Post by Kenzie Rydell on Mar 30, 2017 18:17:23 GMT
DATE: 03/19/17
SCENE NUMBER: 01
CAMERA STATUS: ON / OFF
As your mouse hovered over the latest thumbnail on Kenzie Rydell's YouTube account, your arrow flickered into a white hand. It pointed towards a picture of Kenzie's arm being raised by the referee in the season two primere of #FSociety with a bright toothy smile plastered across her features. The crowd was blurred behind her for a depth of field look, and the picture itself was heavily filtered with brighter colors like every other thumbnail on the site.
You clicked.
The video popped up on the left side of the screen, buffering for a few short seconds until it began to play.
The crowd was loud. You knew immediately that during the video, #FSociety Anarchy episode one was still moving forward, but once an excitable Kenzie Rydell turned the corner of the white hallway drenched in sweat from head to toe, you were sure of it.
"Did you see that, Spencer?! Did you— Oh. You're recording this?"
Her passion was palpable through the screen as she laughed nervously, the former waitress' hands moving to her hips as she leaned forward, trying to catch her breath. Her ring gear clung tightly to her body, and as she continued to speak, she fixed her long brown hair from sticking to her sunkissed porcelain skin.
It took her a second to collect herself and find the words she wanted to say, adrenaline still flowing through her veins.
"Look, I know I'm not 'The Smartest Woman In Wrestling.' I'm not 'The Strongest Woman In Wrestling, ' and I'm not 'The Fastest Woman In Wrestling' either, not yet. I'm not 'The Most Desirable Woman In Wrestling.' I'm not 'The White Phoenix.' I'm not 'The Dropkick Queen.' I'm not 'The Best Wrestler Who Ever Laced Up A Pair Of Boots,' but... But I still managed to accomplish what only a handful of people in this sport can say they've done and that's beat Chuck Matthews and Aurora Graves, on the same night no less!"
You could see her skin start to glow as she beamed towards the camera, almost quietly laughing to herself before she continued the impromptu promo.
"'The Smartest Man In Wrestling,' the last Inferno Wrestling Las Vegas Champion who beat just about everyone back in Inferno Wrestling without even giving it 100%. And Aurora, the former number one contender for the #FSociety Championship who came inches away from becoming champion at Cold Dawn! Together, those two held enough championships to safely solidify themselves in the legendary category and considering the number of years they've wrestled professionally combined? It probably adds up to more years than I've even been alive so I was in for an uphill climb from the get-go, but you know what, guys?"
With a playful tilt of the head, Kenzie leaned close enough to the video camera that her smiling face covered the entire screen. With the same amount of enthusiasm, she whispered into the microphone like she was telling you a secret.
"I still won..."
As sounds of Anastasia Hayden versus Xavier Young had already died down in the background, the muffled shouts of Ana proclaiming she was the best wrestler in #FSociety were still loud and clear where Kenzie stood. Looking behind her for just a brief moment, she smirked at the boast. Without a word on the subject, she eyed the camera lens again and continued what she was saying.
"I won a match I wasn't supposed to win against two of the strongest competitors here in #FSociety, and you know... I needed that win."
She cupped her forearm with the palm of her other hand, eyes slowly tilting to the tiled floor.
"Let's be honest. I've always been a step behind."
With a gulp, she cleared her dry throat.
"People like Ashleigh and Gavin Grimes... People like Allyson Morrow... While we've all started at virtually the same time, I've always been playing catch up. While Gavin Grimes was the World Champion, I was the Five Lakes Champion. While Allyson Morrow finally broke the mold and ended Gray Malone's career in #FSociety — despite the fact that he came back in DARC and Redemption Wrestling regardless — I was still taking time away from the ring."
Hazel eyes bore into the camera lens with a subtle somber expression.
"While Allyson Morrow and Gavin Grimes had their moment at Cold Dawn, I lost in a fatal four-way tag team match for the championships. I lost against #TheBloodReevers the show before that, and when I was scheduled to make my grand #FSociety debut against Liam Callaghan, I lost that too."
With the click of her tongue and a flick of her hair to get it out of her eyes, she continued.
"Sure, I could pity myself. I could throw in the towel right now and ask Chris Night for my release, but I didn't come to #FSociety for an easy win. I came here to push myself against some of the best damn wrestlers in the whole world."
"So to the people like Liam Callaghan and Melissa, people like Locke & Keyes, Lacklan and everyone else I'm forgetting... I want to thank you. You've shown me that I've been stuck in my comfort zone for far too long and that's not going to cut it in #FSociety. That's why I'm constantly improving with new techniques, brand new fighting styles you've never seen before, and elevating my skills so every time you see me out there, I'm stronger than the match before. And after what I just did out there?"
Kenzie's index finger darted towards where the sounds of the crowd originated.
"Well, this is just the beginning."
The army brat's arm plopped back down to her side, and as she took a moment to think, her face suddenly lit up with pride.
"When I was growing up, people told me I was just chasing rainbows and reaching for the impossible. Other students in White Phoenix's wrestling school told me that the chances of getting hired alone were slim, and the chances of making it on television were even lower. And winning a championship? Only a handful of people in the world got that honor."
"They said I was chasing rainbows and at the time, I didn't know what they meant. Now I wear the phrase as a badge of honor, and right now? I've got the #FSociety Championship in my sights!"
"So let's do it, guys."
Kenzie smiled wide in your direction, those hazel hues brighter than they've ever been.
"Let's make the impossible... possible, and let's do it together!"
"Let's keep chasing rainbows, no matter how big or how small, and let's make sure nobody will ever be able to stop us ever again!"
"So how's that sound? Are you ready, Rainbow Chasers?"
You felt like the words were directed at you. Her words energized you, and when you realized a smile crossed your features, you couldn't remember when it got there. With the bombshell announcement that she wanted to win the #FSociety Championship left in the air, the video came to a conclusion. YouTube recommended another promo Kenzie recorded much more recently, and as your cursor hovered over the thumbnail, you prepared to click it.
DATE: 03/27/17
SCENE NUMBER: 02
CAMERA STATUS: ON / OFF
"So... Are you ready?" The words of the aristocratic prince, Spencer Walsh, were so ladened in an unforeseen vagueness that Kenzie Rydell hadn't even understood the question. It was seemingly out of nowhere, sandwiched in between a conversation over the phone about the latest Mass Effect: Andromeda video game.
"... Huh? Ready for what?" The words were almost comical in their delivery, drenched in cliché as Kenzie thought back to the promo she recorded a week ago.
"Are you ready for your match against Adrien Cochrane?" Spencer reiterated louder, general curiosity in the words.
"Oh, I don't even know," Kenzie admitted plainly. "I mean, I beat Chuck Matthews and Aurora Graves, but that's one thing. Fighting Adrien? That's an entirely different undertaking."
"It doesn't take 'The Smartest Man In Wrestling' to figure out this match is just Chris Night's way of preemptively letting the Inferno Network's resistance destroy itself from the inside before it even begins," Spencer proclaimed, not saying anything Kenzie hadn't figured out on her own. "Doesn't mean you can't take advantage of the grand opportunity."
"You say that like beating a three-time world champion is going to be easy," Kenzie replied, leaning back against the couch as she crossed her long slender legs. The phone was on speaker, a Xbox One controller in her sweaty palms. Her avatar readied herself behind cover on the television screen, patiently waiting as she eyed an alien soldier oblivious to the curious human sneaking into their territory with a pistol in hand.
