I ACTUALLY DO INTEND TO BURST YOUR BUBBLE

My eyes widened as I watched the man stop halfway up the entrance ramp and lower his hood. The familiar mask of another ghost from my past, this one a little more recent than the other two that had decided to return.

An old stablemate had just attacked a new one, and now he's just standing there with a damn smirk on what little of his face I can see. The crowd was already in a frenzy from when he planted Coral forehead first into the mat with a double underhook DDT, but their roar could be felt in the floor of Millennium Stadium when they saw the all too familiar mask. I still couldn't move my feet as he turned on his heel and made his way back up the ramp.

I don't think I blinked at all, and I'm certain I haven't taken a breath.

Mortimer Kjedelig was back in PRIME, and he seemed to have Coral’s Alias title in his sights.

-=-=-=-=-

“Bet he wasn't expecting that.”

Victoria Henderson's eyes narrowed as she glared across the table at the father of her child. The ever present grin of Tony Gamble skewed slightly when he realized she was not in the mood.

“What, serves the little shit stain right.” Tony leaned back in his chair, arms folded across his bright red polo.

“Because he insulted you?”

“Of course not,” The Grin chuckled heartily. “I can fight my own battles.”

“You're going to fight a twelve year old,” Victoria laughed out loud. “That's rich.”

“Not how I meant it,” Gamble waved his hand as he continued. “I'm just don't think Olivia kicked the kid in the sack because of what he said about me. She probably just got tired of him always being a little prick.”

“You don't even know the kid,” Victoria's lips curled into a frown as she shook her head.

“And you do,” Tony sat up and placed his hand on the table. “I mean, the way Olivia knows him.”

“I've seen him at a few of the kids parties,” she looked away for a moment and sighed. “But kids are going to be kids, you know that.”

“That makes it okay?”

“Of course not,” she turned her head back to face him. “I'm saying that I only know what I've seen, and that isn't always everything.”

“Well he knows better than to keep messing with Olivia now, doesn't he?”

“She got suspended for two weeks, Antonio.”

“It'll be fine,” he said flippantly, a slight smirk on his face. Truth be told, he was proud of his daughter for sticking up for herself. He wanted to take her out to get some ice cream to celebrate, but Victoria did not see this as something to celebrate. Not because she did not want her daughter to defend herself, but because she kicked him from behind when it wasn't expected.

A cheap shot.

A chip off the old block.

She blamed him.

“Oh, yeah, I'm sure you're going to be great over in London while I deal with this here.”

“I didn't fly back overnight to let you deal with this by yourself,” Tony replied. “But it isn't going anywhere. Why don't you and Olivia join me in England, we'll come back after the show and deal with it together.”

“Sounds good to me!” Olivia yelled as she ran into the room and hopped onto Tony's lap, then proceeded to wrap her arms around his neck.

“You think you deserve a prize for getting suspended, young lady?” Victoria's brow furrowed as her lips pursed slightly.

“It's not really a prize,” Tony interjected. “More of a go to work with Dad.”

“That just happens to be in England.”

“Correct,” Tony answered her with a genuine smile on his face, there was something about an embrace from his daughter that made his heart melt and his face show a bit more glee.

“Please, mom, can we go?”

Victoria did not appreciate the tag team assault she was under, but she also couldn't help but notice the glue her daughter seemed to have whenever she was around her father. She also noticed the way she seemed to soften his heart, and that was something in and of itself.

“Fine,” she responded hesitantly, though the tone and expression on her face concealed her own feelings of excitement for the trip. “I guess we can go.”

“Yay!” Tony screamed out as Olivia's embrace tightened briefly, before she hopped off his lap and rushed to hug her mother next.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you,” filled with joy, Olivia could barely contain herself as she held her mother tightly. “I'm gonna go pack.”

“We're not leaving tonight, Liv.”

“That's fine,” she let go of her mother and took a few steps toward the door. “I'm just ready to go. Do you think we'll have time to try and make the guards laugh? Oh, and I want to visit Downtown Abbey, too.”

The list of things Olivia wanted to do continued as she made her way down the hall, though it sounded more like a jumble of incoherent words by that point.

“Thanks for agreeing to go,” Tony stood up, his attention focused on Victoria.

“Of course,” she replied with a bit of sass as a smirk creased her lips. “I'm not passing up a free vacation.”

“Wasn't too sure how that was going to turn out there in the end.”

-=-=-=-=-

“Have to say I'm a bit surprised.”

Tony Gamble.

“After everything that happened leading up to War Games, I started to believe that I was going to be the reason we lost.”

White and light blue track pants clashed with a neon green shirt; the words ‘mini boss’ in lower case block letters shaped to make a perfect square on the center of it in red. He is not sure if it pertains to an actual game, but he thought it would be funny since he found it in the kids section at Walmart.

“I still believe it should've been me.“

A smirk formed on the right side of his lips as he stood there with both hands in his pockets.

“Actually, I honestly believe we should've won the whole damn thing.”

If you look closely – right between his inner thighs –  you can see the star of the show peeking through.

“I had the Angry Luchador done for in the center of the ring, but DoubleDave had to go and ruin it.”

He shook his head, the smirk that once flashed proudly for all to see slowly became a scowl as he thought back to where things went wrong.

“I get it, he wanted to be there for his team. The thing is, that wasn't a team in any sense of the word. What it was, Danny boy, was a group of individuals fighting for their own goal against a common enemy.”

A beat. Another peek.

“Well enemies, but that's beside the point.”

Tony eased himself back onto the star of the show, which allowed the stool to finally step out of Tony's shadow.

“The point is, that team was never going to win War Games. Not even chains could keep that team together, and in the end it showed. We were the only team capable of taking on the Glue Boiz, so the moment we were eliminated they let out an audible sigh of relief that could be heard by all three residents of Rhode Island.”

It's supported Tony for so long, and yet he treats the stool worse than a secondary character in someone else's story.

“Just kidding, there’s got to be at least fifteen by now.”

What would Tony do if he showed up and the stool was gone. Maybe  it would be treated better by Jared Sykes, surely it would at least be a cushier job.

“Wait, what was I talking about again?”

Is cushier even a word?

“Oh yeah, I was about to compare the Glue Factory's sigh of relief when we got eliminated, to the one Kennade Starr let out when she heard I would be Mr Bubbles’ opponent at ReVival. With my track record lately, this should be an easy win for the big guy.”

Unlike Tony, Jared has a cushy tushy. Even a cameo appearance – as Jared walked by the stool on the way to the kitchen to get Justine some weird prego snack like peanut butter covered fried pickles, or mint chocolate chip ice cream with potato chip crumbles on top –  would do wonders for its career.

“Sorry to break it to you little girl, but your stand is in for a little bit of a challenge. That little losing streak I was on leading up to War Games is over, and you or Bubbles, are just the first hurdle I need to get over to get back on the right track.”

Alas, tis but a dream.

“At ReVival 46 in London I'm starting all over again, and this time I'm planning to finish the game.”