Saldano vs. Rodriguez - Queens of the Ring

And that's why they called her the Surgeon.

Carmen could feel Lorenza's body giving way under each hook, deforming her insides on impact. Her scream highlighted it and told Carmen all she needed to know. That she was still standing was a testament to her durability, the raw toughness she'd garnered on the Tijuana streets. Carmen could admit that maybe, just maybe, Lorenza was the tougher one between them, and If the positions had been switched, Carmen wasn't so sure she'd be standing.

But sheer toughness didn't win fights alone, did it? No, technique came into play, and Carmen had sharpened hers to the bleeding edge.

Lorenza backed off, grasping her sides and Carmen figured she had a good, solid second before she realized how open she was, before she covered up. That was going to get away from her.

She moved in and stayed low, ducking in as Lorenza retreated and getting in her personal space. She braced her feet, put them down hard, and shot up with an uppercut as she rose, the piercing, painful blow head right for Lorenza jaw and bringing the full power of her legs along with it.

Lorenza was unsteady on her feet. Those punches had almost brought her down, and it was in large part thanks to luck that she was able to remain on her feet despite the fact that her insides were being turned to jelly with each punch Carmen threw at her.

She would not be able to remain on her feet for long. Carmen charged her before she had a chance to recover, coming in low at first, then rising and launching her black glove towards Lorenzaâ€s chin. The Mexican boxer tried to bring her own gloves up to deflect the blow. She was just an instant too late.

“Guaah!” Lorenza yelped, as the uppercut crashed into her chin, snapping her head upwards. She tumbled backwards to the mat, arms flopping out to either side, chest rising and falling heavily as she stared up at the lights, dazed from what had been a near-knockout blow from her rival.

The crowd winced. Army winced. If Carmen hadn't been so busy delivering the punch, she might have winced, too.

The punch looked like something out of Street Fighter, but it was effective, no arguing with results. It struck Lorenza's chin with ridiculous force, reminding Carmen what the mouth guard was for. The sort of blow that could shattered teeth and cut tongues clean in half. Unfortunate accidents.

She pushed those macabre thought back as she stepped into the nuetral corner, letting the referee do her job. A quick glance up at the time - only 11 seconds left, then the final round. Two of waiting, coming down to two minutes. No pressure, no pressure.

More than half of the audience started cheering for Lorenza to get back up and finish the fight. Some of them old and new fans, some of the people just wanting to see it go all the way. Even with the two minute rounds that women's boxing had, two fighters going the distance was a rare treat, and Carmen joined in the chant. "Get up, Saldano!" She popped out her mouthguard for a moment, making sure she came load and clear. "You still got some bones to break, not done with you yet!"

“One!” the referee shouted, the single, sharp syllable eliciting no response from the downed Lorenza. “Two!” the referee called out. “Three!”

Lorenza groaned, her eyelids fluttering. She was still conscious, but she felt like a crash test dummy after being sideswiped by a semi. Her jaw was hurting, and she almost felt as if something in that lower part of her face had cracked or popped out of place when Carmen hit her with that bone-crunching uppercut. Her ribs and liver throbbed in her gut, incessantly protesting the continuation of the fight. “Fuck,” Lorenza groaned, rolling over onto her hands and knees.

“Four! Five! Six!” the referee was calling out. The woman was hovering over her, leaning down to peer into Lorenzaâ€s eyes, trying to ascertain whether the champion was still really conscious or just acting on instinct. Lorenza growled and waved a glove at the official, then pushed herself all the way up onto her feet. The referee glanced her over. Lorenza gave a sharp nod, pounded her gloves together, then turned to Carmen.

“Iâ€m not done with you either, Rodriguez!” Lorenza called out, pointing at her with one white glove. “You still have too much pretty in that face! Iâ€m gonna make you look like something out of El laberinto del fauno, Rodriguez!” She would leap forward, pulling her right hand back and throwing one last straight the instant before the bell rang to signal the end of the ninth round. As soon as it sounded, the referee would spring into action, making sure that the two boxers didnâ€t try to fight beyond the bell.

