Ghost of Angels Past

Kishima listened, her expression unchanging as the blonde talked about the match. She remembered it all too well: the lack of normally-prominent power moves in her arsenal, and the excruciating pain that had surged through her with every hit to her back. It send a chill through her just thinking about it. But she was surprised when Chris then apologized for her entire title reign thereafter. It was almost unheard of for a champion to apologize for defending her belt, but in this case Kishima understood why it was happening. No matter how hard Chris had fought to keep that belt, her reign was forever doomed to have an asterisk stuck to it in the minds of all who remembered it.

For a moment Kishima was silent. But when her mouth finally opened, a chuckle escaped it, and her lips turned into a slight grin. “I heard Yukiko chewed you out pretty good over that. She was a great friend, but sometimes I think she forgets she was the one who tore my back up in the first place the night I won the belt. But I can’t blame her too much for that. Not like she was trying to injure me any more or less than you did.” She sighed, then took a drink before continuing.

“After you won the title, I was pretty bitter about the whole thing,” she admitted. “For a while it was easy to just blame you. But the more I thought about it, the more I came to accept that it wasn’t your fault. Yeah, you could’ve given up the belt. Maybe that would’ve made things right by people, maybe it wouldn’t. There’s no way to know now.” She shrugged. “And honestly, I’d be lying through my teeth if I said I don’t still get pissed inside just thinking about it all. But it’s not you I’m mad at. Or Yukiko.” Kishima had a feeling Chris probably knew where she was going with this by now.

“The night I beat Yukiko, I was in too much pain to go out and celebrate. So I went home, went right to sleep. I woke up right before noon the next day to a call from our wonderful president.” The emphasis on the word “wonderful” couldn’t have been more sarcastic if she’d tried. “He wanted the match with you to be that night, and when I explained my condition, he wasn’t having it. Said I needed to be at the arena that night, either in my ring gear to defend the belt, or as I was to surrender it...” She shook her head, and took a big drink.

“Twenty-three hours, seventeen minutes. That’s how long I was on top of the mountain, and I knew I’d never have a chance to climb it again.... But hey, at least I went out with a fight.” With a bit of effort, Kishima relaxed a bit and managed to smile a bit again. “So basically what I’m trying to say is, I forgive you. And thanks for saying that.”

Chris listened intently as her fellow Wrestle Angel told her about her time leading up to when the blonde had won the title from her. She winced as Kishima told her about the President's call to her, forcing her to defend her title.

"God, I can't believe that guy." she muttered angrily, although some of that was, as always, directed at herself for not seeing through him earlier.

When Kishima said that she had forgiven Chris, she looked up at the other woman, relief on her face.

"No....thank you." the blonde replied sincerely. "I made some wrong decisions back then, and there are a lot of things I feel guilty about. But the match against you was one of the ones I always felt the worst about. Most of the other women in Wrestle Angels, I hurt indirectly. You though....I injured you. Me, with my own two hands. That was about a direct as could be."

She shook her head ruefully, thinking back on that match.

"But yes, you went out fighting. Even injured...you were something else. I barely beat you. If you had been at your best that day....you would have won. I can see that now, looking back on it." Chris said.

And she meant it honestly, and not as a way to placate the Bomber. While Chris had been a promising newcomer at the time, and was stronger and more durable than the usual Wrestle Angel, Kishima was a battle tested veteran of the ring. Although Chris might have had an edge in pure strength and ability to absorb punishment, they would have been slight at best. The other woman should have been faster, and should have been able to wear the American down with her greater understanding of submission holds.

She raised her glass to Kishima.

"You would've been....no you were a fine a champion." Chris said. "Risako told me you were one of the last true champions of the league during a....disagreement we were having. While I don't think much of her right now, I know she was right about that much...."

“Hey now, don’t beat yourself up over that,” Kishima replied with a reassuring smile when Chris mentioned the injury the bomber had suffered in their match. “Like I said, there was a lot that contributed to that. Don’t shoulder all the blame for that, alright?”

When Chris discussed the possibility of what might’ve happened if the match had happened under more appropriate circumstances, Kishima just chuckled and shook her head. “Maybe, maybe not. But you’re not giving yourself enough credit. It was a horrible idea on multiple levels for the company to throw so many eggs into one basket, but it’s obvious whey they too such a liking to the one they chose. Good as you were, I don’t doubt that if you hadn’t won it that night, you wouldn’t have had to wait much longer.”

Kishima blinked in surprise when she heard about Risako’s comment. “She said that? Wow, that’s quite generous of her. Thanks for telling me that,” she replied. Risako, even if they hadn’t been the closest of friends, had always been someone Kishima had looked up to as an inspiration. Receiving that sort of praise from her was no small matter to the bomber, who then raised her own glass.

