.:.Black Hearts.:.

.:.Black Hearts.:.
.:.Following Victory XX.:.

“Have you heard anything?”

Edwyn Merrick, also known as the ever elusive Eddy, former best friend of Lachlan Kane and recently revealed as the newest member of the ragtag group of Muri, V and the PWE Victory Champion Angel, sat outside of her locker room. But they hadn’t heard a peep since she walked in and slammed the door behind her. Right in the face of V, who just stood there with her Victory title over his shoulder like usual.

And he hadn’t moved, he just stood outside like a backwards sentry watching and waiting for her to emerge from the room. He said nothing but gave a brief shrug and shake of his head.

“Seems to me that the change that we had been waiting for has arrived. I seem to recall her ripping and tearing apart things after something like this.” Edwyn stated simply, “Of course this is something new for all of us, I think.”

“She’s not there yet...” the small voice of Muri spoke up, practically jumping an unsuspecting Edwyn out of skin. V looked over for a brief moment with an adoring smile on his face at his little sister who managed to give their friend a bit of a jump.

That brought Edwyn to his feet and looked down at her with one hand gently on her shoulder and his other on his heart, “We’ve talked about this...you have got to stop that, little one.”

“I’m sorry, I didn’t know you didn’t see me coming. After all, I’m fairly certain Lachlan is still in the building, so I figured you two would be on high alert.” she said with a sly smile.

“Trust me, I know everything there is to know about that Irishman, and he’s not foolish enough to try anything right now. Especially with the unknown factor behind that door. After what just happened, she’s liable to maim the first person that she sees.” Edwyn looks to V with a smirk, “Which is why I’m fairly certain your brother has yet to go in...let alone knock.”

V just snorts with a quick laugh, “I’ve already felt that fury, thank you very much. My jaw still has yet to recover.”

“Funny, you still manage to run your mouth just fine.” Muri snickers which spins V around to glare at her for a moment, “Don’t even try that. You don’t scare me.”

V just shakes his head, “I really need to work on that when my own little sister isn’t remotely afraid of me.”

“You aren’t the scary one here, V and you never were.” Edwyn simply said, “The one that gives those vibes is on the other side of that door and we need to get her out of here.”

V sighs and looks at Edwyn with a look of annoyance, “We don’t rush her, Eddy. Only bad things happen when she’s rushed...as we were made aware of tonight.”

The door to the locker room finally opens up and we see Angel standing there, no emotion on her face. She stands face to face with V for a moment, “Alright, love?”

She stands quiet for a moment before she simply says, “I’ve had worse days.”

“That you have,” Edwyn lets out with a bit of frustration, “So are you ready to get the hell out of here?”

“Someone is impatient,” Angel remarks, but not wanting to push his buttons, “Don’t worry Eddy, we will be out of Lach’s reach soon enough and you will go on continuing to torture him from afar.”

Edwyn steps up and moves V out of his way and leans in, glaring at her, “Are you saying that I’m afraid of him?”

“No, not at all. But my focus has to shift,” Angel glares back, “I became Victory champ, I retained it from him...but there is more to PWE than your personal vendetta. While I do enjoy antagonizing the entire O’Connell clan, I was reminded tonight that Victoria Lyons and the entire Lyons Den are breathing down my neck. I am supposed to be this dominate bad ass bitch and tonight I got my ass beat by not only her but that cocky fuckin’ prick, Alexander Hate. I LOST, Eddy...and they were all right. Every one of them saw where my focus was and it sure as hell wasn’t about them. So nothing personal, as much as I’ve enjoyed it, I can’t keep poking him. Not when there are people that think that they are just as evil as I am.”

Edwyn takes a deep breath, and steps back, “I get that and can respect that. Actually, I admire that because it shows that you are not a mindless puppet like you were with Synn. It’s not about what we want as a group but growing into a whole new beast. Something far more dangerous.”

“Like one giant messed up family,” Muri says with a huff, Angel’s attention turns her attention to her with amusement, “I know you told me to stay put but I needed to make sure that...well..”

“Thanks,” Angel says before she looks at V and the Victory title on his shoulder. He reaches up and acts like he’s going to hand it to her but she stops him, “Don’t. I’m not worthy of that right now. Let’s just get the hell out of here and move on from this night.”

The sadness in her voice is evident from the night...something new? A new feeling that Angel didn’t like at all. But she wasn’t going to show it in front of them. Her voice betrayed her. So her actions were to just walk away from the three of them.

She’d rail at the demons later.

.:.Illumination Has An Interesting Effect.:.

She hadn’t said much. She had nothing and even her rage had simmered. Part of her wanted to rip the still beating heart out of Alexander’s chest after their match but that would be counterintuitive to what she needed to do and that was focus on Victoria Lyons.

That crazy bitch called it. She looked right down the barrel of the gun and called Angel on all of it. If Angel wasn’t left so impressed by it, she usually would have cocked the damn thing and taken her head off before they even got to this moment.

But that wasn’t her. Not anymore.

Since the day she was plucked out of the middle of nowhere by her little screwed up family, to the day she decided to burn her family home where all the hell had started. It ate at her black little heart. It was like she was being outdone by someone who was worse than she was, but it was also like she was looking in one of those strange fun house mirrors. A strange reflection of what she was....is...oh who the fuck knows at this point.

She just wanted to let it fester like an open wound, she wanted it to infect her very soul...what was even left of it. What the fuck are these fucking feelings?

So she put herself at the only place she’d get remotely any kind of peace. The roof. But like all the somewhat good things in her life...that too must come to an end.

“You really need to get over yourself already,” V’s unusual accent cut through the darkness as Angel’s green eyes peered over in the direction in which it came from as he struck a match lighting a pipe that she had never noticed he had before. Then again there were secrets he didn’t know about her...at least she hoped.

