changes. Everyone else is fighting to stop us. It’s reactionary bullshit. What would this company be without villains? Alicia Lukas has had the red carpet rolled out for her since her return, and she is far from a pleasant individual. Amber Ryan currently has everyone’s attention, including a real hero, all because she continues to keep things interesting.
Kris hadn’t been shy about how impressed he had been with the vast majority of the Bombshells as of late. The twists and turns of that division had long outpaced the men on the roster. In fact, that was one of the reasons that Kris had bailed on the idea of chasing singles championships and opted into the mixed tag division in the first place.
...and sure, you all boo the hell out of us...but what would we be left with if the villains weren’t playing their parts?
He rolls his eyes, some of his enthusiasm falling away.
The half-hearted handjob that will be the respect-fest between Ben Jordan and Griffin Hawkins. It is the least talked about main event in recent memory, and it is because there is no spice to it at all. Sure they have the World Heavyweight Championship to fight over, but there is no real story there. There is no hook. It is just two guys fighting over a belt that is so heavy it does the opposite of holding your pants up. If anyone was looking for the reason that they aren’t the endcap to this show, there you go. It can’t stack up to the excitement of the SCU vs GRIME battle, the Bombshell Championship match, or even Wolfslair taking on Bitch ‘n’ Moan. Why is that? Because of the villains.
Kris loved conflict, and he was not alone. The most hyped matches on the Summer XXXtreme card were between bitter rivals that were trying to maim on another. The matches where there was something on the line other than gold or respect were the ones that everyone was talking about. The fans wanted the competitors to be out for blood. Kris was just giving them what they wanted. You know, except for allowing a hero to walk away with a victory over him.
We give people something to watch. Everyone turns in to watch us lose, only to walk away disappointed. Do they turn off the show and never come back? Absolutely not. They tune in the next week hoping that we get what’s coming to us. It’s not about whatever white knight steps up to stop us. That person is irrelevant. They are just fulfilling a role. The one of the hero that is destined to fail in the end. This is Sin City! We couldn’t have a name like that if the good guys were the ones rising to the top. Even Saint Ben has found that top spot to be a little corrupting.
Kris thinks back to watching Ben’s attempt to call a match down the middle and wavering. He was one of the few that wasn’t surprised to see it happen. Nobody is perfect. It was a good reminder that even Saints can have the occasional crisis of conscience.
...and what heroes are going to be sent to stop The Black Sheep? Bill and Bea Barnhart. See how things come full circle?
He was proud of himself to be able to wrap his point back around to his opponents. Sure, they were far from heroes. Bea mostly spent time on her back in the middle of the ring being pinned. Bill never seemed like he could commit to one side or the other. It didn’t change the fact that most of the fans were still going to side with them over Kris and Mikah though. They were definitely walking into this match as the villains. The Barnharts were heroes by circumstance.
Except, these two are lackluster even by SCW standards. Since spoiling my return Bill has done absolutely nothing. He tried to take on Austin James Mercer, but fell short of reaching gold as a singles competitor. So what did he do? He grabbed the wife and headed over to the mix tag division at the drop of a hat. It doesn’t matter that she has dropped like eight of her last ten matches to more talented competitors. It doesn’t matter that as a team they have yet to gain any traction in the division. They are floundering at the bottom with the Trenton Tigers, and The Black Sheep are about to pass them up after only being on the job for a few weeks. After that it’s onto the champions. After that… this division will belong to The Black Sheep until we decide that we are bored with it. The bad thing is, there isn’t a team on this roster talented enough to stop it from happening. Not Bill and Bea. Not Bella and Malachi. Not even Wolfslair.
He stands from the chair, and starts to move around the desk.
So again, you people keep saying villain like it is some kind of bad thing...
He shrugs, picking the camera up off of the tripod.
I guess I’m just not seeing it...
He offers the viewers a condescending smirk before killing the feed. The screen cuts to static.
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