She wished she could have seen Spencer's face while the two spoke, but the army brat knew her best friend since high school was more than likely busy making business deals or surveying contracts for the latest independent wrestlers down in The Trench. She learned a long time ago never to ask what he was doing when he was busy, or else she would have to wade through the business jargon and the elaborate metaphors he would try to use to explain it to her.
It's not that she didn't understand it once he explained it properly, of course. It's just that the business side of things never interested her in the slightest. She always chose to stay impartial to things like the revenue projections regarding her t-shirt sales in the upcoming months and the fine print written in a way only a lawyer or a business major could understand at the bottom of her contract.
Luckily, she surrounded herself with people who cared enough to help her out with that sort of thing. Between Eddie Walker, who studied to be an accountant, and Spencer himself dealing with the bulk of the behind the scenes work for her, she knew she was in good hands.
"No. It won't be easy. Nothing worth doing is ever easy," Spencer recited like a sentient fortune cookie. "Chris Night might consider this match a punishment for your insubordination, but with the right perspective... It's the biggest reward you've ever been given, and as far as I'm concerned? It's the main event - no matter where it falls on the card."
"Yeah," Kenzie answered with a soft dreamy smile. "When you say it that way, it doesn't sound so intimidating."
"Remember, this is Adrien we're talking about here, Kenzie," Spencer chuckled. "Adam lives downstairs at the Cochrane residence, and you're constantly spending time with them whenever you get the chance. No matter what you two have to say to each other during your promos, and no matter what happens at the end of this match, Chris Night's plan falls flat, but you? You'll have stood toe to toe with your former mentor and shown you deserve to be in the same sentence as the current number one contender for the #FSociety Championship, and if you win—"
"If I win, then I've gained the biggest victory in my entire life by far," she smiled wide. her words infused with excitement as her avatar on screen grabbed a hostile alien with her powerful biotic powers before violently tossing him against a wall.
"Listen. I've gotta go, but I—"
Spencer's voice stopped.
Kenzie could faintly hear muffled shouting in the background.
"Meet me at the gym and tell the others to do the same," Spencer suddenly whispered into the receiver, a rare amount of panic coating every syllable.
He hung up.
Something was definitely wrong.
DATE: 03/27/17
SCENE NUMBER: 03
CAMERA STATUS: ON / OFF
"Faggot!"
The loud and obnoxious slur functioned as a makeshift greeting cobbled together with insensitivity and a superiority complex. His armor of choice was a worn red letterman's jacket draped over a gaudy black Calvin Klein dress shirt, and as he approached the man sitting on the nearest bar stool, he combed blonde hair backward with a callused palm.
"Meet me at the gym and tell the others to do the same," the man at the bar frantically told his phone before quickly hanging up.
"I have a name, Austin," he answered once the cell phone was firmly in his pocket.
"Spencer." The name sounded like a curse word coming out of Austin's mouth, and as Spencer eyed the black pitbull patch on the man's shoulder, thoughts came flooding back of when the two shared a room in the University of Georgia.
Austin Deveraux was built like a truck. His arms were thick with muscle, chest broad and intimidating. A faint vein stuck out of his neck whenever a rush of anger took over, and as he looked over the scrawnier man before him with a look of unadulterated disgust, Spencer could already feel the world he's created for himself crashing around him.
"How did you find me?"
"You're so selfish, so arrogant," Austin spoke with the same temperament of that pitbull stitched into the shoulder of his letterman's jacket. "You think just because you're in the public eye now that I bothered to make the trek all the way from Georgia just so I could torment you? No, no. Not at all."
"You're full of shit," Spencer growled, oblivious to the crowd of people who watched the scene with prying eyes around them.
"Au contraire. I'm a nice guy, a humanitarian even. I let people know the truth instead of the awful falsehoods you spoonfeed to everyone around you on a constant basis just to get ahead. And the truth is... I didn't come to San Jose to find you."[/color]
Spencer's eyes widened. His heart started to pound with more force than it ever had, sweat beginning to pour out of him like buckets. With a big swig of bourbon, he let the warm liquid burn the inside of his throat going down as a way to stop himself from thinking too much.
"You know where she is?"
"Honestly, I thought she'd be here in this bar, but I suppose she's gone sober, and you've been picking up the slack."
"She's been sober for a couple of months now," Spencer confirmed without a thought.
"To save face, I'm sure," Deveraux chimed in with a unique hefty chuckle. "And with all that newfound clarity, she still doesn't know, huh?"
Spencer didn't say a word.
"Then I suppose I'll take matters into my own hands."
"No, I— Where are you going?"
"Funny thing about being in the public eye in the 21st century, Spencer," the man smirked over his shoulder. "With social media and the local wrestling news websites reporting on your every financial move, I know you recently bought a gym over on Monterey Road. Oh. And I've got these funny things called ears too."
Spencer grit his teeth. Austin must have heard him warning Kenzie. With alcohol still in his system, Spencer made the poor choice of running full speed towards his truck immediately after paying the bartender. Now it was a race to the gym with Spencer's livelihood on the line, and he was willing to take the risk of driving drunk just to keep it.
DATE: 03/29/17
SCENE NUMBER: 04
CAMERA STATUS: ON / OFF
"You know when I said in the last video that I was always a step behind?"
Those were the first words you heard Kenzie say once you decided to play the second video. The answer to the question was yes, though. You definitely remembered.
"It's time to bridge the gap."
With the cross of her arms, Kenzie Rydell smiled proudly as she leaned up against a broad tree trunk in the middle of the wilderness.
"Before Adrien Cochrane came to #FSociety at its initial inception, we had a lot in common. See, Adrien thought he wasn't living up to his potential, and despite a relatively successful run in Inferno Wrestling, he wasn't happy. The former EXODUS Pro World Heavyweight Champion participated in four matches — one of them a loss against Lord Raab and another against Chuck Matthews who 'took a personal day' to get out of the match entirely in the 2016 version of Cold Dawn, and the only reason he didn't get the title match with Chuck in season 3 was because season 3 never happened, but still. It wasn't good enough for him."
Kenzie wasn't smiling anymore. Her eyebrows furrowed, and as she continued, she was much more serious as she stood underneath the shade.
"If he wanted to blame anyone for the lack of success in Inferno Wrestling, he should have blamed Chuck Matthews, but hey! What do I know, right? Maybe Adrien thought he could have won the Las Vegas Championship without Chuck Matthews in the building. We didn't talk much back then, so I don't know."
She chucked and yet you noticed she sounded anything but playful right now.
"So this legend, The Dropkick King, still wasn't satisfied with himself. So what's the gameplan? What's the one thing he decides to do to make things right?"
She stopped herself. Leaning towards the camera again, she let her face cover the entire screen as she spoke.
"Let me pause here for those of you playing at home."
Backing up and standing straight, she continued.
"When I was having trouble living up to my potential, I opened up and told Spencer about it. And what did Spencer do? He reached out to my friends back in wrestling school, and he got them all in one place - San Jose. With each of them specializing in different wrestling styles, I've been taking the time to learn the things I couldn't learn on my own from all of them, and now that I've surrounded myself with a support system to help me when I'm feeling down? I feel like I'm more confident in my abilities than I've ever been in my entire life!"
"With all my newfound skills and the help of everyone around me behind the scenes, I defeated Chuck Matthews and Aurora Graves. That's not up for debate, that's a fact."