“All offense, V...fuck off.” she barked out before standing up and walking away from him.

But he just can’t help himself and V’s playful nature brings him to a ledge where he quickly and quite swifty manages to get ahead of her and drops down in front of her, leaning in with a smile, “Why can’t you just accept the fact that despite all the bullshit that you have been through that you are indeed human and through your traumatic experiences and your time here with us has actually allowed you to grow a conscious and actual feelings.”

“Not. NOW. V.” she was not in the mood for these games. Not now. She would barely tolerate any other time. Turning on her heels to get away, he would grab her wrist to turn her around and she would try and swing at him but he’d swiftly stop that and trapped both her arms behind her, “Let me go.” barking out but struggling against him was pointless.

“Sorry love. But you have been bottled up long enough,” he said, peering down at her with his brown eyes that practically hypnotized her, “I can take the beating I’m sure you will let out eventually but coming to grips with our mortality is something we all must face.”

Angel stops struggling and drops her head onto his chest, and whispers so low that he barely made it out, “I can’t.”

He drops his head by hers and simply asks “Why?”

Her breath in and out betrays her, in the cold night the shows her trembling, her emotions “Because the moment I do, I’m exposed and not in the good way. I have spent my entire life being punished when I let my emotions control me.”

“Yeah, I remember that well.” V said as he carefully released his hold on Angel’s arms, sliding them up and taking hold of her face, gently making her look at him, “But we’re not there anymore. We are no longer his pawns being sacrificed for his twisted games. We are free from him, we are free to feel...” he leans a little closer, “We are free to-”

Angel’s eyes flutter closed for a moment before she realizes what is happen and then they grow wide and she pulls quickly away, backing up a few steps, “No, you are free...” she sighs, “I, however, am still a prisoner...”

V’s hands drop and he shakes his head, “Not by anyone here.” he grunts out before he walks by her and stops by her side looking down at her with sadness in his eyes that matches hers, “The bars are unlocked, love. Let yourself out. There are people out here that are just waiting for you to let yourself go.”

He leans and gives her a simple kiss on her forehead before V walks away...and letting Angel wallow in the darkness and cold, the willing prisoner of her own mind.


.:.Two Halves of the Same Twisted Soul.:.

A few miserable days later, Angel sat at the giant boardroom table that once upon a time her and V had a charming game of chess...one that he won with the help of Muri, the little traitor. The memory of it almost cracked a smile in the marble facade that Angel had planted on her face lately, as she laid her head down on the table across her one arm, as the other twirled the queen and king pieces across the board and back again.

“A game of chess can be quite complicated or rather simple...varying on the level of the player that sits across from you.” Angel let out, as she took the queen piece in her hand and held it up, staring at it’s curves and edges, “The Queen for example is your strongest piece, but without the wise moves of the rest of the set, she can be left exposed and without it the king could easily fall.”

“For the longest time, I was much like these pieces...not the Queen but a strong piece to help protect a dark man. He would move us around at various times and in certain locations and endanger each one of us...all for one reason: he wanted to win.” Angel brought her head up, leaning it in her other hand and with the other she swiped her arm across the board and the whole set went flying and clattering onto the marble flooring below, “But when the pieces were taken away....the king cowardly was sent running and the pieces were left to fend for themselves.”

“But yet, the queen remains strong...no matter if she has been beaten by the king, left exposed...and broken...even a chink in her parts...she still remains...” she reveals the queen piece that she hid from the others and slams it dead center of the board, “The strongest of them all.”

Angel inhales, “Broken, beaten, left for dead...she moves swiftly and quietly just to survive even though the game may be over...the queen will still do whatever it takes to survive. You know about that...don’t you Victoria? You and I, are two twisted queens with the same twisted soul that has no problem whatsoever in exposing the rest of the board for our own selfish gain.”

She sets back and reaches into her cleavage and reveals the opposite queen opposed to the one on the board, “We don’t need anyone to protect us, but at the end of the day, it’s nice to not have to do all the heavy lifting. I mean, we could but even queens get exhausted now and again.”

She carefully places the other queen on the board and looks between them both, “And here we are, two powerful queens vying for the prize that we’ve come here for: the Victory Championship. One that I scratched and clawed my way up from literal dirt that I was left for dead in, to get. I twisted the happiest place on earth to do it without a second thought, I emptied my very soul to retain it...and I will be damned if a mirror image of me steals it away from me.”

With a single finger, she flicks the lighter piece to make it fall as it rolls across the board in front of the darker piece, “We’ve been playing the whole ‘who’s soul is the darkest’ for long enough. You think you did something in that triple threat, when you pinned me? All you did was make me that much more dangerous. But now you don’t have some arrogant prick to do your dirty work for you. We also know that the freaks and fucktards you have alike are ready to pounce at a moments notice...but as if they knew it was coming they took the stakes between us and made them a little more higher.”

“So it’s not enough to make one of us fall to the other’s feet...now one of us will be sent through literal HELL and potentially break us even further.” Angel laughs bitterly and that turns into a cackle that echos against the empty walls, “Well my dear sister from another mister, my twisted twin darkened soul...I have clawed my way out of hell once. It’s a familiar blanket to me, I am not afraid of the fall, but I will send us both there first if you think for one moment that I am willing to go back alone.”
She stands up from her chair, as we see the PWE Victory Championship strapped around her waist, “Lets see who truly is willing where both of our souls are lacking to live for what I already have gained. Let the strongest twisted queen...” she reaches down and sets the fallen piece back up again, “...stand tall...”

She grasps both pieces, and holds them out in her long hands, “...checkmate, bitch”

As they both roll off her hands and fall to the floor.