So, How Did Cassie-chan Do?

Akashi was just listening quietly to the conversation with her eyes closed. She had a smile on her face. It was nice to hear Taylor sound like that, even though she knew she'd rather be spending time with her hubby than in the dumb infirmary. She didn't really want to be here either but they probably wouldn't just let her leave. She opened one eye when Taylor spoke her name but then just started up again. Actually, she was pretty hungry.

Johnny said his goodbyes and hung up the phone. The final match of the evening was over and how he had to find enough food int he AFW facility to feed Taylor, Cassie, Akashi and himself. It would probably be an epic task. He was ready though.

"Ahhh, what the hell!?' Akashi growled when Taylor smacked her. "yeah, I heard! I have a headache, I'm not deaf." She said and sat up. She sighed and looked at Taylor when she mentioned Cassie. Akashi's eyes lit up. "Haiii!" She said. "Get her over here! I need to ask her how she did in her match!" She said, beaming. "Oooh... I hope she won!" She said and sighed, fretting a bit. Akashi then leaned back against the wall and looked at her stomach. "Actually... I'm really hungry." She said She then looked up at Taylor. "Ahh... You don't have to stay, really, Taylor-chan. I'm just glad you're here. You can go home once we eat and I'll snuggle with Cassie-chan when we get back home." Akashi sighed again. "That sounds good."

Taylor palmed her face. "Akashi, I don't know how to tell you this, but the retarded Bunnies made you retarded. I guess it's contagious. You really don't remember watching that whole match, going into the ring after Cassie won, and helping Talia to get backstage?"

She sighed. It didn't make her feel good. About anything. She wondered if Akashi should take some time off and back burner Kamikaze for another year.

She turned her phone over and over in her hand, and put her other hand on her hip. "Ya know," she said. "You need me just as much as I need you. Ya know? I am always here for you, just like you've always been there for me." She paused, looking Akashi dead in the eye, her eyebrows scrunched together the way they did when she was particularly serious. "I want the tag titles, Kashi, I want them in our hands. I want Kamikaze to be something special like Japan has never seen before. Know what I mean?

"So I'm staying. Not for you, not for my peace of mind, for us. Well... and for Cassie's sake."

She walked out into the hallway and called Cassie.

Akashi frowned. "I can't." She said dejectedly. She'd never felt like this before and she absolutely hated it. Having a patch of her memory gone that she knew she lived through and experienced was terrifying. It was worse than any beating she'd ever taken. "I... helped... Talia?" Akashi sighed and was about to flop back against the cot when Taylor stared her down.

Akashi focused her glassy stare. She nodded softly."W-We're the best! Of course we'll get the belts! If you had been there in the ring tonight, we'd be in the dressing rooms spraying each other with champagne instead of back here waiting for take out and getting probed."

Aksshi sighed as Taylor left. "TELL CASSIE-CHAN I'M SORRY AND I LOVE HER! AND I LOVE YOU TOOOOOO!

She yelled loudly before flopping onto the cot. She eyed the staff and waved them over. "OK. Back to probing." She said as they brought their tools and questions to her.

Later, with the wreckage of dinner spread out around them, Taylor, Cassie, and Akashi lounged on cots in their corner of the infirmary. Taylor had drawn the long curtain around the two cots to give them their own little room. It was as close to a pillow fort as they would be able to get in the small hospital, and it made their impromptu sleepover strangely homey.

Cassie laid on her stomach on the cot opposite Akashi's with her head at the foot of the bed, while Taylor sat propped up against the headboard with her legs outstretched and propped up on Cassie's back. Despite having taken the biggest win of the three of them, Cassie seemed to be in the worst shape.

It wasn't until then, in the late hours when the arena was dark and the halls empty, that Taylor had a chance to think about the night. When she had stood and watched her Canadian friend fighting for her life, it felt like she was fighting for Taylor's too. After all, what would she be without these girls? Cassie and Akashi were so intertwined with her that for one of them to leave would be like suicide.

