Lady Magdalena: "The Refusal To Evolve Part 2"

[Silver Eagle]

“There, there pumpkin” came the sweet Parisian voice. The girl lay in her lap, facing the blazing fireplace. Her eyes were welling up in this instance, watching the flickering flames as if they were a reenactment of the story she harrowingly told. The blonde tugged at the long, ruffled dress, using it both as a pillow and a comfort blanket as the raven haired beauty brushed the knots out of her hair gently. “Hush. Breathe. There is no need to allow yourself to get all worked up. It’s just you, and me.” Her tone was soothing, one that put the younger blonde at ease. “Take a moment, my darling. Compose yourself. There is no reason to tell only half a tale, is there? You must explain everything, but in your own sweet time. I’m not going anywhere.”

Lady Magdalena stroked Sophie’s hair gently, her mere presence seemingly calming the distraught girl. Magdalena was intrigued by the tale, beautifully told in such exquisite detail, ‘such an imagination, she has,’ was the thought that crossed her mind. ‘And yet, I believe every word.’ She hushed the girl once more, wiping the loose hairs away from her forehead. She had grown to care quite deeply for her tag team partner, a fierce competitor that matched her will for domination and ferociousness in the squared circle. But it was her seldom seen softer side that particularly interested her, and her deep desire to learn and improve with every given moment, with every task, every moment. The Fair Lady, captivated originally by her wonderful talent at creating fine art, had slowly begun to admire her protege for simply who she was. With a singular finger, she raised the emotionally broken girl to eye level. “Dearest Sophie, please, in your own time.” She dabbed away at her eyes with a tissue, as Sophie nodded and cautiously began to continue her story.

---

Sophie looked around the room, feeling only the beating of Anastasia’s heart. It was rapid, a clear indication of Anastasia’s passion. The tears, the yelling, the raw emotion hit Sophie’s numbness like a ballista, shattering the wall down. “It was enough,” Sophie began, her voice coming out on a familiar monotone. “I was just too selfish to understand it. Too caught up in my own philosophy to care about if it hurt you or not.”

“Anastasia, I gave you my heart long ago. Or at least I tried. When I did, you weren’t ready. So you rejected me,” Sophie rose her head to peer into the puffy, but still beautiful eyes that she had admired for what felt like ages. “I...I was just being stupid. I really don’t deserve you. And all I ever do is hurt you, it seems. But Ana, when I said a month, I meant it. Zoey didn’t come here for my own benefit. I’m not trying to pursue her. She wanted to see a show. I didn’t much of it. I should’ve known better.”

Sophie spoke somberly, giving up on any form of serenity and glee. “Jackie, Holly, and whoever else that is out there, wanting to hurt me can do so. It’ll be proper, honestly. Whatever I can do to make this mess go away, I’ll do. Because I just want you to be here, happy and joyous. I don’t want to be the reason why you cry. I don’t want to be the reason that anyone ever gets hurt, especially a person who has been nothing but kind to an imbecile like me,” she broke her gaze and brought her knees up. She settled her head upon them.

“We didn’t do anything, if it would bring some temporary peace.”

“I just wanted her to see me, since you were off trying to win the most important thing to you. But I just ended up getting everyone hurt...again,” she used her free hand to clutch at her own head. She punched on the side of her head. “Again,” another punch. Her other hand, that remained upon Ana’s chest, lost strength, attempting to slide out, like a dead being.

“If you know who hurt Zoey, tell them to find me,” she paused, the fist that she made to punish herself fell to the marble floor.

“They can end me too if it means that you’ll be safe and sound from any more heartbreak.”

Ana gripped the back of Sophie’s head tightly, pulling her face close. Their lips brushed each other’s gently, but the pair hesitated, neither of them moving in to finish what could have started. Starling pushed herself backwards, her arms outstretched as she backhanded the doorframe, her eyes clenched shut. “I don’t want you to be hurt. I didn’t even want her to be hurt. I don’t know why. Maybe I should. Everyone says I should, but I don’t.” She sniffed, her eyes opening wide, the lights in the hospital seemingly making them look red for the merest of moments as she clutched the eagle necklace around her neck. “I don’t know who did this to her. I don’t know what those words mean. I’ve never heard them before.” She paused once more, a slight chuckle coming from her lips. She stared once more at the artist in front of her, her face a picture of emotion. “The most important thing to me…” she stared at the blonde, giving a shrug and a sigh. “...it was you. It is you. It always will be you. And I lost you.” She wiped her nose once more, giving another shrug, then a bow as she faked a smile. “I love you.”

