Taking (the) Flight (For Acuya)

Gemma took the napkin gratefully, though she was a bit embarrassed with herself. Still, she nodded along and even managed a smile, as she listened to Valley. Normally, she'd be paranoid about showing this much weakness, this much vulnerability in front of anyone at, near or even familiar with the AFW. It felt incredibly liberating, knowing she could actually trust someone.

She nodded sympathetically to Valley's story, listening to her recount that rough Summer Splash match, and all the horrors that followed. She was visibly surprised at the mention of Taylor Parker, however- before Gemma's departure, Taylor was one of the few AFW wrestlers that had actually offered her a friendly hand. Price of being at the top, perhaps? She shook it off, and continued to listen.

"Thank you," she said, after another finger of whiskey. "That really does mean a lot coming from you, Valley. 'Specially since it sounds like you've been 'round the block, a couple times. I just ... I guess I really do need to learn to take things in stride. I'm just kinda sensitive, like. My da was my trainer, and my local promoter. I came out here to get away from that shadow, to get away from the rumors I was being 'protected.' That I wasn't facing 'real' competition. Guess when I started getting my bum handed to me on the reg, I started to worry those rumors might be kinda true ...

She took another swig, polishing off the glass before wiping her mouth and giving Valley a questioning look. "You don't mind my asking, like- how'd you do it? Obviously, you turned things around. How?"

Valley's eye perked up when she heard that Gemma had been trained by her father into the business. It made sense - it would explain why she could pull off such crazy moves even though she was so young. The coincidence of it all took her by surprise’, that was all.

She chuckled. "Funny thing." Valley tapped her fingers along the bar. "I know, it's a little hokey, like I keep saying how we're alike, but seriously, you remind me so much of me it’s a little creepy. See, I’m Valley Doll Jr.. My mother was in the business, and she got me in and trained me and everything. So I feel you a bit there.”  She shook her glass, making the ice cubes dance. ”I guess the main difference is that I got my bum kicked right from the start. A lot.”

Despite all the pain in those days, she had a warm smile as she thought back. For all the the trouble she’d gone through, it shaped her as a wrestler, and she wouldn’t change a thing. Except, maybe, the strap match she’d gotten into. That was a little too low.

”As for how I turned things around, well…” She held out her glass for a refill. ”I saw my girlfriend kissing another woman. That helped light a fire in me, for one thing. i challenged her to a match, we wound up drawing, but it really reignited my passion. i had a goal, and I felt driven towards it. I wanted to prove everyone who doubted me wrong. That was my focus.”

She wiggled her fingers as she tried to put it all into a straight explanation. ”So maybe that’s what any good wrestler needs - something to fight for. A goal, a beacon, whatever.” Valley looked over to her young, British doppleganger. ”Why do you wrestle? What do you try to get out of it?”

Gemma raised an eyebrow, nearly laughed at the revelation that she had actually been facing Valley Doll Junior, in their match. She looked a bit embarrassed, at the revelation. "Here I've been," she muttered, going all special snowflake on you, 'woe is the little rasslin' girl, and all that ..."

Getting more comfortable, Gemma took the final glass of her flight, and sipped at it. Her eyes widened a bit, as she listened to Valley's story. "That's ... one hell of a motivator, right there," she said. Gemma knew she'd been embarrassed at all her losses up till now, but it sounded like Valley had an entirely different level of personal to deal with, in her feuds. Was that what was missing, from her bouts?

Gemma nodded, sipping from her glass as she listened to Valley finish her piece. She stared at her glass with wide eyes, however, when the question came to her. Maybe it was the drink, maybe it was being on the spot, but ... she didn't have a ready answer. "I- well, I guess ... I guess it's just that I don't know much else ..." she started, staring at the back wall like a doe in the headlights.

Gemma tried to shake it off, really think about the question. "I want," she started, clearly struggling to think, even as she was speaking, "I want people to take me seriously. As a competitor." There was more and more confidence in Gemma's voice with each word, but doubt still persisted in her eyes.

"You ever have anyone figure you were a joke, just because of your upbringing?" she continued. "Mock you for it, even? Because I can still hear everyone that did that, every time I get in the ring. Every time I lose, I know they're watching. It's right humiliating, and there's nothing more I want than to get that out of my head. I love entertaining the crowd, but this is also the only way I know, to make a living. Not like I can go home and be a shop girl. I just ... I just gotta figure out how to actually succeed, at the end of the day ..."

Valley sat her glass down, empty now, but she didn't ask for a refill. She'd had enough for the day, really, and she wanted to devote some serious brain cells to talking with Gemma.

