Seasonal Yuletide Christmas Bash Extravaganza!

Their position, at the moment, was sort of a 'hold formation' move while Abattoir tried to decide on her next move. Calling it a stalling tactic would be uncharitable - and also dangerous, considering she was fighting on borrowed time now - but it was definitely designed to keep Jessica cooperative for the moment, and so when the Violent Violet began struggling, Abattoir realized it was time to make a decision.

She let go of her opponent's neck, landing in a sort-of handstand and popping gracefully back to her feet like some kind of bloodsoaked harlequin. The lactic acid in her muscles screamed for mercy, but Abattoir was on a roll now, flying high on the euphoria of combat, and it was obvious she fully intended to ride this thing all the way into the ground. Judging from the frenzy with which she tore open one of the remaining presents, and the pleased eye she cast on the candy-cane-striped lighttubes she pulled out from it, 'into the ground' might end up being a little more literal than was usually the case.

As the tubes clunked back onto the mat, cast carelessly into the pile of tacks and broken glass, Abattoir strode with ominous purpose towards the ring apron where Jessica was recovering. Her pulse was thundering in her ears and all the cities of the world burned in the wavering lens of her mind's eye. It was great. Plenty of people in AFW had given her a good fight, and Aisha had given her an excuse to bust out all her favorite toys, but this was like the apex of all those encounters together. Plunder, blood, shots to the head, all the things that made this line of work worthwhile.

She hopped onto the second rope to make up for the height difference, then hooked Jessica's head and arm for a suplex and heaved backwards, trying to launch the other girl over the ropes and back into the ring. Apparently it was, in fact, festive enough for the match's theme, even if she hadn't seen fit to announce her conclusion. (To be fair, outside of murmuring in apparent gibberish and occasional cryptic taunts, Abattoir didn't seem to announce much of anything.)

Jessica was breathing now. It was nice to have her throat clear, and it looked like her attempt to get out of the hold worked. Her opponent probably did some flippy bullshit back there, but whatever. She was free now. She tried to push herself off the rope and failed the first time. Jessica just couldn't muster any courage, any strength, any, well, anything. The crowd loved it. Jessica was clearly on her last wings, and ailing badly. They wanted to see this big bad bully get taken down, and they just might have it.

The Violent Violet was glaring out at the crowd at cursing all of them. Some women in here got a second wind because of them, and Jessica was beginning to feel a second wind in spite of them. Then she was lifted upwards by their hate. Upwards, and over. Then she realized she wasn't getting lifted by them at all, but instead by Abattoir. Jessica was a bit on the heavier side for a wrestler here at AFW but the masked girl got her skyward and back down again. The Violent Violet shrieked in agony as her body was slammed into a myriad of horrific things. Abattoir had seen it fit to lay some tubes down for her, and Jessica crashed down into them as well as some of the tacks still left there.

She was bleeding now. She had been bleeding a lot earlier but now she could pass as a hemophiliac. Jessica shrieked again as she twisted on the mat and the shards of glass and tacks got pushed in further. Curse this masked girl, curse this whole fucking stadium. The more she writhed the more she was stung by a million wasps, but Jessica could not help it. Pain turned her usually clear eyes red and the world seemed filled with blood.

Jessica stopped thrashing in pain. She felt like she had been completely walloped for the duration of the match. There was the torturous sting of the glass and the tacks, the long slow crush of the bruises still left from the barricades, and the mental and physical exhaustion lingering over her and telling her to stay down. For the moment, Jessica was going to obey.

It was difficult to hear over the roars of the crowd and the near-constant 'holy shit' chants, but Abattoir actually let out a delirious little chuckle as she rose. It was a low, grating sound, not unlike gravel sliding into a pit, and did not sound anything at all like the laughter of an actual person. It was obvious that, despite the crushed glass and thumbtacks, the massive blood loss, the excess of head trauma, and the utter violence she and Jessica had inflicted on each other in the last twenty minutes - or perhaps because of it - she was having the time of her life.

For now, the Violent Violet was limp on the canvas, pincushioned with shards of god-only-knew what, and Abattoir contented herself with stepping over the bigger girl's supine form, casting a bloodied eye down at her.

"Get up. Stay awake. Don't go out."

She dropped astride Jessica's shoulders, eyes locked on her opponent's, and the ref girl (who had been cowering behind a Christmas tree for this entire thing so far) peeked out, then very tentatively skittered out from behind her cover, as if reminding herself 'that's right, there are pinfalls in this match!'

"One!"

"Don't go out," Abattoir insisted.

Jessica listened. She wasn't very good at listening but this time she listened. To all the holy shit chants, to the seemingly unending pains and aches in her body and finally to Abattoir. It was so easy to just slip out of the waking world and heed the call of the blackness. She could wake up on a stretcher somewhere with a delightful amount of painkillers running through her veins and just let this all go away. Sure, she would catch hell from all the fans for losing, she would mar her hotstreak with a pretty brutal loss, and she would take another step back from her long march to the title. Was that all worth it, to suffer through this excruciating agony?