"So when Adrien back then was in my position right now, he told all his friends and they all banded together to show him— Oh, wait. That's not true."
The camera zoomed out, as it did, you suddenly noticed that to the right of the tree where Kenzie stood was a small cabin.
"No. You decided to abandon your friends and stay here — in the famous Adrien cabin — for months at a time in an attempt to become a 'better wrestler.' You decided to leave all of us behind while you dropkicked trees and suplexed logs over and over again without any electricity or cell phone reception. You left the people who love you without a word, and then you wonder why I decided to stop calling you my mentor."
You noticed her emotions were getting the best of her, wiping her eyes with her sleeve.
"You're one of the greatest wrestlers I've ever had the pleasure to watch on television, but I don't agree with some of the decisions you make. Give it some thought. You sacrifice the people you love just because Chuck Matthews was an asshole on the day you were supposed to have a match. You consider your tenure in Inferno Wrestling a failure because the guy you were supposed to win a championship against bailed at the last minute and took a personal day. You were fingertips away from adding yet another championship to your already impressive collection, but God forbid! You didn't get that chance."
She took a few steps towards the cabin's front door as she continued to speak.
"And I get it. You were upset. Chuck Matthews decided to be a coward, so you chose to be the bigger man by— Oh, wait. That's not true either. You ran away from your problems instead of talking it out with your friends and family. You shut yourself away from the world like you lived in an underground bunker and then you expected everything to be the same once you triumphantly made your way back to the real world. Doesn't that make you a coward by definition too?"
Kenzie knocked on the door to make sure it was empty. No one answered the door. Without the key, Kenzie just slumped down and sat on the doorstep with her legs extended in front of her.
"Congratulations, Adrien. You sure showed those logs a thing or two about suplexes. Now you can come on home. You're definitely a 'better wrestler' now!"
She laughed at the ridiculousness of the whole thing, fingers absent-mindedly trailing against the door behind her.
"Honestly? I don't think you got any better. I don't think doing a few extra crunches in your nice and cozy cabin instead of back at your house suddenly made you any closer to greatness. I think you were this good from the get-go, and the placebo effect you chose to add to the cabin itself just made you a little more confident once #FSociety started. I'm no doctor, I have no way of proving it, but when you look at all the facts, that's the immediate conclusion everyone's going to make, right?"
"So what makes you a better wrestler? You can't practice many moves out here, Adrien. There's no ring, no ropes, no second person. There's no internet, so you can't check YouTube for new ideas either. Look!"
Adrien's former protégé took out her phone and opened the YouTube application. She showed it to the camera and showed that it didn't work out here. None of the videos were loading.
"I mean, you could have performed aerial dives off the roof, but—"
She looked up, trying to gauge how high up the roof was from the grassy floor beneath.
"I think you'd need a trip to the hospital if you did that."
She was obviously trying to make light of the whole thing, gently poking fun at Adrien now.
"Did you need peace and quiet that badly? Why couldn't you just tell Eddie to leave the house for a while, make sure you didn't get any visitors, or at the very least... Why couldn't you just tell us where you were going instead of making it this big secret? 'Oh, it's Adrien versus the wild! Watch him drink his own urine and chow down on the local snail population!' That's what you wanted, right? The mystique? You'd rather abandon us so that it furthers your legend? Does it really matter that much to you?"
"So you couldn't tell us that you didn't want visitors for a while? Weren't you after the mystique? No? Then damn it, that noise pollution must really be annoying, huh?! Maybe living in a busy city wasn't for you then. Maybe you should move to someplace like Pittsburg, Kansas or Washington, California. Those sound like fun places, right?"
Kenzie took a deep breath, thinking back a little to a different timeframe that was a lot more recent. She was still sitting on the doorstep of the little piece of paradise Adrien called his second home.
"Do you remember when you lost the #FSociety Championship? You ran away again. Eddie recruited Adam and me to look for you. That's how I knew where this place was. I won't reveal the location, don't worry. I'm not that petty. It's just... When it happened, I was so worried about you. I could even see it in Eddie's eyes. He was worried too. And as we split up to search for this place, I remember thinking the worst as I explored the wilderness alone, thoughts of you in danger bouncing around in my head. And then... I found it!"
She stretched her arms out, gesturing to the cabin behind her.
"When I heard your voice... I wasn't worried anymore. I was frustrated! I couldn't believe you made us go on this wild goose chase just because you lost the championship. Things weren't going too well in your personal life, to say the least, but there was still a part of me that resented you for abandoning all of us for the second time."
"Part of me connected the dots, and I thought that championships meant more to you than the people who would take the time out of their day just to search the dangerous woods to make sure you were okay. The first time? You left because you were upset that you couldn't gain the Las Vegas Championship, and the second time, you were upset that you lost the #FSociety Championship. So upset that you didn't even bother to tell anyone anything, and that's not okay by any stretch of the imagination."
"But..."
She paused, her voice becoming less frustrated and more hopeful.
"In the end, I knew you just needed to take the time to collect yourself. All of these bad thoughts I have about you... I know it's just me being selfish. And I know that the whole point of this match happening in the first place was so Chris Night could watch us tear each other apart, but I wanted to use this chance to try and express to you how I felt, Adrien."
"I still think you're one of the greatest wrestlers I've ever had the pleasure to watch on television, but to the people who wonder about our differences... This is it. The cabin in the woods."
She half-heartedly gestured to the cabin behind her again, still sitting down at the front door with a lazy tilt of the head.
"I won't apologize for anything I said and maybe I'm in the wrong here, but what I'm trying to say is... Under pressure, we both have the opposite reaction: You want to lock yourself away from the world and isolate yourself completely, but me? I look for my friends for help. I talk out my problems and I learn from the people around me so I can be that much better in the future."
Taking a deep breath, the leader of the rainbow chasers tried to explain her thought process to her former mentor the best she could.
"I know that nothing I ever say to you right now is going to suddenly make you react differently once something else bad happens in your life. I know the next time you lose a championship opportunity or you fail to defend a championship successfully, you'll just come back here without a word to Eddie or anyone else in your life. I just hope that you'll remember my words right now and you'll give it some consideration, that's all."
"Everyone experiences loss in a different way, sure, but I think... I think you're tarnishing your legacy every time you come here. Solitary confinement can only help you so much. And when you really need help next time? Maybe... Maybe you should finally admit it and call your friends."
She climbed back to her feet and glanced at the wooden door beside her. Grabbing the handle, she tried to jimmy it open to the best of her abilities, but it wouldn't budge. She needed the key to get inside. Flashing hazel hues back in the camera's direction, she continued in that steady serious voice of hers now that she was reaching the end of the video.
"So what's it going to be, Adrien? You have all the experience in the world but when are you going to admit that you can't do it all on your own? When are you going to finally open the door and let the people who care about you inside your life?"
No matter how much Kenzie tried to turn that handle, the door was closed for good. With a huff, she looked back into the camera and finished what she wanted to say.
"Either way, when I beat you with the help of the people I trust with everything I have and everyone else who supports me standing by my side..."
She smiled wide, exuding more confidence than she's ever been known to show as she leaned up against the locked front door with her arms crossed.
"I'll know right where to find you this time, won't I?"
With a subtle grin, she walked back towards the tree where she stood at the beginning of the video.
"You know when I said in the last video that I was always a step behind?"
The YouTube video faded to white and came to an end.
