Jesse Rogers vs Alicia Wells

Jesse had a lot of good basic qualities going for her as a fighter. She was tough, agile, smart and ferocious. But there were two particular aspects that often hindered her more than they helped, and those were her impatience and a very short temper. She could take several heavy hits and keep coming, but it wasn’t hard at all to get under her skin. Hell, Alicia hadn’t even made a conscious effort to piss the blonde off, yet she was practically seething after her inability to catch her foe with the kneebar despite the rough punishment she’d had to endure to earn that opening.

That was starting to worry Julia a bit as she watched from ringside. When her sister managed to keep her cool, she had potential to be quite a fearsome opponent. But when her anger got the best of her, while her attacks might become more relentless and aggressive, that could also make her predictable, which was the absolute last thing she needed to be against someone like Alicia.

“Just simmer down a bit. You’re doin’ fine.” Julia said reassuringly, loud enough for Jesse to hear yet calm enough to emphasize her point. Jesse didn’t directly respond, but she did start trying to control her breathing a bit more. That tended to help a bit, though she didn’t want to calm down too much either. The look in Alicia’s eyes was enough of a warning of that. If Jesse found herself getting caught between her foe’s lethal legs again, she had a feeling there wouldn’t be a hint of mercy to be found in the pressure applied.

But for now her foe was patient. The kick smacked against the side of Jesse’s leg, making her hiss at the stinging pain while Alicia moved in for the jabs. Jesse managed to divert one away from her with the palm of her hand, but the second slipped through and smacked against her face. “Ngh!” she grunted while stumbling back a step, but quickly recovered and attempted to fire back.

Jesse stepped back in and threw a left jab, then immediately followed with a big right cross aimed right at Alicia’s jaw.

For her part, Alicia was hoping Jesse would listen to her sister on the outside. She’d much rather the blonde kept a cool head too, not least because it’d make things more interesting for her. Oh, she was more likely to win if Jesse went berserker and just threw herself at the big redhead but that wasn’t interesting at all.

Judging by the other fighter’s moves, she was doing her best to keep that temper under control. Which was good, even if it meant Alicia’s attacks didn’t all get through. She got the kick and a jab with no immediate effect before Jesse fired back.

Taking a calculated risk, Alicia let the jab through with a grunt and a missed step of her own as the blow slammed home. While she thought Jesse’s power hits were mostly coming from the right, the blonde was no slouch with either fist. She’d prefer not to have to take too many of those, if she could avoid them. But taking that jab left her free to deal with the powerful, slower punch from that right hand. Having already got the armbar on that one, Alicia felt she needed to keep going after it where possible.

Not when it involved risking a punch like that hitting though. That was not a good plan.

So she leant back, letting it sweep past her, before stepping back in and swinging one leg up. Ideally, the result would be her driving her knee right into the soft, vulnerable spot between Jesse’s lower ribs and hips.

Hitting her left jab momentarily gave Jesse a confidence boost. Not that she doubted herself, but the punch landed squarely and seemingly with a pretty good impact. When that happened the blonde felt sure that her right cross would be able to find its mark too. And once it had, Alicia should be nice and dazed, making her vulnerable for something bigger and better.

There was just one problem: the second punch didn’t hit.

Jesse’s fist sailed through the air in front of Alicia’s face, but missed its mark altogether. That left the blonde wide open, and the redhead acted on it immediately. “UGH!!” Jesse gasped out as Alicia’s knee drove itself right into the center of her stomach! She wheezed and stumbled back, suddenly finding it hard to breathe thanks to that intense strike.

This bitch kicks harder than a goddamn mule! Jesse thought to herself. She’d been made aware early in this match of just how strong and impressive Alicia’s legs were, but that knee strike really seemed to punctuate it in the worst way for Jesse.

She tried to go on the defensive quickly, though her balance wavered and she briefly fell to a knee. Jesse tried to push back to her feet right away, hoping that instant hadn’t given Alicia too big of an opening to work with.