TWO!!!

No, no, of course no. Jessica gritted her teeth and forced herself to remain conscious. With a mighty effort she pushed her shoulder up and tried to push Abattoir off of her with her hands. Fuck the fans, fuck her hotstreak, fuck the title. None of that shit mattered right now. The only thing of any importance was winning and Jessica planned to do exactly that. Despite all her blood loss, coupled with fatigue and pain, it was a puissant push and surely enough to get the masked girl off of her.

If she could get there, then she would be unbound. And an unbound Jessica was an awfully dangerous Jessica. She would tear across the ring, grab the first present she laid her hands on and threw it at Abattoir with all the force she could muster. There was too much adrenaline going through her to even register if the thing she tossed was even heavy or light.

At last, something seemed to come alive inside Jessica, and as she shoved Abattoir off and started clawing her way up to her feet with alarming speed, the nak muay felt a giddy little surge of joy. There it was. Her opponent had finally reached that point that people get to when you push them enough - pushing through all the pain and the fatigue and the little concerns for the future, and truly unleashing herself. It was sort of like an epiphany, Abattoir thought, the kind of epiphany that made you a better person (or at least a more worthy one).

She stumbled on her way back up to her feet and became keenly aware that, as Jessica's power waxed, hers was rapidly waning. Well, if that was where the cards fell, so be it. All that mattered now - all that existed now - was the breakthrough and the glorious, festively Christmas-y carnage.

Abattoir turned around and immediately took a flying present right to the chest and face. It was heavier than the Violet Violent had realized, and it clobbered her with a THUNK noise - clearly something with a little oomph to it was inside. The impact knocked her back against the ropes, sending her reeling with her arms flailing for a moment. The sight was pretty funny, particularly with all the glitter and brightly-colored ribbons.

Nonetheless, as Jessica rampaged across the ring, the nak muay had just enough presence of mind to shove an arm into the gift box that'd just blasted her into the corner. Her hand closed around the familiar leg of a kendo stick. Excellent.

There was a beast inside her, one that was barely contained by at least the pretense of pro-social behavior. And now it was out. Jessica was happy to see that the box that she had furiously thrown across the ring had hit its mark and that it had been quite heavy after all. She was somewhat less delighted to find that it was a kendo stick that was very much in the hands of her opponents. The Violent Violet looked to her left and right, thrashing like a rabid dog, until she happened upon a box that she felt for whatever reason seemed cool.

It was kind of small and wrapped with green and red wrapping paper. She was not one to stop and smell the roses and ripped the package apart. Two brass knuckles hit the white canvas with a soft clunk and the game was on. She pulled them on as she sized up Abattoir. The masked girl wasn't attacking. It looked like she needed a moment to collect herself. Jessica honestly didn't mind the half-second breather.

But there was only so long it could go on. The failed pin attempt gave Jessica a second wind and she would ride that wind all the way to the finish line. The Violent Violet charged across the ring with spit and blood flying off her face and a thousand curses on her tongue. After such a long and brutal fight, there was no space for pleasantries and technicalities. This battle would come down to hard pounding and Jessica had an inkling that she could pound the longest. She sent a straight right towards Abattoir's head, consequences and the kendo stick be damned.

For the moment, Abattoir was absorbed in removing the kendo stick; the gift box was long and awkward, and there were plenty of places for her weapon to get caught up in the cheery red wrapping. As such, the second she dropped the box and brandished the stick, she looked up to see a red and purple blur charging towards her and throwing a straight punch that probably would've killed an elephant if it hit them on the jaw.

She managed to get an elbow up (the kendo stick was in the way) and tried to shoulder roll it, but Jessica was on a rampage and nothing was going to stop her shots; all she could really hope for was to mitigate some of the damage. Even that was...dubiously accomplished, at best. The punch glanced over her shoulder, setting it ablaze - holy shit, were those dreidel knucks? Nice to see some cultural inclusion - and crashed against her orbital with enough force to send her stumbling back against the ropes. Cameras flashed all over the arena, having probably caught an incredible shot of blood splattering through the air, and the crowd bellowed its approval. Not that the nak muay realized either of these things, as her vision was now clouded with a few bright flashes of its own.

Abattoir wasn't dead yet, though. She was still in the zone, and even in the state she was in, well...a severed snake head could still bite.

If anything, she seemed to burst forward with more energy, apparently intent on burning up gloriously like a shooting star. Rebounding off the ropes, Abattoir gripped the kendo stick with both hands and swung it like a baseball bat. Not particularly accurate, but considering every swing was with literally all her energy at this point, still quite dangerous.