"I kind of agree." She tipped her finger towards the high-flying Brit. "And I kind of don't." She tipped her finger the other way. "Like, I don't mind saying that I think I have the best ring entrance in the whole AFW. You and me, we're cut from about the same clothe. We don't just wrestle, we try to put on a show. We're competitors, but winning isn't enough. We want to entertain."

She held out her hand and pantomimed Gemma's whole takeoff procedure, putting on the pretend goggles, checking the air, all of it.  "But we want to, you know, win matches, too. So there's a balance we have to strike. And I don't think it's something that can be taught so much - you have to learn, hands on."

Valley laid her hands down on the table and shrugged. "I'd love to work with you, sometime. Train together, if you're willing. But at the end of the day, I think the hard fact is that you've just got to endure the rough times and edge out your own style. I remember..." She closed her eyes as she took a quick stroll down memory lane. So many matches, and they all started to blend together after a while. "I got a lot of hate when I started up, yeah. I came in at eighteen, and my name alone got me a few opportunities. Got a very negative reaction from the older women who didn't want me beside them and the younger girls who'd been at this since they were fifteen, fourteen, sixteen. It could be nasty." Her eyes popped open and she swayed towards Gemma, speaking a little lower. "Not to mention, some fans hate legacies. They thought I was just riding on my Mom's popularity, which I pretty much was at the time, but still."

Valley straightened up in the chair and folded her arms, as if she were proudly bearing it all on her shoulder. "But I kept at it, I kept trying to stand on my own two feet, people took me seriously, and I eventually became the Slamazons champ." She deflated a bit. "And then the company shut down, but minor detail, there."

Gemma watched Valley's finger intently, leaning in deep over the bar, her chest tipping at her empty flight glasses. She nodded along with everything Valley was saying, at this point. She seemed cheered, at Valley validating her impulse to entertain.

When Valley pulled out the panto goggles and went through the takeoff procedure, however, the Brit nearly lost it. Both hands clasped hard over her mouth, trying to stifle the laughs. She struggled to get her heaving shoulders under control, as Valley continued talking. Part of it might have been the drink, part may have been the awkwardness of believing that this gorgeous, talented ring vet was actually not all that different, from Gemma.

Gemma nodded along, listening to the arc of Valley's story. She could hardly believe she hadn't heard all of this, before. It all seemed so painfully, terribly familiar.

"That's so amazing," Gemma said, staring at Valley with her drink held limply in her hand. There was some fangirling going on, and the Brit wasn't even trying to hide it. "All of that going against you, and you just jumped into it anyways ... I need to see some of those Slamazon tapes, Valley. That is a thing that needs to happen. I will go out right now and sink money into a VCR if that's what it takes, we totally need to make that happen!"

”Hey, whoa,” Valley snorted, matching her laugh against Gemma’s. ”VHS tapes? Really? You think I’m that old?” She gave Gemma a little punch on the shoulder. ”My girlfriend has a bunch of the DVDs, you can borrow them all you like. Maybe it'll help, who knows. Though I don’t think you’ll see me do anything that you can’t do right now.”

She got the bartender’s attention and motioned for a cup of water, a little something flat to keep her thirst quenched. ”I am sorry that things have gone so rough for you from the start, though. The AFW’s great about a lot of things, but it really, really sucks when it comes to taking care of the talent. Maybe that’s just the cost of having so many people on the roster, you can’t really control them all.”

She took the cup of water and gingerly sipped away on it a few times before she went back to speaking. ”It also doesn’t help that upper management tends to focus a little much on the sex side of our business and a little less on wrestlers with real talent and potential. Like yourself.” She paused and turned around in the chair, looking curious. ”What brought you to the AFW? I mean, specifically, the AFW? I can kinda guess it’s a long way from home for you.”

Gemma blushed, a bit embarrassed at her faux pas. "Oi, now!" she said, over-selling the punch to the arm, a bit. "Look at how I'm dressed, it's lucky I didn't insist on only viewing the things on Fantascope, or something! You fancy Americans and your fancy moving pictures on your duv-duhs ..."

She nodded along with Valley, a little bleary-eyed but still able to follow her, conversationally. She grinned at the compliment. "I guess that is the thing, with the 'big leagues.' As catty and jealous as they could be, the UK indies back home did feel a lot more ... home-y. And even that besides, I don't think management here was half as upset about my humiliating 'wardrobe malfunctions' as I was. Thanks again, Syd ..." Gemma rolled her eyes, taking another swig from her whiskey.

"As for being here, I think it being far from home was part of the appeal. Get somewhere nobody would have even heard of me. Wouldn't have to put up with the coddled rumours, the whole 'legacy' thing, I could just put that all behind me. That, and I've always heard about old school wrestlers talking up their time in Japan. Helped them learn to hit harder, work tighter. 'Course, I doubt guys like The Giant were booked in too many pet store-themed submission matches, but you know. It's an experience. What about you? Has being in Japan, AFW in particular, done much for your in-ring work? Picked up anything you don't think you couldn't have learned, back home?"