---

Magdalena stood up for a moment, pacing with the utmost grace away from the luxurious sofa the pair lounged upon. As she reached the liquor cabinet, she opened it and produced a bottle of finest cognac. The Fair Lady, usually a connoisseur for the alcoholic pleasures, did not savor the aroma of the liquid, nor did she let the flavour melt in her moist mouth. Instead, she simply poured and drank, swiftly and smoothly. As she stared into the mirror, she noticed a thin trickle of dark water run from her eye. “She grew up,” she whispered to herself, ensuring her guest was out of hearing distance. She hastily wiped away the foolishly escaped tear, reapplying the makeup in the flashiest of flashes. “Such a strange feeling.” She produced another glass, crystal in front and poured generously for herself and Sophie. Pivoting on spot, she let a comforting smile spread on her features, ignoring how tattered and torn the lower reaches of her dress was due to the artist’s use of it as a comforter. She passed the chalice, the most holiest of grails to Sophie El, who drank deeply and greedily.

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be pouring all this out on you. You’ve got enough on your mind as it is,” her artist friend spoke, barely able to lift her weary head. “I just--I just didn’t know who else to speak to about it. All of her friends despise me now, and you know her… knew her better than anyone.” Magdalena wasn’t all too keen on being reminded of that particular fact. She had taken the circus girl into her home at her brother’s insistence many moons ago, instructed to show her the ways of the world and teach her in the art of war. But all she found was a childish little whelp, more interested in playing games, pretending she was something she wasn’t. Her behaviour was an insult, a travesty and Magdalena felt sick every time she looked upon her. And those eyes, those peering eyes of green and blue that stared at her, begging for an acceptance that she refused to give on pain of death. She would not accept anything from those eyes ever again, not after what she was forced to endure. Staring into the eyes of the Bongartz girl make her insides feel like they were being torn apart, as if an alien being was ripping in and out of her, bursting forth in a glory of gore, letting out a malicious cry of victory as she bathed in her bed of blood. It haunted her nightmares still, ever present whenever she closed her eyes. “What happened between the two of you?”

“Hush now, my dear. There is no need to concern yourself with such trivial matters.” The further away from this particular subject, the better. She had disapproved quite openly of her friend’s association with Starling, especially when their bond seemed to become romantic. At this point, Lady simply requested her to keep such ill-advised business to herself. Magdalena found that it would be quite contradictory if she requested her to leave the Songbird, especially after giving The Undying One such advice as ‘The world is your oyster, my dear. Open it up and take what you desire.’ She remembered those words well, and she could not go back on them. It was at this point she wondered if this advice had led Sophie to abandon the child and flee to the side of that Adler slut. Could such a simple piece of advice created a butterfly effect that rippled through time and emotion. “Drink.” Magdalena poured Sophie another generous portion of intoxicating liquor as she cradled her head to her bosom.

“Thanks, Mum…” The words impaled her like a spike to the womb. A slip of the tongue? Or something more purposeful. A tingle shot through the Fair Lady, travelling up her spine, sending shivers through her body. They reached up to her elfin face, pale as milkglass and her ruby lips curled up in an unwitting smile. As she was called this for the first time in her life, she wondered for the merest of moments what it would be like, to cradle a newborn babe in her arms, to watch it grow before her very eyes as time passed by and form into a person in their own right. She shook away the thought before it could take root, concentrating only on her distraught friend.

“Please, my darling girl, continue. You’ll feel better for it.” She had to ensure her friend was clear of mind. After all, this war they found themselves in with Jackson Magnum and Harbinger had become all the more personal, and their battle with Cordy and Herrera was looming ever closer. But most of all, because she cared? Yes, yes she supposed she did. Sophie curled up to her as Magdalena stroked her locks gently, and continued to tell her of that night in Blackburn’s Royal Hospital.

---

There was a silence, a ten bell salute as Anastasia’s declaration echoed around the ward, around the world. The pair stood apart, eyes locked and unable to speak, yet it was The Undying One who broke the tortuous silence. She needed to. She wanted to.

“I don’t deserve to be,” Sophie replied, raising her head up enough to look at Anastasia with tired eyes. “You never lost me. Because I love you too. Beyond anyone else,” she looked upon the small river of blood crawling down her leg, “Even more than myself.”

“I was just ignorant. Hence why I said a month, I needed to grow up a bit. Know that I can’t just go around with whatever person. When you love someone, you’re theirs. No one else’s. And I intend to be just that. I just need a month. Alone. Especially after all this bullshit,” she sapt, burying her head into her knees again.

