The arrival of the anti-knight. (For acuya)

"Hmph, these buildings are befitting for the degenerates of this business. Not for me." muttered a young man as he entered the main hall of the tension heights, he noticed the rather large amount of dust and clutter that lurked around. His name was Damus Kirenko, a man from Russia.

He was raised by a Russian noble and politician, who had an Arabic mistress. Growing up he would often hear of the talks behind closed doors, revolving around political backstabbing and even literal backstabbing amongst the aristocracy.

While he grew up he was taught on the ability of manipulation, and when that failed the art of combat. A building like this wasn't the sort of place where he'd prefer to be, he was more accustomed to the rich parties and dark rooms. But he had in his mind an important reason for being here, and that was because of a certain man who stayed here.

A year ago he was at a fencing tournament, the best of several countries were duelling in the names of their land. With the skill earned through his dark upbringing Damus fought through several of them, that is until he clashed blades with Ryan Knight. It was then that Damus for the first time knew defeat, no matter the move he used the Knight countered and parried.

Ryan Knight, being the polite person he was. Was humble in victory, however Damus thought of himself as near invincible. The loss brought about a severe wound for his family's power in politics, they claimed that Damus was weak due to being born out of wedlock and to a foreign mistress at that. With his Father severely disappointed in him Damus was left with only one option in his mind, swear revenge on Ryan Knight.

However the young man had seemingly vanished off the radar, performing in matches not on TV. That was until recently when Damus saw him in the papers back at home, and how he was competing here. Later that day Mr Kirenko began travel plans to Japan, to compete in the tension roster. However he only had two things in mind.

One, prove he was better than Mr Knight. And the second was to defeat him in front of a live audience just as Ryan had done to him. Now here he was, his bags already having been brought to his room upstairs.

"What a trash bin, so this is where that stupid Knight is staying? It's hardly befitting of a man of my stature, but when he falls to me he will hide in the dirt in this room. I bet there's not even a decent challenge here for me anyway." he said aloud as he looked around the place, not caring if anyone was listening or not.

Life had been strange for Kozue since she came to Japan. Both in and out of the ring.

Inside-ring insanity was a given, of course, and even though she'd been around the ring for quite a short period of time compared to 99% of her fellow wrestlers, she understood that quite well. Hers was now a life of chair shots, clotheslines, body slams and broken tables. Kozue accepted that, and even found herself liking it quite a bit. Crazy was always better than boring. In the ring, anyway.

But outside, craziness was usually a pain in the ass, like the sordid set of events that had led her to living on top of a strip club called the Crazy Horse. It was a weird little deal - she served as a bouncer to the place when she didn't have matches, and in exchange, she got to set up camp in the Crazy Horse's loft. She also got all the free drinks she could handle, which was arguably less important than having a roof over her head, but a nice bonus.

It was fine enough at the start, but now that she was making some decent money, Kozue was considering moving into Tension Heights along with most of the other wrestlers, really getting involved in the community and having her own, personal space. Plus, getting to sleep with crappy Japanese dub step banging in her ears every night was becoming a pain.

So that's why she was hanging around the apartment building, scoping out a future apartment in her street clothes - short shorts and a black Skyrim t-shirt, tied up a bit to expose her taut middle, her sandals flapping about as she went down the stairs.

She already found a good room, so she was on her way out to make the setup, when she passed a man with a thick Russian accent. And she knew he had that, because he was talking. To himself.

She paused for a moment, then decided to not mind her own business and walk up behind him. Always curious. "Hey, yo." She gave him a little wave. "You new in the building, too?"

Damus was busy looking around the place, it felt used and crowded. Not like the things he was used to growing up, it was more a case of grand halls and nefarious private meetings at night for him.

Then he heard a voice that he judged was aimed at him, on instinct he quickly turned to look at the individual who addressed him. Mr Kirenko then did what he was trained when he encountered someone he didn't know, and that was to size them up. The Russian's eyes quickly moving up and down once, a mental list went through his mind due to his methodical nature. "Hmmm....Never mind." he thought to himself, this woman he encountered didn't look like she was about to attack him.

