SS 19 Blade Uehara vs. Beauty Ichigaya

It was everything Beauty could’ve hoped for and so much more.

She had thought, when the opportunity came to express her full feelings to Blade, that she would be less than reciprocal to them, to say the least. She imagined being slapped when she went for the kiss, that she would go running out screaming, curse and spit and rant and rage.

What she couldn’t have expected, however, was participation. And such ardent participation at that.

She held the kiss for a while long as Blade accepted it, melting under her touch. Her tongue came out to play with light flicks against her teeth. Playful dabbing, a gentle touch, a stark contrast to the wild violence she’d been inflicting mere minutes ago. Content washed across her face as she pulled away and flicked off the line of saliva between them.

”Ah, I’ve been waiting so long to do that.” She stepped away with a hand on her hips and smacked her lips, savoring Blade’s waning taste.

Blade had nothing for ya. What was she supposed to think after going from engaging in a brutal blood-feud with her most loathed adversary, to making out with that same nemesis like they were two puppy love smitten high-school romantics doing what teenagers do under the bleacher chairs. Bewildered beyond reproach and supremely taken aback, the Okinawan was torn between fervently tearing herself away or being lost in the passion of the moment.

...well it certainly didn't help that Beauty was one hell of a goddamn kisser, so what resulted ended up being a mishmashed combination of the two as Blade semi-struggled but ultimately went with the smooching flow until the Beaut backed off. Blade wobbling somewhat on unstable legs with her heart pounding a mile a minute and the brightest of crimson red flourishing upon her visage. The frazzled Aerial Artist brandishing the same shade of cherry red lipstick on her panting lips after sucking face with the Beaut, a listlessness to her eyes as she peaked up at her that suddenly went ablaze as she pitched her arm back for an attempted haymaker right to that prudish face of hers.

"THE HELL WAS THAT??!!"

Things were going so well, too.

Beauty had just given her potential paramour one of her best kisses. It had been a while since she’d had the opportunity to even do that with another person. While she had enjoyed quite the active lifestyle in her younger days, since becoming a wrestler, her unwarranted reputation had made dating a frustrating affair to say the least. Dating apps rarely achieved the desired results, pairing her up with idiots and wastrels when she landed anything at all. But she still had the fire, it seemed, if Blade’s wobbly legs were any indication.

But then the woman had to go and wreck it by being, well, Blade. A punch came out of nowhere, smacking Beauty clean across the face, taking her wholly off guard. It was enough to send her spiraling and stumbling and she might have fell down if not for the wall in her way. She wound up leaning against it, rubbing her lip for a moment before she swung back around.

”It’s called a kiss, Blade!” She shifted her jaw about, making sure everything was still in its proper place. The little hellion could pack a lot of power in those tiny fists. ”I trust you’ve had one or two before, at least.”

A reaction well-justified...and damn cathartic if Blade didn't say so herself. Although this was technically not the first time someone totally caught her off-guard and sneaked a kiss in on her. The first place trophy going to her childhood best friend, seven-year old Koji Hanamura...who stole a kiss from her underneath the rafters one day during lunch period and prompting a flummoxed Blade to stare vacantly at him for several seconds before outright socking him too. Admittedly, a knee-jerk reaction to her first kiss that they would both laugh about to this day. But Blade had a feeling she wasn't gonna be looking back on this kiss with nostalgic warm and fuzzies.

"I KNOW what a kiss is you-!!!...RAGH!!!" Blade stopped herself and started frantically scuffing up her hair with a guttural groan as her brain struggled to process what just happened, not an easy feat when combating the fuzzy-minded haze that came with making out with her mortal enemy with a time-stopping kiss that had no right being that good. Eventually she ended up coming to the only conclusion that made sense enough to be true, but what she still really hoped wasn't. "Nnnnnononono...are you telling me that all this time...all our fighting in Wrestle Angel...your entire psycho obsession...was all just because you had the hots for me??!!" Blade pleaded out while stepping in front of Beauty, hands upturned in front of the Beaut as if she were begging for it not to be true.

Yes, this was more akin to the way Beauty thought things would go. In hindsight, she should’ve seen the punch coming and been ready for it, but she had still been riding the high of euphoria from her little surprise going so well. She had meant to spring this on Blade after the match, once they’d calmed down and finally had a moment alone, but she supposed now was as good a time as any to clear the air.