The Violent Violet was of course overjoyed when she saw the blow land even if it didn't land quite where she intended it to. Jessica had never been one of those damned speed demons but she managed to make it across the ring in time to level a monstrous strike. It had once been still, the ring; now it was in motion. Blood flew from Abattoir the same way sweat rained from Jessica. The sheer momentum of the blow elongated the already long Jessica as she carried through. There was an almost manic focus in the eyes of the masked woman and Jessica guessed that is what kept her from falling to the mat after such a devastating blow. It didn't matter to the Violent Violet. That just meant there were more coming.

If there was a home run derby in whatever hole this masked girl had crawled out of, she was surely the reigning champ. Jessica was too spread out and too weary to pull herself back in. She tried to bring her arms down to mitigate the worst of the damage but that did precious little to aid her. The kendo stick came in hard and fast and would have sliced Jessica in two if it were a real blade. Luckily it wasn't but unluckily it made her whole left side light up in sheer agony. As pain shot through her body she noted the sheer energy that came with it. Although Jessica had been throwing broadside after broadside at her, she was still standing, still fighting.

Jessica owed it to the masked girl and to herself to keep fighting. The cannon ball of a blow made that prospect eminently difficult. Jessica staggered to her left side and back a few steps. The blow came with an awfully loud crack that informed her that her ribs might be broken. Every breath seemed painful as Jessica lurched forward once again. To call the move running was a disservice to anyone with even the loosest grasp on the English language. The terribly pained shimmy was inelegant but Jessica wasn't concerned with elegance as much as she was getting closer to Abattoir and ripping her head off. When she was in striking distance she dropped her right arm down and launched her fist upwards in an uppercut with what strength she had left. Adrenaline was the only thing she had left to keep her going. Not technique, as that had flown out the window from almost the beginning. Not blood, as there was way too much all over this damned arena. Not energy, as she felt nearly spent. Just adrenaline and a desire to win.

The satisfying sound of the kendo stick cracking - actually that might have been a rib - was music to Abattoir's ears. Here they were, in the final moments, throwing everything they had left in the tank at each other, and from the way the Violent Violet doubled over, it looked like she had this one. The nak muay raised her weapon again, going for a headshot this time, and stepped up to catch her opponent as she staggered...

...but Jessica lunged toward her, and Abattoir walked right into an uppercut.

It was sublimely timed. The forward momentum made the punch hit even harder, of course, but just as importantly, the hilt of the kendo stick crashed down ineffectually on Jessica's shoulder, doing maybe a tenth of the damage it could have. Uppercuts in the pocket was the ultimate way to negate superior reach (the Daniel Cormier strategy, if one wanted to give it a name), and the reach of the stick had been thoroughly negated. Not that Abattoir was able to think about much of this, as she was mainly focused on the uppercut that had caught her right under the jaw. The noise was like an axe hitting a watermelon, and without much in the way of ceremony, she dropped.

When the world returned to her a moment later, Abattoir was on her knees, leaning on a hand for support. Another hand was automatically reaching for the stick, but it was impossibly far away. Jessica was between her and the weapons, and besides, Abattoir discovered that, at last, her body wasn't doing what she wanted it to anymore. The most she could really muster was kind of a slow twitch. Head trauma, blood loss, and the intense strain of a hard-fought match had at last brought the adrenaline rush to an end.

There was a moment of serenity, and she gazed up at Jessica through a curtain of blood, reddened lips pulled into a rictus grin through the shattered remains of her mask. At last, Abattoir spread her arms in a beatific gesture, welcoming the end.

She didn't - couldn't - say anything. She didn't need to. They both knew this was it.

For Jessica, there was only the tunnel. It was what transported her from oblivion to victory. It narrowed her focus onto whatever was immediately in front of her and would not waver or let itself be distracted. The tunnel, this bizarre and horribly violent zen, barely registered the kendo stick crashing into her shoulder. As Jessica moved towards her opponent she saw the offensive move but the zone had taken over and she was too far gone to fight it. The masked girl hadn't had the range to use it to its full effectiveness, which was a shame for her as it almost certainly would have taken the Violent Violet down, perhaps for good.

But it didn't. Jessica's blow, on the other hand, was delightfully efficacious in causing as much pain as possible. Two red eyes closed and one very solid body dropped to the mat. Jessica followed through with the blow because she had resolved to follow through with everything. Her opponent rose to her knees and surveiled her options. Perhaps there was still a trick or two up her sleeve. After all, she had her arms spread as if she were taunting Jessica. All the blows to the head must have made the smiling woman delirious, Jessica reckoned as she cocked back another blow.

This would have been the time for some wonderful one liner but the match had taken too much from her. Her right fist flew forwards in a straight right. Jessica aimed for the spot right between Abattoir's eyes. Despite the fact that they were a brilliant shade of red, there was a certain coldness to them. Perhaps she would attempt to get a little revenge at some point and she would see those red eyes again. The fist was coming down like an asteroid, portending the same doom that took out the mightiest beasts of the earth.

Let it end. Let this be it.