DATE: 03/27/17
SCENE NUMBER: 05
CAMERA STATUS: ON / OFF
The door of the gym swung open.
"Kenzie? Are you here?"
The words were brutish and angry, spoken with the throat of a smoker.
Kenzie watched as the man took a few steps into the building. He let the door swing shut behind him, but there was no sign of Spencer. Her heart started to pound like a drill as the hulking man started scouring the building to find her.
"You don't think he'll find us back here, do you?" she whispered to the other three, watching the others react to the same situation
"Why are we even hiding? We're wrestlers. We—"
Noah Auburn was the most level-headed of the group. He was the man who taught Kenzie Muay Thai in the first place back in White Phoenix's wrestling school, but as soon as Noah received an answer? He was probably the most scared one of them all.
"Guys..." The usually confident Laura King was shaking as she looked out the small vertical window embedded into the door. "There's something in his pocket. It might be a gun."
"We're all gonna die!" Noah proclaimed as loud as he could without talking above a whisper.
"Relax, bud," Jack Napier smirked in Noah's direction. "What do we know about him? You think he's the hotheaded type?"
"I heard him yelling at Spencer through the phone," Kenzie responded. "I couldn't hear what he was saying, but—"
"Oh shit! He's dead too!"
"Quiet Noah! You're gonna get us all killed if you keep freaking out like that," Laura hissed, sitting on a desk beside Jack. Without consciously thinking about it, she reached over and grabbed Jack's hand. Despite her exterior confidence during the tense situation, it still made her feel better to have him by her side. Noah scrunched himself into a ball next to a large black filing cabinet far away from the window, and Kenzie sat with her legs extended in the opposite corner closer to the desk itself.
Without Spencer here to tell them the full story, the four were left to their own imaginations. Noah imagined Spencer was shot at point-blank range with a militarized shotgun while Jack pictured Spencer getting stuck in traffic. Laura thought the man was an escaped raving inmate who needed to steal Spencer's identity to finally lose the cops. And Kenzie? Kenzie just hoped her best friend was okay.
"He said my name, didn't he?" Kenzie suddenly brought up after a short pause.
"Maybe he wants to talk to you," Jack responded, his laid-back southern drawl thick as ever.
"What could this guy possibly have to say to me?"
"Maybe he's going to profess his love for you," Laura smirked. "Maybe he's a... What did you call your fans again? Rainbow Chasers? I mean, could you get any tackier?"
"Can we please have this conversation, oooh I don't know... When we're NOT all about to get brutally massacred worse than Allyson Morrow and Gavin Grimes combined, please?" Noah was sweating bullets as he listened to the other three talk about the situation so casually.
"I'll go talk to him," Laura responded without hesitation. "I'll walk out with my hands in the air and say Kenzie's not here. Then I'll—"
"No," Kenzie blurted out all of a sudden. Usually a bundle of insecurities, she forced herself to be brave for the rest of the group. "If it's me he wants, then it's me he's going to get."
"Kenz, this isn't a video game," Noah finally spoke up as the voice of reason. "If you get shot out there, you can't just hide out and regenerate your health. It doesn't work like that."
"I grew up around the military, Noah. I know how firearms work." Before she could decide against it, Kenzie bit her lip and climbed to her feet using the desk for support. With a gulp, she approached the door, and as she closed her eyes, she grabbed the doorknob.
Once the door swung open, she opened her eyes and raised her arms up over her head. Slowly, she approached the trespasser with caution, and as the man turned to look at her with fists clenched at his side, she immediately regretted her decision.
"You wanted to see me?"
"Yes," the man responded. "Allow me to introduce myself: My name is Austin Deveraux. Humanitarian, messenger, and an all around good guy. You have nothing to fear. I'm a University Of Georgia graduate just like your friend Spencer Walsh."
"Wait. You know Spencer?" She didn't let her guard down.
"Know him? We were roomies! Hell, we were closer than you'd think once."
"Okay. Then where is he? What did you do to him?!"
"Me? I didn't do a thing to him, dearie."
One of Lacklan's people, Kenzie thought to herself.
"Just tell me what you want and leave, Austin." Kenzie grit her teeth, trying to keep her outward composure the best she could. One sudden move and she could be looking down the barrel of that gun.
"Why are you in such a hurry? We just met, after all. Don't you want to know me a little? Don't you want to learn about all the shenanigans Spencer and I got into back in college, and why he never mentioned me?"
"I don't care," Kenzie retorted, her hands still clasping the back of her head.
"Pity," Austin replied, removing the gun from his pocket. Kenzie gulped, her heart pounding as she took a step back without even thinking. "The second amendment of the United States constitution gives me the right to bear arms. Funny thing, isn't it? It helps people listen to me, and I want you to listen to me very carefully, okay?"
The twenty-one-year-old flinched as the brute started to wave the gun around while he spoke.
She reluctantly nodded her head.
The other three nervously watched what was happening through the vertical window embedded into the closed door.
"Spencer gave me a message he wanted me to share with you. He knew he was too pathetic to say it himself, and that's where my humanitarian expertise come into play. So how about I skip the grandstanding and get straight to the point, hm? Spencer is—"
Before Austin could say the words, Spencer tackled him down to the floor! Grabbing the silver 9mm pistol, Spencer tossed it out of reach and gestured to the rest of the group to come out of hiding for the assist. Noah, Laura, and Jack all scurried out of the office to apprehend the 'humanitarian,' grabbing arms and legs alike to make sure he couldn't get back to his feet. Using all his body weight to keep his archenemy pinned on the floor, Spencer mounted the aggressor and turned to his friends.
"So is someone going to call the police, or are we just going to have to hold this idiot down for the rest of our lives?"
Kenzie quickly reached for her phone and dialed 911.
DATE: 03/28/17
SCENE NUMBER: 06
CAMERA STATUS: ON / OFF
"So you're telling me the police just let the psycho walk?!"
"Austin didn't technically fire the gun, Kenz. He stayed within the law."
"But— That's not fair! He was going to—"
"The gun wasn't even loaded."
Kenzie's eyes grew wide, frustration written all over her face as she listened to Spencer explain what happened after the cops arrived and put Austin Deveraux in handcuffs the day before. As the twenty-one-year-old sat on the couch of her apartment yet again with her best friend by her side, she let her legs swing back and forth as she took the time to think to herself.
"I just feel like... Next time, the gun will be loaded, and someone's going to get seriously hurt. And now that madman, that... asshole... is going to head back to Georgia without so much as a slap on the wrist."
"I know, Kenz. I know," Spencer huffed. "It's scary to think that he might come back at any time. We just have to keep our guard up and focus on our careers, that's all. We can't give Austin the power to take over our lives."
"Yeah..."
Spencer thought for a moment during the long pause, looking down at the dark carpeted floor beneath their feet.
"So... Are you ready?" The once vague words of Spencer Walsh were now clear as day with a smile included.
Kenzie didn't hesitate to answer.
"To beat Adrien in the best match #FSociety's ever seen? You're damn right I'm ready!"
He laughed at her newfound enthusiasm.
"... Hey, Spencer? Can I ask you something?"
"Sure."
"That guy... Austin... He told me you wanted to tell me something. Was there any truth in that, or...?"
"I— Yes..."
She paused, concerned by the look on Spencer's face as he admitted it.
"You know you can tell me anything, right?"
"... Kenzie. What I'm about to tell you doesn't leave the two of us, understood?"
"Understood."
...