As Blade fluttered about, swept away in the shock of it all, Beauty took a moment to run her tongue along her cheek and ensure that everything was in working order. Aside from the slight taste of blood, nothing was amiss that she could see, though she made sure to continue the rest of their conversation out of Blade’s punching range. Thankfully, that was an easy radius to avoid.

”Is it so hard to believe?” She folded her arms underneath her generous chest and stood tall. ”A little teasing, a little rough housing, nothing I knew you couldn’t survive. I’m honestly surprising that you’re surprised.” She flicked her hair back and stepped to the side. ”I’ll concede, it wasn’t always this way. At first, I found you repulsive, irritating, a nuisance...but time’s healed wounds, and done more besides. The more I thought about matches, the more I could see the spark there, the thrill, the passion - don’t tell me you haven’t felt it, too. Some of it.”

Beauty leaned forward, daring to move into Blade’s range, ready to jerk back in an instant. ”You’re not the least bit curious?”

This was a nightmare. A genuine night terror that Blade hoped beyond hope she'd awake from any minute now in a cold sweat and with a renewed determination to ease up on the late-night snacking. But deep within her psyche, all those concrete walls of outright denial began crumbling and collapsing the longer Beauty went on eloquently explaining herself. A dawning realization within was now shedding light over the entirety of their volatile and spiteful feuding. How there'd always be an extra pep in her step, shimmer in her eye, and skip to her heartbeat whenever she was tussling with the narcissist, or was just thinking about her in their off hours. Where there once was a vitriolic, spiteful hatred at the beginning...somewhere along the lines started becoming nothing but raw, passionate emotion. Something bringing a crimson bloom to her cheeks and wavering wiggle to her stark-wide eyes...

"...HUh?! What?!...Uhh, Y-Yes...I MEAN NO...I MEAN..." Blade balked and stuttered at Beauty's round of intimate questioning, prompting the Okinawan to backpedal before turning her back to Ichigaya with hands holding her head once again as she visibly struggled to comprehend the piping hot mess that was her emotions right now. DID she have a thing for Beauty?! Some kind of...severely repressed fascination that kept attracting Blade to such an elegant, posh, luscious-lipped, hip-swaying, blue-eyed...narcissistic, arrogant, and maddening wind-bag like her? And if that were the case, than how fucked up does that make Blade?! "...Nnngh...IdunnoIdunnoIduuno...Cannot buhLEIVE this is happening to me right now. Right in the middle of one of the biggest matches of my career, I gotta deal with the fact that there could be something...between us. Maaan...what the hell are we supposed to do now?" Blade slumped over like a hunchback, arms dangling and at a loss for words.

Beauty watched as Blade tried to come to some reason in all of this, struggling to make sense of her feelings. It was understandable, really. Accepting this hadn’t been a simple task for Beauty, either, and this little had the added burden of her being the object of desire - she was a hard woman to resist, and she knew it. Still, that was what this was all about, getting everything into the open. She’d shown Blade the path, and now they were both going to go down it, whether Blade wanted to or not.

”Now? Now, we go out and continue our little battle. But don’t worry - after I’m done defeating you, you won’t need the AFW anymore. The two of us. Together. My acumen and business sense, your drive and ambition. We can start our own league, do what neither of us could do apart.”

The vision was a pleasant one, and it brought a contented sigh as she stepped forward, her proud chest swelling. She loomed over Blade and leaned forward, bringing their faces close together. Close. Closer.

”All of our dreams can come true, Blade.” Her eyes lids began to drop as she turned her head, the beginning of a kiss that she dared Blade to finish. ”All of them.”

What Blade wouldn't have given for Beauty to just shut the hell up and let her think for a freaking second. But even when she did have supreme silence in the room, no tangible solutions were coming into focus. Hmm...aside from her building a time machine and traveling back to before any of this ever happened and maybe talk to her younger self...and steal...a sports almanac and-*RAH!!!What the hell am I doing??! I can't even think straight anymore!!!* Blade fussed up her hair in mental frustration, finally throwing in the towel in terms of thinking up a way out of this before she'd turn to face Beauty with a scowl. Blathering on about defeating her...and getting very close...again...