So he decided to engage in parley, Damus decided in his mind he could at least give it a try. Digging his hands into his black leather jacket he looked at the girl and said "I guess I'm new here, but to be frank the place is an absolute dump. If this is where the AFW houses the tension roster then I'm amazed that no one's complained to them. The name's Damus Kirenko, and you?"

She looked him over, head to toe - surly looking dude, about 6 feet tall. Looked like the concept of smiling was completely foreign to him, but other than that, a guy like him would do fine on the Tension roster. More new faces were always a cool thing, even if they looked like they were permanently sucking on sour grapes.

Damus, though - that name sounded familiar. Couldn't quite place it.

"Kozue." She stuffed her notepad away and extended her hand for a shake. "Kozue Kaburagi of the New Jersey Kaburagis. You new on the roster?"

Damus took a look at the hand that the woman named Kozue offered, he wouldn't have normally bothered to make an attempt to return the gesture. But regardless he was attempting to parley, so he'd have to put in the effort. The name was rather interesting, clearly Japanese yet she claimed to be from the US. It was odd but he himself had an Arabic Mother, and a mistress at that.

He took the hand and shook it a couple of times, a second of quietness passed before Damus then began to speak again. "I believe I said just now that I was new here, I signed on a while ago but got a response back to move here. But it's no matter, I'm only here for one thing only. And that is payback."

The Russian then leaned on the wall and said "With my logic I reckon you've been around tension longer than I have, so let me ask you something. Do you know the tension wrestler called Ryan Knight? He's British. Blonde hair, acts all posh and that." now this was why he was polite, it was when he wanted something from someone.

Christ, this guy was intense. They didn't have small talk in Russia, it seemed. Or the USSR. Or whatever the hell they were calling it this week.

."Yeah, that's sort of what I meant. I'm not new to the roster, but I'm only now moving in here. Kind of weird, living in the same roof with people you work with. She leaned against the wall and took out some bubblegum. Grape-flavored.

"With...your...logic." She understood what he said, but wow, that was a weird way of putting it."Anyway, yeah, I know Ryan. Had a match. What about?"


She popped the gum in her mouth and offered him a piece. Maybe a little chewing would simmer him down.

"Ah so you know him then, I imagine he must have rather difficult yes?" Damus said, it confirmed what he wanted to know. Mr Knight was definitely active here, that would make the plan of beating him easier to put into place.

He waved his hand to signal no to the offer of gum. "Mint only for me thank you." he said.

So now that Damus knew that Kozue had battled the young man the Russian decided to just be out with it.
"I'll be blunt here, Ryan Knight is the reason for me coming here to tension. I'd be gone from here if it wasn't for him, I'm wanting revenge."

...oh, right, she remembered now. This was the dude from the chat a week or so back, Ryan mentioned him and he popped up for 2.8 seconds. She had thought Ryan was exaggerating, throwing a little knightly flourish on his escapades, but apparently he was dead serious. The guy was crazy, like you read about.

"Uh-huh." She blew a bubble, let it pop, slurped it back up. "So. Just to be clear. You want to get revenge on him...by beating him in a wrestling match?"

Damus nodded in response to the words of Kozue, there was no point in beating around the bush here. He waited till Kozue was done with her bubble, out of common sense of course. After all if he'd explained his desire when she burst the bubble it'd look odd to say the least.

The Russian said "I don't want to just beat him in a match, no no. I also want to have him admit to the whole world something he knows. That I. Am. Better. Than. Him. And I also make it a step to defeat those he has fought before, and also those he considers his allies."

Mr Kirenko then let out a smirk and said "And I'm guessing he's a friend of yours madam, so how would you like to be my first opponent in this organization?" Damus had a strong hunch, Kozue didn't talk about the young man badly so that must have meant they got along.

Maybe Ninjette was missing something, but if revenge was what he wanted and if he was looking to make Ryan admit he was inferior, then the natural thing would be to challenge him to a sword fight, not a wrestling match. Seemed like a weird choice. Maybe a Russian thing. Or maybe Ryan just had the good sense to give this guy a wide berth. Either way.

"Yeah, sure." She blew another bubble and bounced on her heels a bit - no reason to say no, really. Her match card had been fairly empty as of late, so she was fully rested up. He looked like a bruiser - big, strong, but slow, and not just physically. She could handle it. "You got to do me one favor, though - say 'must capture moose and squirrel'."