"I'm gay," Spencer finally mumbled quietly.
SCENE NUMBER: 01
CAMERA STATUS: ON / OFF
As your mouse hovered over the latest thumbnail on Kenzie Rydell's YouTube account, your arrow flickered into a white hand. It pointed towards a picture of Kenzie's arm being raised by the referee in the season two primere of #FSociety with a bright toothy smile plastered across her features. The crowd was blurred behind her for a depth of field look, and the picture itself was heavily filtered with brighter colors like every other thumbnail on the site.
You clicked.
The video popped up on the left side of the screen, buffering for a few short seconds until it began to play.
The crowd was loud. You knew immediately that during the video, #FSociety Anarchy episode one was still moving forward, but once an excitable Kenzie Rydell turned the corner of the white hallway drenched in sweat from head to toe, you were sure of it.
"Did you see that, Spencer?! Did you— Oh. You're recording this?"
Her passion was palpable through the screen as she laughed nervously, the former waitress' hands moving to her hips as she leaned forward, trying to catch her breath. Her ring gear clung tightly to her body, and as she continued to speak, she fixed her long brown hair from sticking to her sunkissed porcelain skin.
It took her a second to collect herself and find the words she wanted to say, adrenaline still flowing through her veins.
"Look, I know I'm not 'The Smartest Woman In Wrestling.' I'm not 'The Strongest Woman In Wrestling, ' and I'm not 'The Fastest Woman In Wrestling' either, not yet. I'm not 'The Most Desirable Woman In Wrestling.' I'm not 'The White Phoenix.' I'm not 'The Dropkick Queen.' I'm not 'The Best Wrestler Who Ever Laced Up A Pair Of Boots,' but... But I still managed to accomplish what only a handful of people in this sport can say they've done and that's beat Chuck Matthews and Aurora Graves, on the same night no less!"
You could see her skin start to glow as she beamed towards the camera, almost quietly laughing to herself before she continued the impromptu promo.
"'The Smartest Man In Wrestling,' the last Inferno Wrestling Las Vegas Champion who beat just about everyone back in Inferno Wrestling without even giving it 100%. And Aurora, the former number one contender for the #FSociety Championship who came inches away from becoming champion at Cold Dawn! Together, those two held enough championships to safely solidify themselves in the legendary category and considering the number of years they've wrestled professionally combined? It probably adds up to more years than I've even been alive so I was in for an uphill climb from the get-go, but you know what, guys?"
With a playful tilt of the head, Kenzie leaned close enough to the video camera that her smiling face covered the entire screen. With the same amount of enthusiasm, she whispered into the microphone like she was telling you a secret.
"I still won..."
As sounds of Anastasia Hayden versus Xavier Young had already died down in the background, the muffled shouts of Ana proclaiming she was the best wrestler in #FSociety were still loud and clear where Kenzie stood. Looking behind her for just a brief moment, she smirked at the boast. Without a word on the subject, she eyed the camera lens again and continued what she was saying.
"I won a match I wasn't supposed to win against two of the strongest competitors here in #FSociety, and you know... I needed that win."
She cupped her forearm with the palm of her other hand, eyes slowly tilting to the tiled floor.
"Let's be honest. I've always been a step behind."
With a gulp, she cleared her dry throat.
"People like Ashleigh and Gavin Grimes... People like Allyson Morrow... While we've all started at virtually the same time, I've always been playing catch up. While Gavin Grimes was the World Champion, I was the Five Lakes Champion. While Allyson Morrow finally broke the mold and ended Gray Malone's career in #FSociety — despite the fact that he came back in DARC and Redemption Wrestling regardless — I was still taking time away from the ring."
Hazel eyes bore into the camera lens with a subtle somber expression.
"While Allyson Morrow and Gavin Grimes had their moment at Cold Dawn, I lost in a fatal four-way tag team match for the championships. I lost against #TheBloodReevers the show before that, and when I was scheduled to make my grand #FSociety debut against Liam Callaghan, I lost that too."
With the click of her tongue and a flick of her hair to get it out of her eyes, she continued.
"Sure, I could pity myself. I could throw in the towel right now and ask Chris Night for my release, but I didn't come to #FSociety for an easy win. I came here to push myself against some of the best damn wrestlers in the whole world."
"So to the people like Liam Callaghan and Melissa, people like Locke & Keyes, Lacklan and everyone else I'm forgetting... I want to thank you. You've shown me that I've been stuck in my comfort zone for far too long and that's not going to cut it in #FSociety. That's why I'm constantly improving with new techniques, brand new fighting styles you've never seen before, and elevating my skills so every time you see me out there, I'm stronger than the match before. And after what I just did out there?"
Kenzie's index finger darted towards where the sounds of the crowd originated.
"Well, this is just the beginning."
The army brat's arm plopped back down to her side, and as she took a moment to think, her face suddenly lit up with pride.
"When I was growing up, people told me I was just chasing rainbows and reaching for the impossible. Other students in White Phoenix's wrestling school told me that the chances of getting hired alone were slim, and the chances of making it on television were even lower. And winning a championship? Only a handful of people in the world got that honor."
"They said I was chasing rainbows and at the time, I didn't know what they meant. Now I wear the phrase as a badge of honor, and right now? I've got the #FSociety Championship in my sights!"
"So let's do it, guys."
Kenzie smiled wide in your direction, those hazel hues brighter than they've ever been.
"Let's make the impossible... possible, and let's do it together!"
"Let's keep chasing rainbows, no matter how big or how small, and let's make sure nobody will ever be able to stop us ever again!"
"So how's that sound? Are you ready, Rainbow Chasers?"
You felt like the words were directed at you. Her words energized you, and when you realized a smile crossed your features, you couldn't remember when it got there. With the bombshell announcement that she wanted to win the #FSociety Championship left in the air, the video came to a conclusion. YouTube recommended another promo Kenzie recorded much more recently, and as your cursor hovered over the thumbnail, you prepared to click it.
DATE: 03/27/17
SCENE NUMBER: 02
CAMERA STATUS: ON / OFF
"So... Are you ready?" The words of the aristocratic prince, Spencer Walsh, were so ladened in an unforeseen vagueness that Kenzie Rydell hadn't even understood the question. It was seemingly out of nowhere, sandwiched in between a conversation over the phone about the latest Mass Effect: Andromeda video game.
"... Huh? Ready for what?" The words were almost comical in their delivery, drenched in cliché as Kenzie thought back to the promo she recorded a week ago.
"Are you ready for your match against Adrien Cochrane?" Spencer reiterated louder, general curiosity in the words.
"Oh, I don't even know," Kenzie admitted plainly. "I mean, I beat Chuck Matthews and Aurora Graves, but that's one thing. Fighting Adrien? That's an entirely different undertaking."
"It doesn't take 'The Smartest Man In Wrestling' to figure out this match is just Chris Night's way of preemptively letting the Inferno Network's resistance destroy itself from the inside before it even begins," Spencer proclaimed, not saying anything Kenzie hadn't figured out on her own. "Doesn't mean you can't take advantage of the grand opportunity."
"You say that like beating a three-time world champion is going to be easy," Kenzie replied, leaning back against the couch as she crossed her long slender legs. The phone was on speaker, a Xbox One controller in her sweaty palms. Her avatar readied herself behind cover on the television screen, patiently waiting as she eyed an alien soldier oblivious to the curious human sneaking into their territory with a pistol in hand.