It seemed like such a fragile state, like each of their lives was a fight just to escape catastrophe.

"So Bear, Akashi doesn't remember your match. The Bunnies broke her brain."

Cassie looked over at Akashi without lifting her head, but no words came to her lips.

"Her loss, man. That... Just give it time. Once you clear your head and you can look back at it... That was something really special. That was a fight."

Cassie shrugged, and her eyes drifted back to the floor.

"Everything's okay now. Everything is just fine. Talia will figure herself out, and you can just do what you need to do to be okay. You proved yourself in there. You'll probably be a bigger name than us now."

Cassie didn't respond to Taylor, but said to Akashi "What was it like before you were champ?"

Akashi was feeling quite a bit better. Now that she had gotten some rest and some food and now that her, Talia and Cassie were together, she was definitely starting to feel good. The headache had disappeared and the dizziness was gone. The memory loss was still there but after asking Cassie a hundred times if she won, and hugging her and crying a lot, she was almost too worn out to care about that.

Now she was just relaxing and enjoying company, listening to Cassie and Taylor speak with her eyes closed and a soft smile on her face. "I'll rewatch it. Maybe when I do, I'll remember it." She muttered. She then opened her eyes as Cassie spoke.

"Uh..." She looked at Cassie. "It's not really different. But... it's a lot different. There's no real pressure on you like there is when you're a champion. Like, everyone isn't really out to get you. But there's so much pressure on yourself, from yourself. Screaming at you to keep pushing forward. To do better. Does that make sense?" She asked. "Uh... why do you ask?" She said, sitting up a bit.

Cassie shrugged, and rested her chin on the end of the mattress so that she looked down at the tile floor. Laying there on her stomach was the only thing she wanted to do. She didn't feel much like talking, and her body ached in ways that made her wish she could just go to sleep for a week. Her every ache would remind her of the match, and in some ways she wasn't ready to forget about it. It was a relief that it was over, but what did she do now?

"Well..." She said. "If this is what it's like all the time, I don't want to do it anymore."

Taylor shook her head. She couldn't truthfully tell her that she'd never cross paths with someone like Dark Angel again. It was more likely than unlikely. She supposed that everyone needed their own reasons, and if they were good enough maybe they'd last long enough to be champ. If they weren't, than people like Dark Angel would be enough to make one reconsider their career choice.

"Not all the time," she said, and rubbed Cassie's upper back with her foot. "Not all the time."

Akashi frowned at Cassie's words. She hated seeing her like that. It felt worse than having memory loss. She sat up fully and leaned against the wall. "Cassie-chan...' She said. "Wrestling is pretty tough but it can be rewarding too. Sometimes the Hell is just a precursor to the waiting Heaven. Look at how horrible things got when Taylor-chan and I fought. It was just the worst. And now, we're even stronger for it."

Akashi sighed. "Cassie-chan. If you have a lot to think over, take your time. And when you can, just answer one question. Has wrestling put you in a better or worse position in your life than where you were before?" Akashi swallowed hard. If Cassie were to answer now, she figured she'd say worse right away. "Think about it. Take some time though and don't answer it right away. We'll both support you no matter what. I..." Akashi lowered her head and rested it on top of Cassie's orange hair. "We both love you, Cassie-chan. We're here for you even if..." Akashi turned and looked at Taylor and frowned. She let her fingers drag through Cassie's orange locks and folded up against her belly.

"Yeah. But I fought so hard to stay, and now that I won I can't quite remember what I was fighting so hard for," Cassie mused. "Not exactly. I don't ever want to leave you guys, but... I guess wrestling so far hasn't exactly been everything I dreamed."

Taylor nodded. "And it won't be. I think... I've been thinking a lot about that, and I think that the dream is the thing you chase, that gets you through all the shit. And I think maybe once you've made it, you're better for it." She looked over at Akashi. "Not that anyone's ever really made it. Being champ means you're just fighting to stay champ, and you can lose everything if you're not careful. Your dreams make you strong enough to fight, and everything else is just a fight. That's life, I think, kinda."