“To...fallen angels, and the hopes that we’ll be able to spread our wings again,” she said, chuckling at the corniness of her own words and clinking her glass against Chris’ before taking a big drink. But as she did, she thought about the last thing the blonde had said. Kishima hadn’t followed the careers of most of the ex-Angels very closely once they’d made the jump to AFW. She’d heard rumblings about problems between Chris and Risako, and saw their heated match at Summer Splash. But she didn’t know much about what had happened between the close of the Wrestle Angels and now that had led things to be as they were now.

“Hey, Chris... You don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want, but.... Mind if I ask what’s been going on with you and Risako?”

After the Bomber gave her toast, Chris gave a laugh along with her. The words were hokey, but they were also appropriate.

"To all of the Angels, may they be happy, wherever they are." the blonde added.

As the subject turned to her former flame, Chris sighed.
"Its fine, theres been rumors flying around since last Summer Splash. But if we're going to talk about Risako, I'm going to need another drink. I guess first off, did you know about Risako and I being....together, back then?"

Chris put stress on thr word together to indicate the romance that had been going on between Risako and herself....

During their time as Wrestle Angels - or hell, even a week ago, no one in their right mind would’ve thought that Bomber Kishima and Chris Morgan would be drinking together and toasting to the happiness of all the other angels together. And if anyone had voiced such a thought, they no doubt would’ve been laughed at or deemed insane by any and all who heard. But it was happening. It was almost surreal, but there was also a strange sense of comfort that Kishima felt. Or maybe “relief” was more accurate. But the issues between them had evidently only been part of what had weighed on Chris’ troubled soul.

When Chris mentioned her and Risako having been in a relationship, Kishima’s eyebrows raised in slight surprise. “No, I didn’t,” she answered honestly. “I mean, there was always relationship gossip being whispered around, but a lot of it ended up just being empty rumors, so I tried to stay out of all that. There was even a point where people thought I was with Yukiko. Hell, even Yukiko herself thought so for a little while,” Kishima added with a light chuckle, trying to ease the mood just a bit before coming back to the real topic at hand.

“But...no, I had no idea about you and Risako. What happened?”

Chris had managed to get the waitress's attention, ordering herself another whiskey sour. She listened to Kishima talk about the often misinformed gossip that floated around back in thise days, chuckling at the thought of people thinking Bomber Kishima and Mighty Yukiko were a couple.

"Ah,but what cute couple you two would've made...." she said, teasing her fellow former Wrestle Angel.

Her drink came, and Chris thanked the waitress taking a sip as she sorted through the memories.

"Well, I guess you have to understand how we ended before we get into our issues in the present. Risako and I, we had been together almost two years, and then I won the title. I think that's where everything went bad. You see a few months later, Risako confronts me. She tells me that I'm being the President's puppet champion, that he's been giving me challengers that I would be able to beat, but with some difficulty, in order to make things seem real. I was astounded, it sounded crazy. Why would a man in charge of a wrestling league sabotage it by having a pet champion? But you see, I never saw through the president until later. He had been a friend of sorts before Risako came into my life, encouraging me to keep training and fighting, so that everyone could see that a foreigner could be a great Wrestle Angel, equal to any of the Japanese ones. So yeah, when Risako told me to give up the belt, I said no. She asked me to do it for the others, the same others who either subtly bullied me when I first came to the league, or politely ignored me as it happened. I said, 'Never for them. They'll have to beat me for it!' Things got....heated after that. Towards the end, she accused me of being his whore, even asked if I was sleeping with him at one point. I asked her if the whole mother hen thing she had with a lot of the girls was just so she had an easy way to fuck her way through the roster. Sorry about the language....but yeah it got bad."

She took another deep sip.

"The day after, I was scheduled to do a promo with the President that night. Risako shows up at my place in the afternoon, and her and I....you know." Chris waved her hand, slipping past saying they slept together. "I thought that everything was forgiven, that we had a fight but it was done. She was gone when I woke up. I guessed that I would just see her at the arena backstage or something. Anyway, when I'm in the ring about to give my promo, Risako interrupts, coming down to the ring, calling me a fake champion who won't fight anyone the President hadn't handpicked himself. That I was a coward, inless I agreed to fight her, that night. I was so furious. Her little charade in the afternoon, a fake, setting me up for this. And then to do this on front of an arena full of people.....so I told her I'd fight her, despite the President yelling me not to. The rest you probably know. She beat me. Risako trained me, she knew all the weaknesses I had at the time. She was prepared, I wasn't. It was obvious who would win, I just didn't see it.. She betrayed me that night, taking the title from me, abandoning it right after. Before she laid me out with one of her kicks, she told me 'If you make me choose between the people of this league and you, it will always be them'."

"So yeah as far as breakups go, getting knocked out in front of thousands of people was by far the worst....." Chris finished the first part of her tale of her and Risako. "So you can see why we have such bad blood now, right?"