She wished she could have seen Spencer's face while the two spoke, but the army brat knew her best friend since high school was more than likely busy making business deals or surveying contracts for the latest independent wrestlers down in The Trench. She learned a long time ago never to ask what he was doing when he was busy, or else she would have to wade through the business jargon and the elaborate metaphors he would try to use to explain it to her.
It's not that she didn't understand it once he explained it properly, of course. It's just that the business side of things never interested her in the slightest. She always chose to stay impartial to things like the revenue projections regarding her t-shirt sales in the upcoming months and the fine print written in a way only a lawyer or a business major could understand at the bottom of her contract.
Luckily, she surrounded herself with people who cared enough to help her out with that sort of thing. Between Eddie Walker, who studied to be an accountant, and Spencer himself dealing with the bulk of the behind the scenes work for her, she knew she was in good hands.
"No. It won't be easy. Nothing worth doing is ever easy," Spencer recited like a sentient fortune cookie. "Chris Night might consider this match a punishment for your insubordination, but with the right perspective... It's the biggest reward you've ever been given, and as far as I'm concerned? It's the main event - no matter where it falls on the card."
"Yeah," Kenzie answered with a soft dreamy smile. "When you say it that way, it doesn't sound so intimidating."
"Remember, this is Adrien we're talking about here, Kenzie," Spencer chuckled. "Adam lives downstairs at the Cochrane residence, and you're constantly spending time with them whenever you get the chance. No matter what you two have to say to each other during your promos, and no matter what happens at the end of this match, Chris Night's plan falls flat, but you? You'll have stood toe to toe with your former mentor and shown you deserve to be in the same sentence as the current number one contender for the #FSociety Championship, and if you win—"
"If I win, then I've gained the biggest victory in my entire life by far," she smiled wide. her words infused with excitement as her avatar on screen grabbed a hostile alien with her powerful biotic powers before violently tossing him against a wall.
"Listen. I've gotta go, but I—"
Spencer's voice stopped.
Kenzie could faintly hear muffled shouting in the background.
"Meet me at the gym and tell the others to do the same," Spencer suddenly whispered into the receiver, a rare amount of panic coating every syllable.
He hung up.
Something was definitely wrong.
DATE: 03/27/17
SCENE NUMBER: 03
CAMERA STATUS: ON / OFF
"Faggot!"
The loud and obnoxious slur functioned as a makeshift greeting cobbled together with insensitivity and a superiority complex. His armor of choice was a worn red letterman's jacket draped over a gaudy black Calvin Klein dress shirt, and as he approached the man sitting on the nearest bar stool, he combed blonde hair backward with a callused palm.
"Meet me at the gym and tell the others to do the same," the man at the bar frantically told his phone before quickly hanging up.
"I have a name, Austin," he answered once the cell phone was firmly in his pocket.
"Spencer." The name sounded like a curse word coming out of Austin's mouth, and as Spencer eyed the black pitbull patch on the man's shoulder, thoughts came flooding back of when the two shared a room in the University of Georgia.
Austin Deveraux was built like a truck. His arms were thick with muscle, chest broad and intimidating. A faint vein stuck out of his neck whenever a rush of anger took over, and as he looked over the scrawnier man before him with a look of unadulterated disgust, Spencer could already feel the world he's created for himself crashing around him.
"How did you find me?"
"You're so selfish, so arrogant," Austin spoke with the same temperament of that pitbull stitched into the shoulder of his letterman's jacket. "You think just because you're in the public eye now that I bothered to make the trek all the way from Georgia just so I could torment you? No, no. Not at all."
"You're full of shit," Spencer growled, oblivious to the crowd of people who watched the scene with prying eyes around them.
"Au contraire. I'm a nice guy, a humanitarian even. I let people know the truth instead of the awful falsehoods you spoonfeed to everyone around you on a constant basis just to get ahead. And the truth is... I didn't come to San Jose to find you."[/color]
Spencer's eyes widened. His heart started to pound with more force than it ever had, sweat beginning to pour out of him like buckets. With a big swig of bourbon, he let the warm liquid burn the inside of his throat going down as a way to stop himself from thinking too much.
"You know where she is?"
"Honestly, I thought she'd be here in this bar, but I suppose she's gone sober, and you've been picking up the slack."
"She's been sober for a couple of months now," Spencer confirmed without a thought.
"To save face, I'm sure," Deveraux chimed in with a unique hefty chuckle. "And with all that newfound clarity, she still doesn't know, huh?"
Spencer didn't say a word.
"Then I suppose I'll take matters into my own hands."
"No, I— Where are you going?"
"Funny thing about being in the public eye in the 21st century, Spencer," the man smirked over his shoulder. "With social media and the local wrestling news websites reporting on your every financial move, I know you recently bought a gym over on Monterey Road. Oh. And I've got these funny things called ears too."
Spencer grit his teeth. Austin must have heard him warning Kenzie. With alcohol still in his system, Spencer made the poor choice of running full speed towards his truck immediately after paying the bartender. Now it was a race to the gym with Spencer's livelihood on the line, and he was willing to take the risk of driving drunk just to keep it.
DATE: 03/29/17
SCENE NUMBER: 04
CAMERA STATUS: ON / OFF
"You know when I said in the last video that I was always a step behind?"
Those were the first words you heard Kenzie say once you decided to play the second video. The answer to the question was yes, though. You definitely remembered.
"It's time to bridge the gap."
With the cross of her arms, Kenzie Rydell smiled proudly as she leaned up against a broad tree trunk in the middle of the wilderness.
"Before Adrien Cochrane came to #FSociety at its initial inception, we had a lot in common. See, Adrien thought he wasn't living up to his potential, and despite a relatively successful run in Inferno Wrestling, he wasn't happy. The former EXODUS Pro World Heavyweight Champion participated in four matches — one of them a loss against Lord Raab and another against Chuck Matthews who 'took a personal day' to get out of the match entirely in the 2016 version of Cold Dawn, and the only reason he didn't get the title match with Chuck in season 3 was because season 3 never happened, but still. It wasn't good enough for him."
Kenzie wasn't smiling anymore. Her eyebrows furrowed, and as she continued, she was much more serious as she stood underneath the shade.
"If he wanted to blame anyone for the lack of success in Inferno Wrestling, he should have blamed Chuck Matthews, but hey! What do I know, right? Maybe Adrien thought he could have won the Las Vegas Championship without Chuck Matthews in the building. We didn't talk much back then, so I don't know."
She chucked and yet you noticed she sounded anything but playful right now.
"So this legend, The Dropkick King, still wasn't satisfied with himself. So what's the gameplan? What's the one thing he decides to do to make things right?"
She stopped herself. Leaning towards the camera again, she let her face cover the entire screen as she spoke.
"Let me pause here for those of you playing at home."
Backing up and standing straight, she continued.
"When I was having trouble living up to my potential, I opened up and told Spencer about it. And what did Spencer do? He reached out to my friends back in wrestling school, and he got them all in one place - San Jose. With each of them specializing in different wrestling styles, I've been taking the time to learn the things I couldn't learn on my own from all of them, and now that I've surrounded myself with a support system to help me when I'm feeling down? I feel like I'm more confident in my abilities than I've ever been in my entire life!"
"With all my newfound skills and the help of everyone around me behind the scenes, I defeated Chuck Matthews and Aurora Graves. That's not up for debate, that's a fact."
