"mercenary"

I think it was Ferris Bueller that said something about life moving pretty fast and how if you don't stop to look around, you could miss it. I don't think I ever really bought into that until the past couple of weeks. I went from San Diego to jail in Japan to wrestling in some really historical venue to Knoxville, and now I'm sitting in the home of Jonathan Collins.

A home that I probably would have done a few months for breaking and entering to about six months ago.

There's a weird silence in the house right now, seeing as how nobody in here is really acquainted with one another. I barely know Cailey Carter, she barely knows me, and Jonathan's wife and daughter don't know us from a hole in the ground. Fiona might recognize me since she and I kind of work together, but beyond that, nothing.

"So...anyone hungry?" I ask, just trying to break the silence.

"Me!" the little girl says with a hand raise, and Fiona goes to silence her.

"So...you guys know Cassidy?" she asks us.

"Me? Like, kinda yeah. Nothing you'd call best friends. I talked to her for a couple of days before she got Loki'd," I say with an eye roll.

"She's my sister," Cailey mumbles. "I hope she still is," she adds with a broken voice. She's taking this the worst of us all, mostly because that's her blood. Jon looks out for the (R)Evolution students like his children, and he always considered Cassidy one of them, but Cailey lost a family member to these games and I can't help but feel a little sad for her. Whatever I got myself wrapped up into, it's taking away pieces of people's lives. When you take away vital parts, it's worse than killing them, honestly. If someone dies, they can't feel anything. These people are walking around every day with missing parts of their hearts and lives. Cailey can't call her sister, and Fiona and Madison are watching Jonathan travel the world without being here when they need them. They're living in the darkest hour of their lives and all I can do is watch.

At least I know where my girl is, even if I can't talk to her.

"Cailey, we're gonna get her back. You should rest, considerin' what happened to you last night at that show. Blondie did a real number on you," I tell her, looking over at Fi. "She got hit with some move I ain't ever seen before. Then again, it ain't like I've seen 'em all. Jon's barely had Papa teach me the ropes. He brought this new guy in though I guess," I say with a shrug.

"He's a friend of Chris Strike's, and Jon's been putting a lot of trust in Chris as of late, possibly more trust than he's put in myself, Jimmy, or Darrin. I trust Chris myself, I just need to know what's going on in his head," she says as she sits down with us, looking at Cailey with some sorrow. "I'm sorry this happened to your sister. She seemed nice from the little I was able to talk to her."

"It's okay," Cailey tells her. "Well, I mean, it's not. We need to do something, but I guess he's out of town trying to get some answers."

"Jon's gonna be back in a day or two. He's convinced that finding an old friend will help him get more than he's losing here. For his sake, I hope he's right," Fiona says, sighing.

This group ain't exactly the happiest I've ever seen, and it's starting to take its toll on me.

A day or two later, and Cailey and I just got plain sick of staying at Jon's. It's not a bad place, but I need a little more freedom. Staying at Jonathan and Fiona's kind of reminds me of being made to stay at my aunt and uncle's. They're not strict enough to enforce every rule, but what else can we do? So we took off, and inevitably we decided we needed something to escape the blues. How do you forget what we've seen?

You drink. And you drink a whole fucking lot.

It's my favorite bar nobody knows about in San Diego, it's called Barnaby's. Just a little bar out of the way, and it's not the style of Cailey or Tommy's, I'm sure. Here's my best guess.

Cailey: Loves fruity drinks with umbrellas and gets classic white girl wasted. She's what you may call a "WOOO! Girl."

Tommy: Wants a night club to pretend he's VIP.

What they got is a place that looks right out of Road House, aka where I'm at home. A few beers and we're off and running, and it's not long until Tommy is showing the world why he's totally from Japan and Cailey's just enjoying being out. We escaped and I gave Cailey a chance to just forget it all before we got bombed. Earlier came the food and fun times, and now's just the chance to forget.

"So what do you do besides save the world with your pipe, Carey?" she asked, leaning against the bar as she looks at me.

"I'm the midnight rider, didn't you know?" I say with a snort, taking a sip of my own beer.

"Does that line work with the girls? Did it work with my sister?" she asks, eyebrow raised.

"It worked with my dame. Ain't nothin' between me and Cassidy. I just liked the fact that I had someone I could talk to about the old man," I respond, talking about Jonathan Collins. "She's the only one of his trainees that don't think I'm a fuckin' waste."

"You're not the easiest person in the world to get along with, Carey," she replies, knowing she's got me dead to rights.

"Well it keeps the wrong people out. I ain't in this to love everyone and have 'em love me. I'm in this to bash the Deacon and be done with it. Gonna retire undefeated," I tell her.

"That plan got shot down the drain, considering I heard you lost to Aries Reed at Ascendancy," she says, a little bit of a smirk and a nudge to my side.