“Heh, yeah, I’m sure we would’ve,” Kishima replied with a chuckle when Chris teased her about Yukiko. This hadn’t been the first time such a comment had been made to her, but the bomber had mostly chalked it up to the fact that they’d been good friends and tag team partners. They were seen together a lot, so people drew conclusions. It probably would’ve been cute, truthfully, but oh well.

As Chris started to explain, Kishima very quickly understood why the blonde wanted some alcohol in her system before she got around to the details. She wasn’t terribly surprised to hear Risako had confronted her about her controversial title reign - more than a few veterans had done the same. But a pang of guilt stabbed at her with the mention of how various Angels had acted around Chris. Kishima hadn’t exactly gone out of her way to make her feel welcome, and she knew about others who’d been far more blatant in their dislike of Chris, but hadn’t done anything about it.

Kishima visibly winced as the details of Risako and Chris’ relationship unfolded, particularly the argument the night before the promo. The bomber remembered that promo and the match that followed, and the guilt she’d felt a moment ago paled in comparison to what course through her now. And by the end of her story, Kishima found herself wishing she’d had the prior wisdom to take a few more drinks of her beer before listening.

“Wow...” That was all she could think to say for a moment while she digested the story with a somber expression. But then she looked up at Chris again, finally took a big drink, then spoke. “I think I owe you another apology then. I remember your match with Risako thoroughly.” That same night had marked the start of tournament to determine new contenders for the tag titles, which of course Kishima and Yukiko had been lumped in, along with several other top starts who could’ve made great cases for themselves as contenders to face Chris...assuming that crooked president wasn’t there to meddle as he always did.

“I remember watching it backstage with Yukiko. We cheered Risako on, even celebrated when she won... That was back when I was still pretty bitter about how things had gone down between you and me; when I blamed you for, well...everything that was going wrong there. I shouldn’t have judged the situation when I didn’t have a clue about your side of the story. That was wrong and immature of me. So I’m sorry,” she said, nodding her head in a slight bow before looking at Chris again.

“Yeah, I can kinda see what you mean. That’s...gotta be rough. I’m guessing the Summer Splash match didn’t exactly help matters very much, did it?”

"It's okay." Chris replied to Kishima's apology. "You didn't know, you couldn't have. And even if you did, well, you lost your title to me under shady circumstances. It's okay, really."

"You're right, Summer Splash didn't help things out at all." she answered Kishima's observation. "Out of all the Wrestle Angels, Risako was the only one I truly wanted to have it out with, to see her broken and beaten. But all I got was a....indecisive win. I won the match, but Risako injured me. But....I think losing to me did something to her. Did you see Risako and Suzumi Ishikawa's match? Suzumi managed to win, and Risako snapped afterwards! She nearly beat Suzumi's face in. I had to go out there and throw Risako off of her. After that, I thought we were going to have a fight right there, but then she just took off, running into the back."

She sighed.

"Thinking back on it, the look on her face...maybe Risa seemed to realize what she had done, and maybe the guilt drove her away? I don't know. How the hell did our roles get reversed? When did I start having to protect Wrestle Angels from Panther Risako for God's sake!?" Chris exclaimed, also slipping up some and using her pet name for Risako...

Kishima smiled softly, relieved to hear Chris accept her apology. Though that smile quickly faded again as the blonde described the problematic nature of her match with Risako, as well as her vicious attack on Suzumi not long after.

“Yeah, I did see that,” Kishima answered. She’d seen that show from home, but had been stunned by what happened. The bomber hadn’t been sure if it was just Risako being bitter over her loss or if there were other factors at play, though now it seemed clear it was a bit of both. It was fortunate Chris had intervened when she did, or Suzumi’s career very well might’ve ended that night in one of the worst ways imaginable. The thought alone sent a chill through Kishima’s spine. She finished the rest of her drink in one big gulp, just in time to catch the waitress coming their way to ask for another.

“Wish there was something I could do to help out. I’ve always had a ton of respect for Risako, but we never did get to know each other all that well,” she said. “Or, is there something I could do? I’m not sure how much it’d help if I tried to talk to her, but I’d be glad to give it a try at least.” It seemed like the least she could offer, and there was a chance it wouldn’t change anything at all. But it couldn’t hurt either, right...?

Taking a sip of her drink, Chris shook her head. Before the incident with Suzumi and Risako she might have welcomed Kishima playing a peace maker between the Panther and herself. But now, she felt like that might put the Bomber at undue risk.

"No...I couldn't ask you to get involved. I'm sure you have better things you can be doing with your time." the American said with a sigh. "Risako is my problem. Along with that sadist Hibiki Izayoi. Be careful of that one. So far, she never seems to show up for a fair fight, and it looks she has an axe to grind with all of us former Wrestle Angels."

She added in the last part, remembering to try and put Kishima on guard about Hibiki Izayoi and her habit of attacking former Wrestle Angels just after, or during a match.