He was fine.
Over the last few weeks — months, even, he’d dealt with his own inconsistencies with a sour disposition and an annoyed expression that kept most people away from him. He’d been the Roulette Champion, and probably could have stayed that way if he’d given any kind of shit about it – hint, he didn’t. He was all set up to face Goth, but that also fell flat when he realized that gatekeeping was what the stoic man with a lot of words (that didn’t really say anything) decided to do in Sin City. He hated lack of recognition. He hated being thought of as less, but in every reality, he was doing less. It was a catch twenty-two with no way around it.
He kept telling everyone that everything was fine. He’d be back on his feet before he knew it. And he was in some ways, wasn’t in others. When he walked into Next Level and he took the World Heavyweight Championship – a championship he should have never lost – in his first match back in the company, that should have been the cornerstone of everything that needed to be done. He was able to take what he wanted with an iron fist, and he was able to take it for his own. For some reason, it came easy to him. And maybe it was because he rose to the fucking challenge that was placed across his feet.
Finn Whelan was able to easily assess the people that were placed in front of him. Seth Dillinger was a challenge. Seth Dillinger had something he wanted. This forced him to have drive, to seek power, to ultimately crush the insurgent that kept him from the glory that he knew he could gain.
But at Sin City…well, it just wasn’t the same.
The people placed in front of him he didn’t consider a challenge. Bill Barnhart, Hitamashii, The Troll and even fucking Goth weren’t on his level. Alexander Raven may have won the title off him, but if we want to really look at the narrative driven…Finn hadn’t truly wanted a championship that he considered was on par with the third long-island iced-tea of the night that a pre-gamed college girl tried to ingest and promptly vomited on the floor – only to try for a fourth. The pedantic prick of pompous proportions was silent until he got a win off a man who didn’t even get off his ass to post a promo – now he couldn’t shut up on Twitter about Alpha Males and shoving dicks up his ass.
Maybe not so much the second one, but you never know in this day and age. Not that it would be a bad thing, either.
But Finn hadn’t done everything he needed to. Anyone who was anyone knew that.
For a while, he couldn’t figure it out. Why was it such a fucking struggle to get focused, to do what he needed to do? Besides the fact that he didn’t feel like he had a match that was worth a damn in front of him, he should have had better reasons for failing miserably in his own mind to even get off his ass to do anything. He wasn’t booked for a majority of the whole India tour, so why had he bothered to continue travelling with the company? Why had he bothered to wrestle on a boat, why had he bothered to continue popping from place to place with the rest of them?
Maybe it was because Miles needed mentorship. He and the Manchester Corsair was pushing in his footsteps and eventually, he would need to be– no.
Miles wasn’t the reason.
Maybe he was just avoiding other semi-significant people in his life that also annoyed the shit out of him on a regular basis– no. Aaron was mostly insignificant and Dickie was rotting in his own puddle of nothing at this point. Maybe it was his new roommates, the Australian and his girlfriend. Aiden Reynolds, another member of Wolfslair and his pregnant practically-almost-fiance, Kallie Reznik, moved into the unused secondary apartment within his penthouse in NYC. But it couldn’t have been them either, because he never heard them when he was in town.
Maybe it was because he’d stepped into Pro Wrestling EXCELLENCE again just for the hell of it.
The answer evaded him. Finn was at a loss. He didn’t realize why he couldn’t focus. He didn’t realize why he stuck around. He didn’t even fucking realize why he chose to stand in the back, watching her matches and ensuring her success, reading himself to pick up her flaws and missteps so that she didn’t make them again. At least, when she would talk to him again.
Fucking Kayla.
Kayla Fucking Richards and her goddamn rollercoaster of a fucking attitude.
All of it was a fucking clue and he hadn’t seen it, which was actually pretty strange. Finn prided himself on not being an idiot. He prided himself on being observant enough to notice when people were off, when they were acting weird, when they were turning around and treating him like shit for no apparent reason. The two of them were friends, but the moment they’d decided to binge drink and she woke up half-dressed should have probably gone differently than it did.
He put his foot in his mouth. He ignored it. He avoided. And Kayla, in turn, avoided him. At least, until she couldn’t anymore. The expression on her face, no matter how she tried to morph it into her usual bullshit of “my shit doesn’t stink even if I’m being a grade-A royal cunt”, told more than she’d ever let on. And no matter how many times he’d cursed her in his head, ignored her on purpose, and bitched about her to his brother, she made him do the one thing that no-one had been able to.
He relented.
He watched the minute details, the shoulder slump, the hitch in her voice, the fact that she realized that she fucked up this time.
The Relentless relented.
He’d punch the wall later and realize that he gave in, which ultimately just continued her behavior. But for whatever reason, the fact that she was upset bothered him. She was his friend. And he shouldn’t have treated her like that. Kayla Richards had no fucking concept of what she was doing to others, and the fact that he’d relented had allowed her to continue with her bullshit, which led him right back to square one. Kayla didn’t want him, and to be perfectly honest, he didn’t even know what he wanted. Regardless, he knew she wanted the victory that came with getting her way like she always had.
And he was just the current pawn in her game to beat into submission like a chess piece cast aside.
•••••••
I don’t deserve this shit.
No, listen. Stay with me here.
A company that values their wrestlers would offer challenges to their roster as a kind of incentive to get them going. For the last couple of times I’ve been around, I’ve been given…
Well.
Shit.
I know what I am, I know who I am, and I know what I can do. And instead of being able to participate in a match that actually gets to matter in the grand scheme of things, I’m over here facing Hitamashii again. I know what you’re going to say. I know that you’re going to tell me I had a shot at the Internet Title and now Lachlan is going after it and great fuckin’ kudos to him. But you clearly didn’t fuckin’ listen the last time I had a promotional video in this company so why should I expect you to do so now?
I need something to drive me. I need a reason to push myself, elevate myself, be better than stabbing Hitamashii in the face with a metric fuckton of thumbtacks. Every company I have ever been with realizes that I’m not someone to just sit in the corner and give matches that will ultimately end up being me kicking the shit out of someone else. I don’t want that. I want a reason to push myself to be better. And this?
This wasn’t the way, Mando. That’s a fuckin’ no from me, dawg.
I came into Sin City with the goal of being better than even your best, and where am I? Bottomfeeding with the fuckwits of the company.
But Finn, you had a chance.
No. I was going to be fed to a person who talks in fuckin’ circles. I was going to be stuck where I don’t belong. There’s something to be said for earning your way up the card, but when it comes down to it? You all have given known names a match and then a second match, and suddenly they were facing for a championship that they didn’t deserve because they proposed the match.
Should I just start rolling up in emails to potential competitors? Give me a shot at your championship? Give me a match at the Supercard that will carry some clout? There’s only so much to be gained from what I have, and yeah – fuck you Finn, you haven’t been around.
I’m definitely feeling the fuck you part.
So while I’m sitting in a throwaway match on a card, I get to be seen one more time as that man who might be violent enough to poke out someone’s eyeball with a fuckin’ thumbtack at this point so they don’t see me beat them again. Add a little more insult to injury, and I’m sure next week I’ll be fuckin’ around with Alexander Raven’s Magnum Opus of Bullshit again just for the hell of it.
Really seems like something to be excited about, you know?
Can you tell?
It’s wafting off like a cheap hooker’s perfume in the breeze. You can smell it coming a mile away and you know there’s nothing you can do about it.
But you know what? Give me Musashi over there. Let me make an example of him. And next time? Maybe the fans at SCW will actually get a glimpse of wrestling and not a fucking execution.
