Sayumi Arai vs. Valley Doll - Turn the Page

The crowd let out a collective cheer at Valley’s turnaround, with even the one’s backing Sayumi taken aback by the sudden switch, the speed it happened, the smoothness of it all. Valley just wished she could share in the enthusiasm - truth told, she had just escaped the end by the skin of her teeth.

She could feel the tension in Sayumi’s body, see the look in her eyes as she was being lifted. No mistaking it, she was preparing for a finisher, and if it hadn’t been enough to do the Slamazon in, it would’ve brought her close to the edge. Not a spot she wanted to be in.

So, while Sayumi was rolling away, spasming about and dealing with the pain, Valley was breathing a much-deserved sigh of relief. All that had been a harsh reminder of how dangerous her opponent was. It was time to bring this home, before the Cherry Blossom actualized all that potential.

Valley looked over to the corner, considering the Double Moonsault for a moment, but she wasn’t the least bit sure if Sayumi was winded enough for the move - the woman had a habit of being in better shape than she appeared. Didn’t mean that she couldn’t do something in the corner, though, and she had a good inkling what that could be.

”You’ve been an excellent opponent, Sayumi. Really.” Valley crawled over to Sayumi and seized her with a headlock, getting a good grip on her. She stood up, forcing her foe to straighten along with her, and started moving towards the corner, intent on steering this match to the endgame. ”But I’m closing the book on this.”

Twisting on the mat, nothing seemed to help. Pressure, positioning, even letting out all that negative energy with a frustrated bowl. Valley's knees had felt they had they blown apart her back and now she wasn't even able to muster the strength to stand. The crowd see d to be loving all of this though.

She wasn't sure if it was because of the back and forth of the match or the fact Valley has just taken over again. She hoped it was the former. While having this match was something she wanted to do, for the challenge and the experience of facing a champion level wrestler, Maria had known it was a great way to boost her reputation and that came with bargaining power.

She hoped this wasn't the end. Going out after having her unused finisher reversed was downright embarrassing. What could she have done better? No fanfare maybe? She needed that flare for the crowd. She would have to watch the match back later and think of something else.

Sayumi grunted softly as the veteran wrapped an arm around her head, tightening it up snugly to keep her well under control. They rose together as one, though halfway there her legs buckled, dropping her to a knee. A small speed bump that was overcome by a more forceful attempt to coax her upright by the former champion with a crank of her neck. Soon both women were moving towards the corner. "I'm not… done yet." She groaned softly, in no real position to be making such claims.

Sayumi was not a heavy woman, and probably weighed less than Valley herself, who was well within the lightweight class in Tension or even Friction. Even so, lifting her up took more effort than the Slamazon had expected, and when the woman’s legs gave way, she nearly fell down with her. She had to widen her stance and hunker down to keep straight, and even still it was a close thing. Just a testament to how winded this fight had made her, far more than she was expecting going in.

”Sorry, I disagree.” She braced herself and lifted her up, continuing their march forward. ”I think I know how to figure it out, though.”

She moved them into the corner, dipped down and lifted Sayumi up, placing her on the top of the turnbuckle. The audience began to swell, anticipating something big coming next, and their hopes were confirmed when Valley climbed up as well, getting up to the second rope.

Valley was close to the position she was going for, but just to be sure, she threw a couple of elbows into Sayumi’s face, making sure she was pliable and dazed, opening her up for what would be coming next.

Sayumi let out a small, frustrated sigh as Valley dragged her along. She was finding it difficult to walk, let alone put up any valid resistance. Leaving the veteran in control was terrible news, especially given they were heading towards the corner. Before she could question it, Valley has hoisted her up onto the turnbuckles leaving her slumped forward.

Sayumi reached out to grasp for Valley as she climbed up, intending to shove the woman off the ropes only to be hit hard with an elbow. Her head jerks to the side, struggling to keep from falling back off the turnbuckle. She reached back, ready to throw a punch of her own only to be clocked with another elbow, and a third for good measure.