"So when Adrien back then was in my position right now, he told all his friends and they all banded together to show him— Oh, wait. That's not true."
The camera zoomed out, as it did, you suddenly noticed that to the right of the tree where Kenzie stood was a small cabin.
"No. You decided to abandon your friends and stay here — in the famous Adrien cabin — for months at a time in an attempt to become a 'better wrestler.' You decided to leave all of us behind while you dropkicked trees and suplexed logs over and over again without any electricity or cell phone reception. You left the people who love you without a word, and then you wonder why I decided to stop calling you my mentor."
You noticed her emotions were getting the best of her, wiping her eyes with her sleeve.
"You're one of the greatest wrestlers I've ever had the pleasure to watch on television, but I don't agree with some of the decisions you make. Give it some thought. You sacrifice the people you love just because Chuck Matthews was an asshole on the day you were supposed to have a match. You consider your tenure in Inferno Wrestling a failure because the guy you were supposed to win a championship against bailed at the last minute and took a personal day. You were fingertips away from adding yet another championship to your already impressive collection, but God forbid! You didn't get that chance."
She took a few steps towards the cabin's front door as she continued to speak.
"And I get it. You were upset. Chuck Matthews decided to be a coward, so you chose to be the bigger man by— Oh, wait. That's not true either. You ran away from your problems instead of talking it out with your friends and family. You shut yourself away from the world like you lived in an underground bunker and then you expected everything to be the same once you triumphantly made your way back to the real world. Doesn't that make you a coward by definition too?"
Kenzie knocked on the door to make sure it was empty. No one answered the door. Without the key, Kenzie just slumped down and sat on the doorstep with her legs extended in front of her.
"Congratulations, Adrien. You sure showed those logs a thing or two about suplexes. Now you can come on home. You're definitely a 'better wrestler' now!"
She laughed at the ridiculousness of the whole thing, fingers absent-mindedly trailing against the door behind her.
"Honestly? I don't think you got any better. I don't think doing a few extra crunches in your nice and cozy cabin instead of back at your house suddenly made you any closer to greatness. I think you were this good from the get-go, and the placebo effect you chose to add to the cabin itself just made you a little more confident once #FSociety started. I'm no doctor, I have no way of proving it, but when you look at all the facts, that's the immediate conclusion everyone's going to make, right?"
"So what makes you a better wrestler? You can't practice many moves out here, Adrien. There's no ring, no ropes, no second person. There's no internet, so you can't check YouTube for new ideas either. Look!"
Adrien's former protégé took out her phone and opened the YouTube application. She showed it to the camera and showed that it didn't work out here. None of the videos were loading.
"I mean, you could have performed aerial dives off the roof, but—"
She looked up, trying to gauge how high up the roof was from the grassy floor beneath.
"I think you'd need a trip to the hospital if you did that."
She was obviously trying to make light of the whole thing, gently poking fun at Adrien now.
"Did you need peace and quiet that badly? Why couldn't you just tell Eddie to leave the house for a while, make sure you didn't get any visitors, or at the very least... Why couldn't you just tell us where you were going instead of making it this big secret? 'Oh, it's Adrien versus the wild! Watch him drink his own urine and chow down on the local snail population!' That's what you wanted, right? The mystique? You'd rather abandon us so that it furthers your legend? Does it really matter that much to you?"
"So you couldn't tell us that you didn't want visitors for a while? Weren't you after the mystique? No? Then damn it, that noise pollution must really be annoying, huh?! Maybe living in a busy city wasn't for you then. Maybe you should move to someplace like Pittsburg, Kansas or Washington, California. Those sound like fun places, right?"
Kenzie took a deep breath, thinking back a little to a different timeframe that was a lot more recent. She was still sitting on the doorstep of the little piece of paradise Adrien called his second home.
"Do you remember when you lost the #FSociety Championship? You ran away again. Eddie recruited Adam and me to look for you. That's how I knew where this place was. I won't reveal the location, don't worry. I'm not that petty. It's just... When it happened, I was so worried about you. I could even see it in Eddie's eyes. He was worried too. And as we split up to search for this place, I remember thinking the worst as I explored the wilderness alone, thoughts of you in danger bouncing around in my head. And then... I found it!"
She stretched her arms out, gesturing to the cabin behind her.
"When I heard your voice... I wasn't worried anymore. I was frustrated! I couldn't believe you made us go on this wild goose chase just because you lost the championship. Things weren't going too well in your personal life, to say the least, but there was still a part of me that resented you for abandoning all of us for the second time."
"Part of me connected the dots, and I thought that championships meant more to you than the people who would take the time out of their day just to search the dangerous woods to make sure you were okay. The first time? You left because you were upset that you couldn't gain the Las Vegas Championship, and the second time, you were upset that you lost the #FSociety Championship. So upset that you didn't even bother to tell anyone anything, and that's not okay by any stretch of the imagination."
"But..."
She paused, her voice becoming less frustrated and more hopeful.
"In the end, I knew you just needed to take the time to collect yourself. All of these bad thoughts I have about you... I know it's just me being selfish. And I know that the whole point of this match happening in the first place was so Chris Night could watch us tear each other apart, but I wanted to use this chance to try and express to you how I felt, Adrien."
"I still think you're one of the greatest wrestlers I've ever had the pleasure to watch on television, but to the people who wonder about our differences... This is it. The cabin in the woods."
She half-heartedly gestured to the cabin behind her again, still sitting down at the front door with a lazy tilt of the head.
"I won't apologize for anything I said and maybe I'm in the wrong here, but what I'm trying to say is... Under pressure, we both have the opposite reaction: You want to lock yourself away from the world and isolate yourself completely, but me? I look for my friends for help. I talk out my problems and I learn from the people around me so I can be that much better in the future."
Taking a deep breath, the leader of the rainbow chasers tried to explain her thought process to her former mentor the best she could.
"I know that nothing I ever say to you right now is going to suddenly make you react differently once something else bad happens in your life. I know the next time you lose a championship opportunity or you fail to defend a championship successfully, you'll just come back here without a word to Eddie or anyone else in your life. I just hope that you'll remember my words right now and you'll give it some consideration, that's all."
"Everyone experiences loss in a different way, sure, but I think... I think you're tarnishing your legacy every time you come here. Solitary confinement can only help you so much. And when you really need help next time? Maybe... Maybe you should finally admit it and call your friends."
She climbed back to her feet and glanced at the wooden door beside her. Grabbing the handle, she tried to jimmy it open to the best of her abilities, but it wouldn't budge. She needed the key to get inside. Flashing hazel hues back in the camera's direction, she continued in that steady serious voice of hers now that she was reaching the end of the video.
"So what's it going to be, Adrien? You have all the experience in the world but when are you going to admit that you can't do it all on your own? When are you going to finally open the door and let the people who care about you inside your life?"
No matter how much Kenzie tried to turn that handle, the door was closed for good. With a huff, she looked back into the camera and finished what she wanted to say.
"Either way, when I beat you with the help of the people I trust with everything I have and everyone else who supports me standing by my side..."
She smiled wide, exuding more confidence than she's ever been known to show as she leaned up against the locked front door with her arms crossed.
"I'll know right where to find you this time, won't I?"
With a subtle grin, she walked back towards the tree where she stood at the beginning of the video.
"You know when I said in the last video that I was always a step behind?"
The YouTube video faded to white and came to an end.
DATE: 03/27/17
SCENE NUMBER: 05
CAMERA STATUS: ON / OFF
The door of the gym swung open.