Carmen sat in the corner with her legs swaying and her feet tapping. Staying hot. "Get up. Get up."

Sure enough, Lorenza was getting up, eyelids fluttering like a dark-skinned Sleeping Beauty. Oh, it was taking her little while, but she was doing it, and Carmen was starting to wonder if anything short of really knocking her out would do the trick. And just like last time, when she did get back up, she got up plenty pissed. The way Carmen liked her, nice and feisty.

Carmen moved in and took a shot off the side of her face. Hurt, sure, but didn't slow her down, and she threw a straight of her own before she pulled in, clinching with Lorenza and practically turning it into a wrestling match. "Think I'm pretty, huh?" She mashed her forehead against the Blue-Haired Bruja, muscling into her as the ref tried to pull them apart. "Gimme a kiss, come on! Puta!"

Lorenzaâ€s straight landed just after the bell rang, skimming the side of Carmenâ€s face. Almost simultaneously, her brown-haired rivalâ€s straight connected with her own cheek, forcing her head to the side a little. But Lorenza would not back up, and would push against Carmen hard, clinching with the Puerto Rican boxer as the referee tried desperately to separate them.

“One round to go, Rodriguez,” she hissed, spitting her mouthguard out before pressing her forehead up against Carmenâ€s.

“Back to your corners!” the referee insisted, her arms wedging into the space in between Lorenza and Carmenâ€s chests, trying to push the two rivals away from each other.

Lorenza smirked when Carmen taunted her, asking for a kiss. “You want me, huh, puta? You want me like you did that other girl? Estás caliente, eh? Horny?” Puckering her lips, she gave Carmen a quick peck on the mouth, mocking her by actually giving her the kiss she had demanded. “One more round. Gonna knock you the fuck out, Rodriguez.”

Once again, their forehead's wrestled for superiority along with the rest of their bodies, the referee slipping in between them and trying to wedge them apart. She would have an easier time separating the white out of bread. The two of them were forces of nature, living magnets, and no matter how far apart they went or whatever they did, they would always crash against each other, sooner or later.

Lorenza brought up Kurohime again, and that made Carmen press all the harder, legitimately pissed. It seemed like every other day she got that first match thrown in her face. She indulged one time, just one time, and all the sudden everyone acted like-

Carmen's train of thought was derailed by getting the actual kiss she'd joked about, Lorenza pecking her on the lip. It was so brief the crowd seemed to think it was an accident, though that didn't stop a few of them from making lewd noises. It was enough to make Carmen back up and give Lorenza a hard stare as she went on, and while she couldn't see her cheeks, she could feel the blood rushing even with all the pain on her face. She had some blush going on.

She shook her head, snapping out of it. For all the blood and sweat, it hadn't been that bad of a kiss, but they had work to do. Lorenza was just trying to get in her head, fuck with her a bit. Doing a good job, but it wasn't happening. "Yeah, yeah. You've been saying that shit since, like, round one, but now you really mean it. Right." She threw a little jab into the air, before backing up to her corner, eyes focused on Lorenza the whole way.

Lorenza smirked after giving Carmen that quick peck on the lips. The woman shouldnâ€t demand in jest what she was unable to handle in reality. While the crowd might have believed the meeting of their lips was an accident—and, in fact, a majority of them might not have seen it at all—it had been completely intentional, a calculated move on Lorenzaâ€s part, and the fact that only she and Carmen knew that gave Lorenza the sense that she had won a small, but notable, psychological victory there when their lips met.

Carmen backed up, and Lorenza wasnâ€t sure, but she thought that, though her eyes were swollen to narrow slits and Carmenâ€s face was covered in bumps, bruises, and blood, she could just make out a faint blush on her opponentâ€s cheeks. Lorenza chuckled. Then, as Carmen said her last, Lorenzaâ€s face grew hard again. She stared into Carmenâ€s eyes. “Now I really mean it,” she confirmed, with a nod. “See you in a minute.” She backed up into her own corner, eyes locked on Carmenâ€s every step of the way.