A moment of silence fell between them. The sounds of the equipment, the heart monitor broke it every so often. An occasional sniffle from either one of them also came. Sophie rose her head up again, finally moving her knees down to sit fully upon the ground. She looked at Zoey and then back at Anastasia.

“But this investigation isn’t because I care about Zoey the way that people think. No, I just know that I have to make this right. If this was anyone else, I would do the same thing. It’s how I was raised. Whoever did this to an innocent woman who thought she did okay deserves retribution,” Sophie said, summoning up fury into her voice. When she finished, she simply sighed.

“It’s only right…” she looked up at Anastasia, the tiredness now acting as brokenness, “Right?”

“Right,” she looked out of the window hopelessly, trying to slow her breath down. “Whatever it is you have to do, you have to do it, I guess.” She stared at her once more, that look that she always used to give in their happier moments together. “Find who did it. Find out why. I dunno.” There was the briefest of pauses, as Ana reached for the door, giving another sniff. “Be safe.” Her gaze turned to the broken girl in the bed. “And be honest.” She turned the handle, taking a brave yet reluctant stride towards an escape. She tried to speak, but the words just wouldn’t come, her mouth moved but nothing came out. “Sophie…” But nothing else would come. Her heart sank, and she turned away.

“I love you, Anastasia Starling. If I ever hurt you again the way I did, please...please,” Sophie got up and stood still. She stopped herself, looking to the ground. “Nevermind.”

“I shouldn’t make promises. I seem to keep screwing up on them.”

Anastasia had left Sophie alone in the room with Zoey. Silence once again returned to remind Sophie of everything. She looked down at the throbbing pain in her leg. She hissed when she touched it, the numbness finally fading away and allowing for much needed anguish. She saw the small puddle of blood, and then cursed at herself.

“Hey, that could’ve went a whole lot worse, right?”

“Stop asking stupid questions.”

---

She stumbled to the window, shaking off the high heel shoes to both gain balance and comfort. Using a single hand to hold herself up against the balcony window, she gently massaged the soles of her feet. Time has passed by, the sands gently falling down to the bottom of the hour glass just as the bottle of cognac had emptied through the night. As she breathed in the moist night air, she found herself becoming lightheaded, the vast volume of alcohol she had consumed taking hold of her senses. She peered out into the labyrinth she called her garden, noticing the behemoth known as Ramsay prowling the maze like a Bengal Tiger set loose. After hearing of Sophie’s tale, she could not take any chances. This Adler woman had seemingly been attacked for upsetting the Bongartz girl, and no one had quite succeeded in that task but Sophie. She felt making arrangements for Bobby’s pet to guard the grounds was more than justified, so she had made the call prior to her tag partner falling deep into slumber in her arms. She was now in the guest room adjacent to her own, sleeping soundly. She found it quite peculiar that she had tucked her into bed herself, before kissing her lightly upon the forehead as gently as she was a newborn baby.

“Mum…” It felt as alien as it sounded, yet the word kept repeating over and over in her drunken mind as she fell back into her armchair. The room span as the thoughts of the evening spiralled through her mind, mixing in with strange tales, foreign enemies and dreams of fortune and glory. As her thoughts wandered aimlessly to the task that awaited them in Frontier Grappling Arts. She had always admired Cordy Stevenson from afar, an edge of talent and beauty that not many held. Whilst many seemed to hold one or the other in spades, she held both parts equally. She laughed to herself gently about the one time they did meet, though she knew Cordy wouldn’t remember. Magdalena, however, remembered everything. And Dan Herrera, she knew him far better than he would ever know her. At one time he was one of her brother’s closest friends, a businessman who had built his entire legacy on the back of her sibling as he swatted the opposition away like pesky flies. And once, when the dream was all but ended, they became the bitterest of enemies. That tale read it’s end in the hallowed grounds of FGA, and it was her brother that stood tall and Herrera could not stand at all. While she wasn’t a spectator in the crowd that very night, she felt the raw emotion that poured through. Dan Herrera, the promoter, showed that he was capable of being a star in front of the screen as well as one behind it. But her brother… he was the "Morning Star”, the brightest of them all. And when she felt the urge of jealousy driving deep within her, she abruptly halted herself, repeating a line that Sophie had spoken earlier on in the evening.

“The girl being of their blood, and her eyes being of great importance,” she whispered. Those words seemed ever so familiar, and yet so foreign to her that she barely recognised the letters, never mind the words. There was a pain in her stomach, a fist from within that kept punching and punching and punching. “The girl being of their blood, and her eyes being of great importance,” she whispered. What did it mean? What could it mean? She cared little for this slut that dear Sophie had associated with, whether a mistake in her artist’s mind or an escape from what lay ahead, but these words spoken to her… she’d heard them. Somewhere, some place, somehow.