"I just want things to be how they were. I feel like I can't be happy anymore."

Taylor thumped her heel against Cassie's back with a lopsided smile. "Bear, I'll have Akashi hold you down, and I will tickle you until you pee."

Akashi frowned. Cassie being down and out and being the depressing one was like living in opposite world. All she wanted was for Cassie to be her smiling, cheerful, happy self again. But she also knew how wrestling warped people. How this league especially could crawl inside someone and start to change them without them even knowing.

"Ahh... Taylor-chan's right. You can't ever let your dreams die. A dream accomplished is one step closer to the next dream. I joined the AFW because fighting is my life. It's the only thing I know, it's the only thing I'm good at. I couldn't Sumo wrestle so I came here. But... that wasn't enough. ust wrestling. I wanted to be the champ. I wanted to be the Yokzuna." She said smiling. "And, I worked hard and I made a lot of friends and maybe an enemy or two." Akahsi chuckled. "Though, back then, I think my friends were more dangerous." She said, thinking about Sarah Gatt. "I got to be the champ but it wasn't enough. Then, I had to STAY the champ. it couldn't last forever but I tried. I ended up losing it and then..." Akashi looked at Taylor. "Well, my priorities changed a bit. I was still focused on wrestling, but I wanted to keep Taylor in my life. That was my new goal. And, I was stupid about it. About how to do it and all i knew was that the only way was to fight her. And somehow it worked out. But that left me with more to think about. Now I have lots more goals. I want to be the champ again. I want to be the tag team champs with Taylor. I just ... I want to be the best. But..." Akashi sighed. "I want to make sure my family is happy. That's a dream I have."

Akashi stood up. "People change and people move forward. Things can't go back to how they were. We don't live in the past for a reason but..." Akashi said. "It's like that for a reason. Because if we stayed frozen in moments of time, we'd miss out on so many more great ones. If... I was ... If I stayed frozen then... I wouldn't be here I'd..." Akashi was starting to get a little teary eyed.

Akashi paused. "Well, I would still be a little girl and my father would still be alive." She said finally. Akashi ran her fingers through her hair. "Well, ugh..." Akashi said. Akashi groaned. "Dammit, Cassie-chan! You're so gonna get tickled!" She said, trying to lighten up the mood that she had just killed.

"Oh..." Cassie said quietly, her voice heavy with sadness.

Both Cassie and Taylor, and maybe Akashi, sometimes wished time could be played backwards. Taylor and Akashi had both lost their fathers. Taylor had tried to adopt her new father-in-law in her deceased father's place, but she'd been spurned, told she'd never be part of the family. There was a hole in Taylor that she knew no one would ever fill, but she had come to accept it as part of what made her who she was. It helped her understand how great the need was for those important people in someone's life.

Cassie had decided, when first she was sorting through the reasons why she hadn't just quit wrestling and gone home to her family, where she'd most likely be happier, that she wanted to help. She figured she'd never be in line for the title. She was too small and not athletic enough, and she was too nice. She had told Taylor that she wanted to make it her job to help her any way she could, and she did that all the way up until she found Talia, standing over her beaten and incapacitated friend with a chair in her hand. One kimura lock later, she'd made an enemy and created Dark Angel, who then consumed the next year and a half of her life.

It seemed like so long ago that she was happy. She never wanted any of it, the war with Dark Angel. She had tried to be her friend. She'd tried to help her. But the girl was unhinged and hell-bent on doing the wrong thing, out of spite and misery and hate, and it put Cassie in an impossible position. She couldn't ignore her. She couldn't leave. She had to stay and fight and protect what she cared about from someone who was determined to cause harm. She had done that, and at great cost to herself.

When she thought about who Cassie was, about the things that made her herself, she used to be perfectly content with the answers. Now she wasn't so sure.

"So... I guess I just need to figure out what my priorities are," she said.

"Don't we all," Taylor said, with a sympathetic glance at Akashi.