"You see him afterward? He didn't look like a winner. I got up and walked away, I say that makes me the one who won," I tell her dismissively, practically blowing off the idea of a disqualification. What the fuck is a disqualification anyways?" I ask.

"Very charming, Carey. That caveman routine's gonna take you miles," she says with a scoff.

"I'd like to think it works for me. I get to be me, you get a little bit of entertainment," I say with a chuckle as I glance at her before pardoning myself. "If you excuse me, the beer that's gone in needs to get out. You sit tight and I promise I'll be back before you can recite the whole Gucci Gucci thing whatever the fuck that female rapper did," I tell her, deciding it's time to drain the snake. The bathroom is the last place a motherfucker like me gets any privacy, though at any given time, it turns into an office. The weird thing is that ever since I started doing this wrestling gig, I've forgotten all about my primary source of income.

Marijuana.

Tommy buys from me to sell and I make a decent living distributing, just enough to do my thing and not have to worry about scraping for money. I keep telling myself I'm gonna stop someday, and I mean it. To be honest, I was gonna go legit when Payton walked into my life. She doesn't need to look over her shoulder because her old man's a goddamn criminal.

That's when I stop and I let myself really linger on that word. It's a word that's never really left me.

Criminal.

And I feel it's a word that's probably rightfully become synonymous with me. The only reason I'm not rotting in a Japanese cell right now is Jonathan Collins, and I'm taking it all for granted.

These are a lot of thoughts to escape while I piss. I need to slow my head down, find some sort of relief for all of this. I'm not asking for a miracle cure, but when I leave the bathroom, it comes in the heaven sent form of the one thing I was born to do and do exceptionally well.

Fight.

"You here all alone?" the dude asks Cailey and I'm a little offended by how he's treating her. Approaching, she can already see me as I come up and clear my throat. "I got this, man," he tells me.

"No, you really don't, buddy," I tell him as I place a hand on his shoulder that he quickly pushes off.

"This lady's enjoying my company!" he tells me.

"She don't look it, friend," I reply and the dude turns around to look at me, only to be met with a sharp elbow to the nose.

"And now you don't look like a fuckin' smartass, friendo. Hope you get the hint now," I tell him as she looks at me.

"You're charming, Carey," she says and I grin.

"A gentleman for all occasions," I remark, taking a bow. "Come on, grab Tommy and we'll go to the next bar.

And that's what our Friday is. It's a blur of booze, brawling (at least for me), and music. Oh, and a passed out Asian guy who will insist tomorrow he out drank us all. More than likely, I'll let Tommy talk. It helps keep him feeling good, and considering I haven't been out to make anyone feel like shit, it's the least I can do. With him passed out in my beat up truck, I walk Cailey up to her hotel room and stand with her, leaning against the wall as she does against the door.

"You gonna be okay?" I ask her.

"You know, it's a process. I don't think I'm ever gonna get over what happened. I want Cassidy back safe and sound, but it was nice to not have it at the front of my mind tonight," she tells me, and I nod.

"I don't think anyone wants to have that sort of cloud over them constantly. We're just trying to find a little reprieve in a storm," I say before pausing and realizing how quiet it is. "I mean, I got shit of my own I gotta deal with too in all this."

"What exactly are you doing in all this?" she asks me.

"I gotta get back to it, but I owe a receipt to Jeremiah Robinson," I tell her. "Jeremiah put someone real important to me in the hospital. She ain't woken up since, and not a day goes by where it doesn't stick in my craw. I never wanted any of this wrestling world, but I guess I'm in it now for better or for worse. It's making things better for Tommy, he's making some money doing things legit, and I'm kinda going legit. I ain't ever gonna be more than a thug though, and that's fine with me. You take what you're dealt."

"You can be more, Carey. Everyone can be more," she says and I look down at her.

"Right now, I just wanna be enough to get this guy," I tell her.

"Then why are you helping me?" she asks.

"Because maybe it'll take some of the stain off me. And maybe it'll give me a reason to find somethin' beyond all this bullshit with Jeremiah. And maybe because it's about time I relieve some sufferin' after all the pain I put others through," I tell her. "And maybe, it's so I'm good enough for Payton when she wakes up. That's our story, we're both waitin' on people to wake up."

She's quiet for a moment and so am I. I don't know what I'm showing, but I imagine it's probably more than I want, and I know that this isn't the right time or place for anything. Not under these circumstances, not with everything shrouded around us.

"What's she like?" she asks. "Payton."

"She's a hell of a dame. Called herself the One Girl Revolution. Cute, smart, the kind of girl that just needed a spark to start her fire. We weren't much for long, but I knew it was somethin'. I ain't sayin' I'm in love, but I knew that I could've gone right for her. You find someone in this world you wanna turn it around for and walk away from damnation, and you know there's somethin' big about them," I say and she nods in agreement.