"...W-W-Wait...T-Together?...Our...Our own league? How did you...know that's...what...I...want..." Blade backpedaled nervously as Beauty stalked her, the Okinawans words petering off to a muttered whisper with a soft breath as the Beaut drew closer. Mesmerized not just by the fulsome narcissistic temptress and the brief remembrance of those crimson lips taking full control of her with one smooch, but of the since abandoned dream of operating her own wrestling league. Their...own. Her back eventually being pressed against the dressing room door with Beaut's voluptuous breasts swelling up against Blade's, who'd take a big gulp and pant softly. Fluttering eyes closing shut before tilting her head...and started timidly kissing back. Tenderly...sweetly...

...until in one flareup of survival instincts, Blade would reflexively shoot her arm towards the doorknob and and jam it down. The Okinawan barrel-rolling backwards a few tumbles out of the dressing room with a shocked yelp and right in front of the maintenance team now putting down the tools they were going to use to jimmy the door open. Cameramen huddling around them once more as Blade started crawling over toward the nearest chair, leveraging herself against it as she staggered back to her feet, but applied twice as much effort into wiping off Beauty's crimson lipstick off of her mouth before it could be filmed and be plastered all over the gossip sections of wrestling websites.

Beauty was eager to take another taste of Blade’s lips, humming as the woman initiated her own kiss. In her mind, it was almost as good as signing on the dotted line to her idea, a sign that she could picture the glorious future they could both have. Beauty, using her business acumen and contacts to provide a solid foundation. Blade, the admittedly more friendly face of the company, energizing the talent and aiding in the recruitment. The two of them could fill each other's weaknesses, accomplish so much more than they could apart, succeed as one where they had failed apart…

It was a daring, wild idea, encapsulated in a heated moment, and it wasn’t meant to last.

Beauty nearly fell flat on her face as Blade suddenly escaped through the door, tumbling out of the room, passing an extremely confused crowd on onlookers. She took a moment to grab the sides of the entrance for support, looking on as her potential partner scrambled to rise and compose herself. This wasn’t over yet - there was still a battle to win, to seal the entire plan, and it was one she intended to win.

Bursting out of the room, she came up behind Blade as the smaller woman frantically tried to wipe off her lipstick - L’Oreal, as it turned out, a special cherry-flavored edition she’d bought solely for this occasion. Reaching around Blade’s chest, she tried to pull the woman up into a tight full nelson, clutching it tight, as she brought her lips down to her foe’s ears.

”Going somewhere?”

Blade scanned her immediate surroundings for something she'd desperately needed more now than ever before in her life...a pitcher of freezing cold water. Preferably still being chilled with ice cubes before she dunked the whole frigging jug over her head in a frantic attempt at cooling herself off. The Okinawan not remembering the last time so she'd been this hot and bothered in the middle of a match (...actually, no wait...yes she could, it was in a losing effort against Freia Kagami) but unlike that time, Blade was awash with visions of a prospective future. Of Beauty adorned in her business suit in a office room bathed in the orange glow of a setting sun. Who'd arise from her seat after the last call of the day to approach Blade off to the side dressed in her tracksuit. Both fatigued from their managerial duties, but not enough for Beauty not to hold her tightly, and gradually guide their pursed lips togeth-

*GRAAAGH!!!!WATERWATERWATER!!!* Blade slapped herself in the cheek rather emphatically before darting her eyes around the hallway for a refreshing pint of H₂O, which of COURSE wouldn't be seen anywhere despite the fact they were near the freaking catering table. Hell, she'd even take a fruit punch bowl to dunk her head in at this minute. Might even wash off some of Beauty's crimson red lipstick, and get the taste of cherry flavored smooches out of her mind...which was too distracted to sense the Beaut coming before she'd already latched on a secured full nelson, one which she squirmed and thrashed against but ultimately sink into the longer it was applied. "...Huhg...L-Look now...I'm uh...flattered and all, but uh...you can't...honestly think anything could work between us, right? Y-You were just messin with me in there, right?" Blade whispered in a frazzled blush, they're backs to the camera crew to briefly not catch what was being said.