"Kenzie? Are you here?"
The words were brutish and angry, spoken with the throat of a smoker.
Kenzie watched as the man took a few steps into the building. He let the door swing shut behind him, but there was no sign of Spencer. Her heart started to pound like a drill as the hulking man started scouring the building to find her.
"You don't think he'll find us back here, do you?" she whispered to the other three, watching the others react to the same situation
"Why are we even hiding? We're wrestlers. We—"
Noah Auburn was the most level-headed of the group. He was the man who taught Kenzie Muay Thai in the first place back in White Phoenix's wrestling school, but as soon as Noah received an answer? He was probably the most scared one of them all.
"Guys..." The usually confident Laura King was shaking as she looked out the small vertical window embedded into the door. "There's something in his pocket. It might be a gun."
"We're all gonna die!" Noah proclaimed as loud as he could without talking above a whisper.
"Relax, bud," Jack Napier smirked in Noah's direction. "What do we know about him? You think he's the hotheaded type?"
"I heard him yelling at Spencer through the phone," Kenzie responded. "I couldn't hear what he was saying, but—"
"Oh shit! He's dead too!"
"Quiet Noah! You're gonna get us all killed if you keep freaking out like that," Laura hissed, sitting on a desk beside Jack. Without consciously thinking about it, she reached over and grabbed Jack's hand. Despite her exterior confidence during the tense situation, it still made her feel better to have him by her side. Noah scrunched himself into a ball next to a large black filing cabinet far away from the window, and Kenzie sat with her legs extended in the opposite corner closer to the desk itself.
Without Spencer here to tell them the full story, the four were left to their own imaginations. Noah imagined Spencer was shot at point-blank range with a militarized shotgun while Jack pictured Spencer getting stuck in traffic. Laura thought the man was an escaped raving inmate who needed to steal Spencer's identity to finally lose the cops. And Kenzie? Kenzie just hoped her best friend was okay.
"He said my name, didn't he?" Kenzie suddenly brought up after a short pause.
"Maybe he wants to talk to you," Jack responded, his laid-back southern drawl thick as ever.
"What could this guy possibly have to say to me?"
"Maybe he's going to profess his love for you," Laura smirked. "Maybe he's a... What did you call your fans again? Rainbow Chasers? I mean, could you get any tackier?"
"Can we please have this conversation, oooh I don't know... When we're NOT all about to get brutally massacred worse than Allyson Morrow and Gavin Grimes combined, please?" Noah was sweating bullets as he listened to the other three talk about the situation so casually.
"I'll go talk to him," Laura responded without hesitation. "I'll walk out with my hands in the air and say Kenzie's not here. Then I'll—"
"No," Kenzie blurted out all of a sudden. Usually a bundle of insecurities, she forced herself to be brave for the rest of the group. "If it's me he wants, then it's me he's going to get."
"Kenz, this isn't a video game," Noah finally spoke up as the voice of reason. "If you get shot out there, you can't just hide out and regenerate your health. It doesn't work like that."
"I grew up around the military, Noah. I know how firearms work." Before she could decide against it, Kenzie bit her lip and climbed to her feet using the desk for support. With a gulp, she approached the door, and as she closed her eyes, she grabbed the doorknob.
Once the door swung open, she opened her eyes and raised her arms up over her head. Slowly, she approached the trespasser with caution, and as the man turned to look at her with fists clenched at his side, she immediately regretted her decision.
"You wanted to see me?"
"Yes," the man responded. "Allow me to introduce myself: My name is Austin Deveraux. Humanitarian, messenger, and an all around good guy. You have nothing to fear. I'm a University Of Georgia graduate just like your friend Spencer Walsh."
"Wait. You know Spencer?" She didn't let her guard down.
"Know him? We were roomies! Hell, we were closer than you'd think once."
"Okay. Then where is he? What did you do to him?!"
"Me? I didn't do a thing to him, dearie."
One of Lacklan's people, Kenzie thought to herself.
"Just tell me what you want and leave, Austin." Kenzie grit her teeth, trying to keep her outward composure the best she could. One sudden move and she could be looking down the barrel of that gun.
"Why are you in such a hurry? We just met, after all. Don't you want to know me a little? Don't you want to learn about all the shenanigans Spencer and I got into back in college, and why he never mentioned me?"
"I don't care," Kenzie retorted, her hands still clasping the back of her head.
"Pity," Austin replied, removing the gun from his pocket. Kenzie gulped, her heart pounding as she took a step back without even thinking. "The second amendment of the United States constitution gives me the right to bear arms. Funny thing, isn't it? It helps people listen to me, and I want you to listen to me very carefully, okay?"
The twenty-one-year-old flinched as the brute started to wave the gun around while he spoke.
She reluctantly nodded her head.
The other three nervously watched what was happening through the vertical window embedded into the closed door.
"Spencer gave me a message he wanted me to share with you. He knew he was too pathetic to say it himself, and that's where my humanitarian expertise come into play. So how about I skip the grandstanding and get straight to the point, hm? Spencer is—"
Before Austin could say the words, Spencer tackled him down to the floor! Grabbing the silver 9mm pistol, Spencer tossed it out of reach and gestured to the rest of the group to come out of hiding for the assist. Noah, Laura, and Jack all scurried out of the office to apprehend the 'humanitarian,' grabbing arms and legs alike to make sure he couldn't get back to his feet. Using all his body weight to keep his archenemy pinned on the floor, Spencer mounted the aggressor and turned to his friends.
"So is someone going to call the police, or are we just going to have to hold this idiot down for the rest of our lives?"
Kenzie quickly reached for her phone and dialed 911.
DATE: 03/28/17
SCENE NUMBER: 06
CAMERA STATUS: ON / OFF
"So you're telling me the police just let the psycho walk?!"
"Austin didn't technically fire the gun, Kenz. He stayed within the law."
"But— That's not fair! He was going to—"
"The gun wasn't even loaded."
Kenzie's eyes grew wide, frustration written all over her face as she listened to Spencer explain what happened after the cops arrived and put Austin Deveraux in handcuffs the day before. As the twenty-one-year-old sat on the couch of her apartment yet again with her best friend by her side, she let her legs swing back and forth as she took the time to think to herself.
"I just feel like... Next time, the gun will be loaded, and someone's going to get seriously hurt. And now that madman, that... asshole... is going to head back to Georgia without so much as a slap on the wrist."
"I know, Kenz. I know," Spencer huffed. "It's scary to think that he might come back at any time. We just have to keep our guard up and focus on our careers, that's all. We can't give Austin the power to take over our lives."
"Yeah..."
Spencer thought for a moment during the long pause, looking down at the dark carpeted floor beneath their feet.
"So... Are you ready?" The once vague words of Spencer Walsh were now clear as day with a smile included.
Kenzie didn't hesitate to answer.
"To beat Adrien in the best match #FSociety's ever seen? You're damn right I'm ready!"
He laughed at her newfound enthusiasm.
"... Hey, Spencer? Can I ask you something?"
"Sure."
"That guy... Austin... He told me you wanted to tell me something. Was there any truth in that, or...?"
"I— Yes..."
She paused, concerned by the look on Spencer's face as he admitted it.
"You know you can tell me anything, right?"
"... Kenzie. What I'm about to tell you doesn't leave the two of us, understood?"
"Understood."
...
"I'm gay," Spencer finally mumbled quietly.