The failed idol's eyes threatened to roll back in her head, her hands slipped away from Valley's shoulders. Sayumi's body started to lean forward, resting against the climbing veteran while she made her ascend uncontested.

Busting Sayumi in the mouth like this probably came off as a little mean spirited, but really, it was just a CYOA measure on Valley’s part. Cherry Bomb struck her as what her mother used to affectionately call ‘comeback kids’ - wrestlers who excelled at surviving things you wouldn’t expect and making comebacks from near nothing. She didn’t want to leave anything to chance, not when she was so close to putting a ribbon on this match.

Especially not when they were this high off the ground.

Her elbows seemed to do a good job of weakening her foe, though, knocking out a good deal of her fight, and Valley continued to scale. It was a balancing act, but she managed to get to the top of the turnbuckle with Sayumi in toe, holding the younger wrestler up with one arm around her chest - in perfect position to land the C4. It had been a good while since she’d used this move, her first time in the AFW, but this seemed like as good a time as any to pull out the fine china.

A quick check of her shoulder to make sure the referee was clear, a deep breath, and she was good to go. ”Blast off in three, two-”

Only through Valley's lead did she manage to see herself stood upright on the top rope, leaning up against her opponent in an ironic twist that in doing so she was likely about to lose. She wasn't an aerialist. While she did employ her drop kicks and body splashes from the ropes from time to time, whatever this was she was glueing set up for was far beyond her normal wheelhouse.

Her balance wobbled, one boot on the turnbuckle while the other sole straddled the top rope precariously. Valley wrapping an arm around her helped Sayumi find some measure of stability… but was that what she wanted? Much like she had done, the veteran was counting down her next move, having learned nothing from the Japanese natives own folly moments earlier.

The lavender haired girl punctuated what would have been the veteran's count of "one" by throwing her head know wide, trying to clip the side of her head. This was a do or die situation. She wasn't sure she would be able to survive a big move from up here, so she needed to wrestle control. She rolled a shoulder, trying to shrug Valley's grip off of her before attempting to grapple the woman to hopefully turn this situation around before it was too late. "Launch is delayed!"

The countdown was almost as much for her personal headspace as it was for show, a little something to help her focus for this move. A moonsault? That she could do. That she could do all day long, if need be. But a moonsault that dragged another person along with it? That could be a little complicated, and she needed to ready herself for the plunge. A few seconds couldn’t hurt. Right?

Wrong.

Something hit the side of her head - what, she wasn’t sure, and it hardly mattered. It was enough to throw her for a loop and send her flying off the turnbuckle, though, pulling Sayumi along with as they plummeted to the floor.

Instinct took over, and she tried to tuck and roll before the impact - tried. She hit harder than she liked, rolled farther than she wanted, and wound up smacking her head against what she guessed was the announcer’s table. A nasty hit, and one that had her seeing stars and left her world spinning, laid out and loopy at the ringside.

The blow had meant to shake Valley free, from there she hoped to turn things around, perhaps slam the other woman to the mat from on high. As she crutched the veteran though, it had been like being latched to a drowning person. She felt her own poor balance be thrown off kilter and before she could even let out a cry of surprise, both women were falling. Not even to the canvas, no, to the harder more distant outside.

She had tried to let go, but the tangle of the two wrestlers made for a difficult aerial maneuver for her to overcome. The crowd had cheered, rolling chants of how awesome the match was and calls for both women to fight forever echoing out around her even before her body smacked the ground with a bone crushing thud. She bounced with a hard impact on her side, Valley ending up not far from her, but keeping track of her was outside her current priorities.

Sayumi curled up, clutching her side as she rolled on the floor in pain, practically howling. She had been heaved over the top ropes before by a horrible woman in the gym once, all when her girlfriend had been watching in horror. That had been a more pleasant experience than this, which was saying something since that one had lead to a hospital visit. This had done a lot to reinforce her dislike of high flying as a whole as she writhed on the ground.