She opened a drawer to the left of her chair, and as she stumbled and tumbled through the vast array of pictures within, she found one. There she stood, tall and beautiful and perfect. And there was he, long haired, silent and fierce.

“All these years, Isaac, and your actions are still haunting me...”

---

I’m staring at you all, quite unsure what to say. Maybe it is doubts, something that all professional athletes go through, but are generally terrified to admit. You always find yourself in situations that you find daunting, whether it is trying to deal with the words of an opponent, jealous, scared or whatever. It is rare that a professional wrestler will ever admit something like this, I can maybe count on my hands how many times I have witnessed this phenomenal feeling myself, either for myself or merely someone that is a witness.

People look at it as ‘a challenge’. That someone is going to give ‘their all’, throw their very heart into the squared circle and it matters now how the result went. People make excuses before it happens. ‘I have faced the greatest.’ ’I faced astronomical odds’, ‘I faced everything and more and I kept coming’.

People set themselves up to lose. I will never, ever understand it. I’m not the one to wish an opponent good luck, or am I the one the wish them all the best. Why would I? Why would I hope they give it their all and everything else in between? Many people state that their wish is to face the very best, an attempt to justify every word they have spoken, to justify their callous actions, to justify the means they went to.

I can praise my opponents, I can list every accomplishment they have ever had. Their titles, the tournament wins, the cheers, the glory. It would be that difficult to come up with a long list of all Cordy has accomplished, not just here but everywhere. It wouldn’t be difficult for me to list the number of people who believed Dan Herrera to be a madman for ditching a life behind a desk for a life within the ring. Oh, the laughter I heard, the taunts, the humour. And yet still he perceived. Still he fought on. And now, many don’t even remember his wondrous adventures as the head of a global company. Most see him as he sees himself. A wrestler.

I supposed he has earned this, effort is effort after all. But I have never seen him as such. I remember going to my visit my very first GDW event, I was merely a girl back then, my brother was the worldwide star that carried the flag of the company, and Dan Herrera, whilst a genius in business sense, was eternally in debt to my sweet brother.

Myself and Dan share many similarities. I first met him when I was but a young girl, He didn’t even know who I was, bless him, but my brother introduced us. He said I was simply a fan, not wanting a shoulder of the world ton rest upon me. My brother, the grand protector.

Daniel didn’t know until years later, my identity, that is. The world didn’t. I remember the look of shock on his face, the awe in his features, the fear in his eyes, “Oh no, another one” he said. Jest was jest, but I knew what it meant.

Over my years in the business, I have had a shadow cast upon me, as I believe my dear partner has as well. I have always had the name ‘Lasiewicz’ labelled next to me by promoters. It is a simple way for them to make money. ’Look upon the sibling, she is of his blood, she is of his name.’

This shadow has been dark and looming, and whilst it matters not whom I face, whom we face, it is eternally spoken. I do not wish to be in my dear brother’s shadow. I do not wish to be simply an extension of everything he has ever accomplished. His victories and bloodthirsty path are ever present. I cannot escape it, I know that. But in stepping into this tournament, in standing defiant with Sophie El at my side, I have the opportunity to carve out my our history, my own tales, my own legacy.

I care little if you feel I am simply an extension, or whether my talent is nothing in comparison. I love my dear brother and everything he has done.

In the words of my broken manager, members of the jury… hear me now.

I have been through hell, I have been through caged, I have been through the worst of the worst of the worst and yet… here I am. I will settle for nothing but victory, I will settle for nothing but you laid upon the floor defeated. I will not stand for anything… but victory.

Cordy Stevenson once looked at me as a mere distraction, a girl invited to her party by her former lover to bring jealousy. I would not stand for it. I left. And yet, I can’t think of anything else that fits so perfectly to our situation. On that day, I was simply a girl she was jealous of. When we are victorious, I will still be the same thing. A girl that she is jealous of.

And Dan Herrera. Bless you. I mean that. Whether you and my brother were warring or in the midst of true friendship, you were always there. I thank you for that. But that does not change my mindset. I want to be my own woman, with my own goals and my own future and my own destiny. Sir Robert may call upon the members of the jury to cast judgement, but right now I speak for myself. Myself alone.

I care not for your goals.

I care not for your plans

I care not for your past successes.

I care not for your failures.

I care for only what I want; I care only for what my partner wants.

We want victory.

Thank you. That is all.