Bashira Matsumoto vs. Masuyo Ai - Food Wars

Match Type: Standard Match
Win Conditions: Pinfall, Submission or Knockout.

Continued from...


Pre-match rituals tended to run the gamut depending on the competitor in question. Of course there were the more typical fare of backstage stretching and limbering up or some junk. Those of a more religious nature may take the minutes before subjecting themselves to bodily harm to send a quick heads-up to the man upstairs to make sure they were still cool. Bashira even knew of few ladies back in her past wrestling federations who refused to wash their socks, insisting that the putrid smell wards off evil spirits and that it grants them luck in their matches. She always thought that all that lucky charm nonsense was just a crock of baloney, plus she hardly ever washed her socks OR wrestling attire anyway and that didn't seem to affect her match outcomes in the slightest anyway. Nah, the Bear-Bellied Beast had her own specialized pre-match tradition all her own, one she steadfastly adheres to...and is probably what she'd be doing even if she weren't about to perform anyway. Scarfing down on all manner of food stuffs and washing it all down with an energy drink. Protein bars, chocolate bars, last nights leftovers...basically whatever she remembered to stuff into her duffel bag right before making her way to the arena. Backstage personnel staring gobsmacked at Bashira still scarfing down mere seconds before she was due in the ring, one of those employees who wasn't nauseous at the gorging sight signaling to Bash that she was due up now. Prompting her to take one last swig and stomp to the curtain, leaving a trail of wrappers and empty containers for the janitor to worry about.

Bashira Matsumoto:

The billowing black curtain being swiped to the side by the rotund bear woman upon her heavy metal theme song being played, stopping at the top of the ramp for a sumo side stomp and bellowing roar before beginning to make her way down the ramp. Cricking her neck to her sides as her pony-tail swayed behind her, spitting to the side with her singlet stretched tightly around her rotund musculature. The steel steps echoing from her heavy sumo stomps before making her down the ramp, adrenaline pumping and inwardly intoxicated from the thrill of the moment. Thrilled to finally be yanked off of the sidelines and be seeming some goddamn action ever since first signing onto AFW months ago, but what made this all the more satisfying was that she wasn't going to be matched up against some no name punk from the boondocks or something, but someone she had legit beef with. Someone who she owes a knuckle sandwich to, and someone whose earned herself a diploma from the school of hard knocks, and Bashira was going to be the professor schooling her today. The Bear Brawler stomping up the steel steps before shimmying through the ropes, shadow-boxing briefly before taking the white towel around her neck and patting herself down. Then slinging the towel towards a ringside employee before centering her gaze at the top of the ramp, that employee than picked up the towel with his pinching fingers and a grossed out expression.

The koto wasn’t far behind Bashira after she settled that porky hide into the ring. That’s right, she knew her name. And that was all Masuyo needed.

Masuyo, Ramen Avenger:

Theme:

The scarfed figure emerged from atop the ramp and stepped out from the stage lights. Though met with rapacious applause and cheers, more than a few patrons in the front row halted their celebration the closer the MMA maven approached in her descent. The familiar, cheery native they had come to know was gone for the evening. Her laser-focused gaze cut a path down the center straight to the overgrown bear at its center.

Bashira was a newcomer. That was probably why Masuyo hadn’t heard anything about her until she looked her up yesterday. Over her time here, she’d kept some tabs on the local bullies she’d stumbled upon. Women she could fight and humble at the same time, just like she’d done in MMA.

But honestly, there wasn’t much to find out beyond what she already learned at the gym. Bash was big, strong, unpleasant, and her manners weren’t going to change just because a referee would be there. Plenty of examples of that on the net. Normally, Masuyo would be excited about this kind of challenge. Someone so far removed from her comfort zone, employing a style and techniques that she’d get to experience firsthand. A huge opportunity that would have left her giddy on any other day.

Not today. No sitting down on the bench and reflecting on what she’d done to get this far. No reassessing the situation or considering how she was going to approach this fight. No soaking in the overwhelming excitement that filled her veins every time she stepped into this arena, ready to let loose. There was no place for any of it with the emotions stirred up inside of her burning gut. The ebony warrior blazed a burning hatred laid manifest in every pronounced muscle evoked across her unrivaled physique etched through countless hours pursuing the annihilation of callous malefactors such as her.

Nobody eats her damn soup and gets away with it.

Masuyo climbed the steel steps and slipped through the ropes, letting her bare feet grace the mat at her corner. But she didn’t stay there long. She kept walking until she was at the center of the ring, standing over the Friction logo as she watched her adversary across the ring. That long, distant gaze staring into the ursa’s maw.

Bashira ain't do no researchin bout nobody. Never have, never will. And she was damn proud of it too. All of that statistical analysis and looking up an opponent's history and fighting style was all just a crock of shit in her book...that is, if she ever read books. Wrestlers who wasted their time doin all that gobbledy-gook were all just a bunch of namby-pamby, number-crunching nerds whose lives Bashira delighted in tormenting back in the day...and to this day, as a matter of fact. Whatever strategy you think up from all of that researching gets thrown out window anyway once you get punched in the face and panic starts overcoming you, so what was the point? All Bashira ever needed to win her matches was her bad-ass attitude, bulked up mass, her two mitts, and maybe some well-timed rule bending to send her opponent's back up the ramp on a stretcher with a bloodied face and their lesson learned about what happens when they step up to the Grizzly Magnum. Bashira palming her chin and the top of her head as she twisted her head from side to side to get the cricks out of her neck, watching her fresh meat come striding down the ramp to that shitty theme of hers trying to look all Billy Badass on her...