Looking at her, it was easy to see that Alicia was powerful – her build, particularly her lower body were a clear advertisement for her dangerous kicks and scissors or any other hold that required the strength of the legs. Perhaps not how strong but the signs were there at least. But it was harder to see how quick the redhead was and it was that speed which caught her opponents off guard. Just like it caught Jesse on the hop as Alicia swayed back from the punch and came right back at her.

Her knee gouged right into the blonde’s midsection, exactly where it’d needed to go to cause the most damage. And Jesse’s breathing suffered, going from fast but regular to a distinctly unhealthy rattle as the other striker’s lungs tried to remember how to work again. Her walk turned to a backwards stagger, before she dropped to a knee.

The kickboxer too was taking a moment to recover, shaking off the lingering daze from that jab. But she knew this was too good an opportunity to miss and she knew exactly how to take advantage.

Alicia got herself into position, measured the distance between them with a glance and brought one powerful leg up in a blistering roundhouse aimed at Jesse’s jaw. Too early for a KO but she could still thoroughly rattle those brains and she meant to do just that.

Jesse had a really bad feeling about where she was. It was as if while her body worked to push herself back to her feet, alarms were sounding off in her mind to warn her of incoming danger. There was a wide open window for Alicia here, and it was not going to end well at all for the blonde if she didn’t shut it fast!

As Jesse started raising up, so did her foe’s leg. She saw it, and started raising an arm to try to shield her face from the oncoming kick. It was all she had time to do, but unfortunately it didn’t do all that much.

Bam!

The kick broke through Jesse’s attempt at a guard with ease and pounded right against her jaw! Instantly the blonde’s head whipped to the side while she cringed in pain. What she’d recovered of her balance was completely lost, and her whole body stumbled the direction she’d been kicked, before she finally fell forward onto her front!

“Oh shit! Hang in there, Jess! C’mon, get up!” Julia cheered on from ringside while pounding on the apron with her palms, and Jesse tried to comply. She pushed against the mat and started to slowly raise up, but that kick had seriously scrambled the blonde brawler. She was dazed and hurting, not to mention much more vulnerable. Jesse was in trouble, but there wasn’t a thing she could do about it until she’d worked through the cobwebs, something she doubted Alicia would be too keen on just letting her do.

Alicia’s kick smacked home with the crisp elegance she liked to pride herself on, the stylishness of a well-executed blow with its inevitable results. Certainly, she’d not been sure it would hit but she had been sure it’d smash through Jesse’s flimsy block with ease. And it had, sending the blonde crumpling to her face after a moment spent tottering.

The kickboxer watched her fall but didn’t pause for more than a heartbeat before she resumed her attack.

This time, she wasn’t waiting for anyone to stand up. It was pretty impressive how fast Jesse was moving, to be fair, but it wasn’t fast enough and it never would be. The sister could stand there cheering all she liked but that wouldn’t change anything either. Down on her hands and knees, head hanging, the blonde striker just wasn’t fast enough after the hit to the head.

As Jesse struggled, Alicia stalked closer. Demonstrating a flexibility not obvious of a woman with her build, she quickly raised one leg until it was parallel to her chest. Then, without pause, with a banshee shriek that showed the effort she was putting behind the blow, the powerful redhead instantly swept her deadly limb back down in a brutal axe kick aimed at the back of Jesse’s vulnerable skull.

She had the blonde firmly on the ropes now. All she needed to do was press her advantage. And keeping the other striker dazed, in pain and too shaken to fight back was exactly the way to do that.

No matter how much Jesse tried to get back up and keep fighting, her brain was just far too scrambled. Each time she pushed up, the blonde lost her balance and stumbled right back down. She wasn’t making any progress, and Jesse was coming right in to take advantage of that.

Jesse didn’t see her foe raise her leg up, but Julia’s eyes widened a bit at the impressive display of flexibility. It was easy to guess that Alicia was athletic just by a quick glance, but that didn’t always translate to being able to do a perfect vertical split. And while that was indeed an impressive sight, it was a horrible sign of what was to come for Jesse.

“Look out--!” BANG!