It took Valley a moment to key onto what Gemma was talking about, but when she did, she snapped her fingers. ”Oh! The ‘Littlest Pet Shop of Horrors’ match, right?” She pointed her way and gave the younger wrestler a quick thumbs up. ”That looked...well, over-the-top, really. Never much liked gimmick matches.” Given how that match had ended for Gemma, she was regretting that it came up in the first place, but at least she had a handy escape hatch.

The name ‘Syd’ rang a slight bell, but then, most wrestler’s names didn’t. It wasn’t anyone Valley could recall seeing in action, at least. Whoever it was, it seemed like she left a mark on poor Gemma, and like so many things, she could relate. It made her all the more eager to move on to a happier topic.

”Oh, yeah, I picked up some stuff.” Valley gave an emphatic nod. ”When I started wrestling, I sort of siphoned off my experience as a cheerleader in high school.  Felt like a natural step, and it helped me with a lot of the fancier, flashier moves, but my ground game wasn’t the best.” There was a wistful tone in her voice, as she remembered some of the nastier beatdowns. "I used a lot of kicks, and I got some mileage out of them, but in Japan I really learned how to maximize my lower body strength and get the biggest bang for my buck.”

Valley rolled her fingers around, spiraling it all the way to the bar. ”Picked up a few brand new moves, too. I can do this wicked double-rotation moonsault, got to show it to you sometime.” She arched her back a bit, almost as if she were preparing to do a backflip off the stool and demonstrate. Crazy and nigh-impossible, but it would make for a fun mental image. ”Hard to land and I'm always sore the morning after I do it, but the crowd goes ballistic for it like you would not believe. Worth it.”

Gemma gave an embarrassed half-smile and a wave of "jazz hands," when Valley recognized her most infamous match. On the one hand, it was nice to have her work recognized. On the other, she rather wished it could have been for literally anything else.

Still, the Brit nodded along attentively, to Valley's story. "Hah," she grinned, "I could've pegged you for a cheerleader," she said. "No offense, mind, it's just that you're pretty much every single thing pop culture's told me a cheerleader is like. Imagine that helped with the confidence, like," she added, with an honest grin. Gemma's cheeks were a bit flushed, at this point, the preceding drinks beginning to hit her.

Naturally, her response to this was to hit them back, downing the last of her final shot as Valley spoke to her. She wiped her face, then, blinking dramatically as it washed down her throat. "And I bet it is a sight, at that. I'd love to see you pull it off, sometime," she said, nodding along. "Preferably from a comfortable, not-about-to-eat-it distance. "You've kind of seen all my offense, haven't you? Give or take a kick or two I've had a few good ideas, since coming this way. Kinda proud of my springboard underhook DDT, there. You might remember it," she added, with a sly wink. "Maybe. Kinda. I love popping the crowd, but ... I dunno. Maybe I need something stronger, like. Nothing I do seems to say, 'stay down, you horrible slag,' the way I'd like it to. How do you get to that point? I'm feeling like that's what I need to do. Not bringing the pain like I should, maybe ..."

Valley had a nice, inward sigh when it became apparent that Gemma wasn’t going to take the mention of that match too personally. Lord knew she had quite a few matches she wished she could erase out of all memory, too, but pretending they never happened wouldn’t solve anything.

”Yeah, no offense taken. I got used to being a blonde stereotype a long time ago.” She twirled a strand of hair around her finger and blew it away. Maybe that would all get better now that she’d stopped dying her hair so white? Possibly. ”But an underhook DDT? That was what that was? I mean, I remember my head getting drilled into the mat, but aside from that…” Valley was half-joking, but only half. Gemma had landed that move perfectly, and if she’d put a little more offense on before hitting it, she might’ve cinched the match right then and there.

”It depends on how hard you want to go, really. There are a lot of moves that are pretty and get big air, but can really pound your opponent into the mat. Like, you don’t have to end a moonsault with a splash like that. You could land on your knees or even your feet, really pound into them with the pressure.” Valley gave her stomach a good slap, showing the landing zone for that sort of move. Not a pleasant place to have two knees drilling into. “And it’ll be a safer landing, too. It can be a little brutal, but if that’s what you’re going for…”

She snapped her fingers as another thought occurred. ”Another thing you’ve got to work on is the timing. Knowing when to use what move, I guess. That’s really the big problem with our style, you know?” She held one hand flat on the bar, then fingerwalked with her other hand around the rim of a glass. Her hand jumped off, sore through the air...but the target moved at the last minute, and it crashed and burned. Crude display, but she hoped it would get the point across. ”Knowing when to jump and when not to jump.”[/color]