"And you don't think you'll ever find that again?" she asks, glancing up.

"I don't know, I gotta be honest. Ain't sayin' I won't, but I ain't lookin' for it. Right now, I just wanna do what's right. What's right is clubbing Jeremiah and helpin' you," I say.

It gets quiet and her and I are looking at one another. It's that weird silence where you're not sure if anything's being said without being spoken or the type of silence that makes you never want to talk to someone again. It's the kind of silence where you can't quite figure out what it means and you're not sure you want to for fear of misinterpreting it. Whatever that silence is, I break it with some body language like a nod.

"You should get in bed. Don't want ya all lonely and shit tomorrow. You can come by the school with me while I train. I thought I heard the old man's coming back to town tomorrow and he may be able to check up on us and give us some info," I say and I chuckle. "He's still workin' hard and we're here drinkin'."

"He's doing a good thing," she says and I nod back at her, realizing what time it is and what's just transpired.

"I'll see you tomorrow, okay? I'll pick you up at a decent time and we'll hang out," I say, giving her a playful nudge. It's nothing more than that, but once she's safely in her room, I start walking back out to my truck. It's not exactly how I pictured tonight to end, but I'm glad that we all got our reprieve. Lord knows we need it.

In case you've missed it, my name is Carey Dean, and I'm the newest hard hitting bastard to hit (R)Evolution Wrestling.

It's weird though, because I ain't here for World Titles and shiny things, I'm here for one reason only, and that's to lodge this pipe in the skull of Jeremiah Robinson. The big, bad Deacon put my girl in the hospital, and I ain't quite forgiven him for it just yet. So that's good news for some of you, and that's bad news for the rest.

See, here's the thing. I'm gonna get Jeremiah Robinson in that gauntlet somehow. I don't care how I do it, but I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna make sure I get him, and if there's anyone I see in that ring before I get to him, I'm gonna fuck them up and knock them out until I get the Deacon. The funny thing is that you guys think I'm joking here, but I want you to understand one thing...

...I don't care if I win or lose. If I go through this whole thing? Well, ain't that grand? I get to go fuck up the rich boy in front of his boyfriends and take that belt for myself. If I lose? Well it ain't like anyone thought I was gonna be the winner anyways! I got nothin' to lose in this! The fact is right out there for the whole world to see, people: until I get Jeremiah Robinson, the rest of you guys are just filling in and delaying me turning his face into Hamburger Helper. So you can either get out of the way or you can take his beating for him, but that's not gonna help him. If you think I don't swing my fists or this pipe hard, well you can ask Aries Reed how many teeth he spat up after our little dance at Ascendancy.

Now if you happen to be one of those people who gets lucky and sees me after I give Jeremiah the migraine from hell, well you're gonna see a kinder, gentler Carey Dean! And by that, it means that I ain't gonna knock you out with this pipe, but I'm gonna knock you out with my fists. It means I'm gonna do what I gotta do to win, because I ain't a big fan of losing. So at least you can take solace in the fact that I don't plan on rearranging your face with steel.

This gauntlet? I have the keys to victory. See, I got no fear of what's gonna happen, and I got nothing to lose. There ain't a thing more dangerous in this world than a man with nothing to lose, and now you get to see just how little I have when you get into the ring with me. What are you gonna do, appeal to my reason to be champion? Shit, I'll pawn that belt off to pay my rent if I gotta! That belt could get me some nice coin at the pawn shop, and that ain't saying I disrespect that title...because it's that one thing you guys are chasing. The truth is, it don't matter to me, not until I finish what I came here to do. So go ahead and keep posturing yourselves for some fight like y'all have a chance once you're one on one with me.

And before I got, just a little message for a couple people. You know who you are, and you're vain enough to know this song is about ya. You want it so bad? Come to San Diego, step into my office in the parking lot. You're gonna find out nice and quick that if you didn't think I played nice in Knoxville, I won't get any nicer in my hometown. You Hot Topic twins can bring blondie, bring Elvira, bring a whole army of undead freaks to come take me down, but I'm gonna show that you picked the wrong dude to fuck with. So go on, try me. I'm in a real foul mood and I don't mind for a second taking it out on you two fuckin' bitches. You two ain't shit, and you got nothin' on me.

So bottom line is real simple, people. Nobody move, nobody gets hurt unless you're Jeremiah Robinson. It's time for the payback, and I ain't stoppin' until I'm done.

And if I win? Well Jeremiah better tell that rich boy Brando how it's gonna feel to get got by the only true heavy hitter in (R)Evolution Pro.

I don't care who you are. Monday night, bitches are getting stitches. Sorry if you just happen to be collateral damage.