The Bear Woman dipping her head down as she wobbled her wrists, limberin up her hittin fists and directing a cavewoman-esque blankness to her eyes that was not all that far off from representing her overall I.Q. as well. Their dullness belying a hidden, feral savageness as if Masuyo was one misstep away from having the proverbial bear start coming at her like an actual ursine. For now standing in place square in the middle of the ring for the dead-eyed stare down that had the intensified aura of a viciously prolonged blood-feud that spanned years of their respective careers, but was in fact just about ramen noodles...an origin Bashira would allude to as she started muttering low enough for only the two of them to hear. "First I ate your shitty ramen soup...now I'm gonna eat your lunch, bitch." Bashira snarling out her words before raising her gloved hand to palm Masuyo's face and thuggishly shove her face to the side. The Grizzled Bully blatantly punking Masuyo out and straight up dissing her in front of the entire world to the crowd's "ohhhing" surprise. The referee tepidly stepping back and signaling for the bell knowing that this match was gonna get started soon enough regardless.

An aikido prodigy shouldn’t be acting this way. Wasting her time and talents picking fights the equivalent of an overgrown school bully. She wasn’t ten years old anymore. The traditions she was expected to live up to expected her to embrace tender moments of weakness such as these. What could even come of stooping to someone like Bashria’s level? Overcoming that kind of strife was what she used to pride herself on.

But this was more than tradition. More than winning or losing. More than her personal honor or all the faith she had in her martial pedigree combined.

This was about ramen.

That was no doubt the reason for her rather bold strategy of standing right in front of this monster without even thinking of putting her guard up. She could already hear Gin screaming in her ear over this. Keep your distance, play from the outside, don’t try to face that strength head-on. Those thoughts floated like dead air in the back of her mind. Before her ursine foe, the Demon acted as one made of stone and didn’t so much as flinch at the friendly advice offered her way. Nor the palm that slapped her across the face in a long splash of skin and wave of hair.

Push all she wanted, Masuyo would come back harder. Her head whipped to the side from the palm slapping her face and her body twisted with it, only it kept going as she spun on the spot in a fast circle. Her arm shot out in a wide arc, throwing a backfist straight back at Bashira to clap her twice as hard across those stuffy cheeks that she swore still had pieces of her home cooking left over. “That was my lunch, fatty.”

This was gonna be child's play. Bashira was already speculating on what she was going to treat herself to later on in back in catering after she's finished serving this scrawny puke one hell of a one-sided beatdown. This impending pummeling couldn't be anything less than that considering the Bear-Woman had a reputation to solidify, and afterward uphold. Backstage locker-rooms were no different than hen-houses of gossiping chickens spreading rumors and juicy tid-bits, and there was already rumblings about how this little twat punked out Bashira back in the weight room with nothing but more than a pair of chopsticks. Slight fabrication aside, Bash had to squash there rumors nice and quicklike to salvage her bullying reputation...

...and that just meant putting the literal squash on this uptight biotch who just got pie-faced with thuggish emphasis. The disrespectful gesture garnering stunned and prolonged gasps from the peanut gallery as if to say "Oh, you did it now...". Bash snidely folding her arms and not seeing what she had to be afraid of or what the big deal was...nor did she see the spinning back-fist coming until it had already cracked her right across her jowled face to a booming smack!!! Putting the Grizzly Woman into an immediate tailspin off to the side in a rattled tizzy, attempting to discern which sound was the ring-bell and which were the ones chiming off in her head as she soothed the side of her face. Stunningly managing to stay vertical after being caught off guard, although only after being too arrogant to put one up in the first place.

She’d been waiting all day to do that. Masuyo wouldn’t call her soul a particularly vengeful one. The thrill of an exciting fight was one thing, causing others gleeful harm was another entirely and she certainly didn’t ascribe to the latter like so many others around AFW appeared to do so readily. But she did believe in tit-for-tat and seeing those hefty jowls quake against her knuckles.

For the audience it was quite the sight. Masuyo was decidedly the underdog in the strength category going into this contest. Appearances alone were hedging a lot of bets in one direction or the other, even now. It was like watching a rabbit stare down a grizzly. So seeing this mighty Bash sent spinning away with one solid swipe from the smaller fighter felt for an instant nothing short of depth-defying. The crowd swelled with a rapacious roar though through it all the Demon merely looked on with a stoic glare towards her target.

With that out of her system, she could focus on the fight. The Demon dropped into her usual posture; fists up, head low, hips squared, breathe out. She rushed forward to greet Bashira with a high hook to the side of her head to keep that bell ringing. Straight away she followed up with a couple quick punches straight to that big oversized target of a stomach before she went to leap back out of range of those massive paws.