"Carmen." Her father's voice was like a distant echo - she could hear it, but even though he was standing right next to her as she sat, he might as well have been miles off. Her focus was straight forward. Locked. Stealing a glance Lorenza's every time she could get a clear look. Her body was aching all over, her face felt like giant bruise, her eye was threatening to swell shut, her right wrist was numbed up - which would make it easier to punch with it, at least - and her chest fell like a bag of loose bones. If Lorenza wasn't joking about her still having some pretty left, then her vision must have been seriously up.

Army applied the eye pack and the pain jolted her back to reality, making her arc her back and hiss as their father stepped in front of her. "Carmen, listen."

"I'm ready for her, Papa." Army gave her a swig of water and she gulped it down. "I can-"

"I know, I know." He held up his hand and cut her off. "I just wanted to tell you..." He closed his eyes and sighed. "I'm sorry."

She and Army both froze, exchanging glances, confused. Carmen was the first one to break it. "For what?"

He looked back up at her, shaking his head. "For never really supporting you like I should have. When you were born, I...for three generations, the first born in our family's always been a male, and he's always been a boxer. I won't lie. When you were born, I was disappointed. I loved you, of course, but I wanted a boy."

If Carmen hadn't taken the mouthpiece out beforehand, it would have fallen out. "Dad, Papa, I-"

He ran his hands through her hair and shushed her again. "I told myself, I told you, that I didn't want you boxing for your own safety. That was a lie. The truth is, I wanted the legacy that our family's been building up. I thought you would tarnish it. Nobody took female boxing serious in my day. They still don't, many of them."

That was true. Too true. Guys with worse records and a whole lot less talent and skill made more money than her as a boxer. Getting booked was a pain in the ass. Most sponsors wouldn't even touch her, and she was one of the most recognized names in the sport. It had taken them decades just to get a spot in the Olympics, and there was already talk about taking them out again.

"I never gave you the best training I could give you, and for that, I'm ashamed. But you've become a great, fine boxer despite that, and I just want you to know how proud I am." Carmen closed her eyes as a few tears streamed out, stinging her eyes. Army was quick to clean them off, and their father leaned forward to kiss her on the forehead. His blessing. "If you don't know anything else, know that. That's all I have to tell you."

That was all she needed.

The bell rang and the referee ushered them both to the center of the ring, her hand between them. Carmen approached, slow and steady, focused and furious. She held out her fist, straight out, waiting for Lorenza to give it a tap. "Two years in the making. You ready for this?"
'

Lorenza kept her eyes on Carmen, nodding somewhat absentmindedly as her corner team spoke to her, treated her injuries as best they could, and gave her strategy advice for the final round. She heard what they had to say, but she was more interested in watching what was going on in her opponentâ€s corner. Maybe she was trying to assess just how much Carmen had left in the tank. Or maybe she was just watching to see how the little Rodriguez family drama played out.

Lorenza chuckled as Carmenâ€s father kissed the brown-haired boxer on her bruised forehead. She couldnâ€t hear what they were saying, but even the silent play that she was taking in was sweet.

She finally looked away from her opponent, turning her head over her shoulder to look at her coach. “Did you get all that, Lorenza?” he asked, crossing his arms over his chest and smirking at the former champion. She rolled her eyes—or tried to, anyway—and nodded.

“I got it. Knock her out,” she said, earning a laugh. “Thanks, you guys. Iâ€ll see you in a hundred and twenty seconds.” She opened her mouth, letting her cutwoman slide her mouthguard back in. She nodded to her team, pounded her gloves together, then turned back towards the center of the ring, mirroring Carmen as the Puerto Rican approached. Lorenzaâ€s eyes locked onto Carmenâ€s again. She was focused and intense. But she was not afraid to tap her glove against Carmenâ€s when her rival held it out. If there was one thing that no one would ever be able to call Lorenza, it would be unsportsmanlike. “Iâ€m ready. Iâ€ve been ready to do this again for two years,” Lorenza replied. “Buena suerte, Rodriguez. Carmen. Good luck.” She put her gloves up as the bell rang, signaling the beginning of the tenth round. “Youâ€ll need it, mi hermana.”