”FIGHT FOREVER! FIGHT FOREVER!”

Valley never did like that chant, feeling it was almost a bad omen. As much as she loved wrestling, it certainly wasn’t something she could see herself doing for all eternity. Definitely not with someone as tenacious as Sayumi.

That was what it was starting to feel like with the Cherry Bomb, though, as she continued with her uncanny ability to turn the match around on a dime, a skill that led to this point. On her back, aching, Valley was just starting to come to grip with her position. A quick glance to the side told her that Sayumi was nearby, which meant she suffered the same fate, but that wasn’t the best news by itself. Not when their position meant…

”3!”

Yeah, that.

The referee was starting up the count, already a third of the way to ending this match in a countout. It wasn’t something Valley had ever done in one of her matches, and she wasn’t about to start now..but, at the same time, it wasn’t wholly up to her. Her body had the final say in the matter, and at the moment, it wasn't all that cooperative. She tried to sit up, but she was dragged back down before she had the chance, her body rife with pain. If she could just recover more strength, had more time, she was sure she could make it...but that was a big ‘If’, and the chances weren’t looking good.

"Four!"

With both women down on the outside, the disqualification count had begun. It was a race against the clock now to see who would get back to the ring first. With that came a huge advantage of intercepting the other wrestler upon entry, something both of them desperately needed to get in order to out the other away at this point.

"Five!"

Sayumi staggered to her hands and knees, trying her best to ignore the pain the shot up and down her entire side. Like a thousand white not needles had been jammed in her body, pinpricks of pain dotting what otherwise was a mostly numb soreness. The Japanese native crawled, making a drunken zig zag path back to the apron.

"Six!"

Hand over hand she tripped the ring dressing baringthe design of Friction displayed boldly across it, nearly dragging it down off the apron. It felt like trying to scale a mountain more than a few feet of cloth but when she managed to get her forearms up over the lip of the spring she was able to hang from it with weak legs dangling to catch her breath.

"Seven!"

She shifted her body, trying to throw up one of her legs to clear the apron. Half way, that was all she got before the pain of the sudden stretch of her limb hit her like a brick wall causing her to buckle and nearly fall. She let out a cry of pain, half way between agony and a laugh, deciding not to do that again. Pushed herself up more she reached for the bottom rope, relying instead on her upper body to drag herself up onto the outside.

"Eight!"

She shimmied under the rope leaving one leg to hang underneath, she was safe. Lifting her head she glanced around… where was Valley? Looking back she found the veteran, still struggling on the outside. The match was hers. Sayumi had won, there was no way the former champion was going to get back in the ring.

"Nine!"

She was smiling in celebration over her victory. Hard fought as it had been. It hadn't been the end she wanted but… her smile faded. It really wasn't how she wanted this. It felt cheapened. She had t earned it through her own merit. If she won by count out she didn't really beat Valley… Valley just failed to get back into the ring. How was she going to be happy with that?

Sayumi suddenly rolled to the side, throwing herself back under the ropes to tumble to the mat in a clatter on her hands and knees, resetting the count to most everyone's surprise. Hanging her head she swore under her breath, something she rarely ever did. If she did this and still lost, it would haunt her forever, she knew this. It was a manner of principle though. She hoped Maria would understand and regardless of the outcome, Cicilia would be proud of her for the choice.

"One… two… three!"

It had taken her back to almost the start of her own rise to shuffle on all fours to where Valley lay, managing to get herself up onto one knee. She was faring slightly better now in dealing with the pain, perhaps due to determination or just raw adrenaline. She reached down to wrap an arm around the veteran, trying to scoop an arm up to sling it across her shoulders to help the woman rise.

"Four!"

"Come… on, get up." She whispered through gritted teeth, pouring what little strength she could muster to attempt to drag both women to their feet. She hoped Valley had strength to help because she wasn't certain she had enough to get them both back to the ring.

"Five!"