Alright that's TWICE now that this trumped up ramen dweeb ended up sneak attacking the overweight heavyweight when she wasn't ready. Figures that this sucker-punching stick figure could only get her licks in when her defenses were down...let's see her try that again now that Bash was primed, poised, and in fighting position. Dukes up and-*Thwack*-Bash repelled backward a few more steps after the follow-up right hook somehow made it through her impermeable defensive stance. One lucky shot after another, that's all it was. Delivered with such booming impact that the only thing more jarring than it's concussive sound was that the Bear Woman was still upright, tanking through the gut punches with a quaking jiggle of her stomach.

"Why you little!!!..." Bashira snarled out with teeth-gnashing savageness, swiping out at Masuyo who'd wisely opted to leap out of arm's length after getting her shots in. Rattled and banged up hardly deterred, Bashira fed off that throbbing head pain and began encroaching upon the soon to be deadmeat with her own widened MMA stance. Arms extended to her sides to make herself appear even more ominous and larger than life as she started making one imposing step after another towards the ramen waitress...hoping she wasn't realizing the corner turnbuckle creeping on her from behind until it was too late, and she'd find no further room behind her to treat into. The instant this little twerp sensed the turnbuckle behind her, the Bear-Woman would make her play and start attempting one arching haymaker after another right to the side of her face and abdomen.

Wow. Bashira really was just what she expected. The "keep-away" playbook was a given with the kind of opponent she was faced with tonight, but she was having an easier time of it than she trained for. Oh, Bash was big and scary and powerful and she didn’t even want to talk about that reach. But she’d seen faster reaction times from her happy hour patrons.

Not that she wanted to sound disappointed. It would just make kicking her giant, lunch-eating butt all the easier. As the larger woman advanced, Masuyo backpedaled, throwing a quick jab in here and there when she got too close. That was the plan she was going to stick to...right until her back hit the corner.

In the same instant she realized where she was the first hit sank into her ribs and forced her up against the post. She was just barely able to get her arms up in time but it hardly mattered against the force that came with the next haymaker. And the next. And the next. Battering her left and right in the corner.

The instant Masuyo saw an opening she went for it. When Bashira went for another wide swing the MMA girl ducked under her right arm and zip out behind her. Assuming she could get away fast enough, she’d throw a quick kick to the back of the bear’s leg before leaping back behind her slightly crumpled guard. A glare flashing over her taped fists.

Bashira may have looked like an impatient slob who manipulates and intimidates the weak-willed into getting immediate satisfaction, but that was mainly when skipping food-lines. Or demanding protection money from other rookie wrestlers to keep her "client" from getting harassed by the unsavory thugs in the locker room...who were mainly just Bashira herself. In the ring though, the massive Bear-Woman knew all about the virtue of waiting and biding her time. She knew this Masuyo was going to be a slippery weasel from all of her slippings and her slidings. Freaking annoying footwork that wasn't gonna do her any good once she'd run out of real-estate...and Bashira did indeed go to town with walloping haymakers once Masuyo found herself well and truly cornered. The ramen waitress' frame swaying slightly to the opposing side with every thudding connection despite her defensive guard being up and giving a sneak peek as to the power Bashira had at her chubby armed disposal.

But that didn't stop the little shrimp-boat here from weaseling her out of the thresher machine, as Bash likes to refer to it when she's pounding down on scrawny puke. And not without smacking Bash in the back of her knee and hobbling her posture with a wincing grimace as she turned back around to face the battling waitress, pursuing her once again in her MMA striker's stance and with a now slowed pace thanks in large part to that kick. "...Tch....whatcha just gonna dance all day...Maybe ya wanna run back to your shitty ramen store...can't keep ducking me forever...sooner or later than scrawny ass of yours is mine...where ya gonna go huh...where ya gonna go..." Bash uttering smack-talk meant to aggravate under her breath in glaring eye contact with Masu, peppering her guard with jabs meant to annoy and irritate, and once again eyeing the ropes behind Masu that Bash began attempting to backpedal her towards.

Masuyo’s ribs were aching on the outside and her lungs felt battered on the inside. That shouldn’t have been too much of a surprise to her given who exactly she was tangling with. She knew that getting into an exchange with Bash was going to put her on the losing end nine times out of ten. But even if she told herself to watch out for those fists, there was a clear difference between planning for danger and being in the thick of it. That difference made itself known once more with a stabbing pain against her side, enough to make her wince when she tried to raise her arms a bit higher.

Mind the distance, that was all she had to do. Her ursine foe wasn’t about to make that task easy on her though. Her larger foe was good at keeping the pressure on, laying into her guard with strikes that were as solid as they were snappy. There was nothing the ramen master could do but bear her teeth and walk backward, just as she was before. She was seeing where this was headed and there was no way the Demon was about to let it go that way.

Bashira threw another jab her way, crisp but nowhere near the kind of speed she needed. Just before it could breach her guard, Masuyo ducked forward underneath her fist. In the next instant the MMA maven shot a check punch straight up to meet the underside of Bashira’s meaty jaw as she carelessly stumbled into the line of fire.