Chasing Shadows 1

Pressure Point 73
Aug. 25, 2003
Starring Sharc, Bait & Trey Vincent(?)

In Sharc's room, there was tension. Bait could feel it as she sat on a small wooden bench in the room. Sharc was on edge. More on edge than she had ever seen him. The entire Reed Young and Trey Vincent situation was getting to him. There was an air of uncertainty of what was going to happen at Instinct on pay-per-view. Sharc had tasted blood last week, as had Bait. They both knew Vincent and Young wouldn't just take it and move on.

Sharc wanted to be the aggressor. And tonight, his weapon was a television monitor, or, a TV monitor in this case, waiting on Trey Vincent. The cocky asshole. As soon as he showed in the arena tonight, Sharc would be there.

All he needed was just the sight of him. Then it'd be time for some good friendly violent fun.

"Rich," Bait, aka Amy, started. She tried to continue, but apparently didn't have the words ready. Sharc just stared at her with his cold gaze. A gaze she had rarely been on the receiving end. "That! What's up with that?"

"Nothing," Rich said, resuming his paces.

"Have I done something wrong to you?"

Sharc didn't even stop pacing to answer. "No, of course you haven't. Everything is great. Life is great. I'm great, you're great. I'm six days away from going into a fight I've never been in. A gauntlet match. So forgive me if my mind is on other things."

"You still don't trust me."

Sharc grunted, half-laughter, half-anger.

"Rich," she said, standing up and reaching for him. "This has got to stop. I'm not going to turn on you at the pay-per-view. I know you think I am, but I'm not. Not tonight. Not next week. Not any week. I'm on your side. Why don't you believe that?"

Sharc looked into Bait's eyes. "Everyone leaves me, Amy. Everyone. My family. My old friends. My old enemies. Everybody used me, abused me and moved on. I've got nothing left but this wrestling business and you. If you can deal with that, fine. If not, take a walk. There are plenty of other shitty wrestlers here who could use some chick to make them look better. Lord knows it's helped me."

That was as close to a verbal slap in the face as she's ever gotten from the laid-back Future Hardcore Icon. His frustration at Action Wrestling was beginning to show. She was stunned speechless, not believing he was taking it out on her. All she could do was point to Sharc's precious TV monitor as a single tear rolled down her cheek.

Trey Vincent had arrived. Sharc spun around and looked on the monitor to see Vincent entering the arena with a big travel bag over his arm. He dropped it at the feet of some employee.

"Pick that up and bring it to my dressing room, scrub."

Sharc didn't notice Bait was crying. Probably because he was out the door and on the charge. He had mapped out his route quite a number of time and had it down. He charged past various employees, and a couple of wrestlers during his sprint.

Turned the corner where Vincent should be.

Nothing.

"What?" Sharc said aloud, confused. No Vincent in either direction. He just kept looking back and forth in every direction, dumbfounded. No bag. No Vincent. No scrub.

"What the..."

NEXT CHAPTER: Chasing Shadows 2 >>