Julia had tried to warn her sister, but it was too little too late. Alicia’s boot collided against the back of Jesse’s skull with a sickening impact, dropping the blonde right back down to the mat. Julia gasped and covered her mouth as she watched the kick connect, as did many in the crowd. Jesse’s hands and feet shifted around in a manner that barely amounted to more than light squirming.

The sister on the outside did her best to warn the Rogers sibling currently splayed out on the mat but it wasn’t even too late – coming so soon on the heels of Alicia’s previous kick to the head, Jesse would have need either a lot of luck or inhuman resilience to get out of the way. Her boot came down like a guillotine and Jesse went right back to the canvas.

Well, given the way that one had hit home, this was about to be her first win by KO in Friction. Alicia felt a bit disappointed but, well, it happened. At least the blonde had put up a fight. Unlike someone else she could mention.

Alicia watched Jesse’s body spasm and twitch for a moment before she glanced over at the referee, who was staring down in a sort of sick trance.

”Check her.”

The two words, the first that the big redhead had spoken since entering the ring, seemed to snap the ref out of wherever her mind had wandered. Quickly, she dropped down besides the blonde, taking one of Jesse’s hands in her own.

She raised it.

She let it fall.

Limp as a piece of spaghetti, it flopped to the canvas.

”One!”

As the referee called it, the crowd’s noise began to pick up, cheering and doing their best to encourage Jesse to rise. Alicia ignored them, watching patiently as the ref repeated the exercise. Once again, she raised one hand and once again she let it drop towards the mat….

“Two!” The ref called out as Jesse’s hand flopped to the mat a second time. The crowd continued to get louder in hopes that the blonde could keep fighting, and they weren’t alone.

“C’MON, JESS!” Julia yelled out to her sister from ringside. Then the ref grabbed Jesse’s hand again and raised it up, only for her to yank the limb away before it could be dropped! The crowd burst into a loud cheer at the sight, and so did Julia!

“YES! Now get over to the ropes!” she called out. Getting to the ropes or a corner would buy Jesse a few precious moments of near-guaranteed freedom from any potentially lethal holds or any extended onslaught of strikes, assuming the ref did her job. From there maybe Jesse could recover enough to keep hanging in there, perhaps even get lucky and turn things back around. Possibly wishful thinking, but not impossible either.

However, Jesse didn’t do that. She planted her palms on the mat and once again started pushing herself straight up instead. Blood was smeared around her nostrils and over her lips, clearly the result of having her face blasted back into the mat by Alicia’s last kick. But that didn’t stop Jesse from slowly pushing herself back up, groaning as she did so. And as she made the slow journey she looked right at Alicia with a bloody grin, and flashed her a middle finger.

The two count came and went. The cheering and shouting was growing louder but Alicia kept right on ignoring it, her eyes focused on that hand. It went up, it went down.

Two.

It went up and- Jesse yanked it free.

The admiration in Alicia’s gaze wasn’t even grudging. Axe kicks to the head were no laughing matter, even when they didn’t come right after a roundhouse to the head. Taking one to the back of the skull, being slammed face-first into the mat and then beating the three count was not something she’d seen often. So, yes. The blonde was tough as nails. It wasn’t going to save her at this point, whether she went for the ropes or not, but that was seriously impressive.

Of course, pushing herself straight back up and giving the woman who just slammed her face-first into the mat the middle finger probably was not the wisest course of action. The big redhead, who’d been considering standing back to let Jesse at least put up a fight before she put her down, went very still. In the light, her eyes were metaphorical black pits, with all the warmth, humanity and decency of a shark watching its next kill.

And then she brought her leg up, chambered it back and went to kick Jesse in the head for the third time in a row with all the force and speed she could bring to bear.

It wasn’t even so much that Jesse had made her angry, although Alicia was not in a good mood. But this wasn’t a fight any more; it was an execution. And the big kickboxer was more than ready for it to be over.

And yes, having had a good fight, hard fought on both sides that she’d enjoyed up till then ruined by a sore loser did make her angry.