Attempted Damage Control
I originally had a very bad title for this story. I won't say what it was and the story was only around under the title for about an hour, but it was a very inappropriate title for a story, especially on this particular day.
If you saw the title and were offended, all I can do is throw myself at your mercy. I did not mean to make light of anything or insult anyone. I was unable to come up with a title and one of my beta readers suggested the title and I was exhausted and wasn't thinking. I know this isn't an excuse, but it is the truth and I am very, very, very sorry. I have changed the name and in the future I will try to think before I do something that dumb again.
Author Notes
Before you write me to tell me I got some names wrong, you need to read this.
My own, number one, personal rule about fanfiction is this; I do not write fanfiction about real people. It's a rule I've had since day one. (No, this is not the first fanfiction I've ever written, it's just the first time I've ventured into writing about Sports Entertainers) Any time I've had "real life" people in my stories, they've had a small role, they've never been the main characters. In most cases, they've been no more than a mention as in, "They were going to see Justin Timberlake in concert that night."
What does that have to do with this story? Well, it explains a couple things. 1: You will never hear me refer to the members of Shield as "Joey" "Colby" or "Jonathan Good" (Jon Moxley, maybe, because Moxley is as much of a character as Dean is) Because once I do that, I cross the line and that is something that makes me uncomfortable. I am willing to write fictional stories about Roman, Dean, and Seth, but not about the actors/superstars/professional wrestlers that play them.
Nor will I use the real names of Leati "Joe" Anoa'i's fiance and daughter, even though I decided that at least in this story, he has a fiance and daughter. I know the names, they aren't hard to find, but I won't use them because they aren't characters, they are real life people. So, instead, since there is no fictional name for them, in my fiction world, Roman's fiance is named Jessica and his daughter is named Leah.
How did I pick those names? Well, Jessica was easy, because I once read on the internet that was the name of Joe Anoa'i's fiance. That turned out to be a mistake made by the reporter, but I decided to use it for the story, because at the time she was born, Jessica was a pretty popular name, so it worked.
Why Leah? Because I thought it was pretty. No other reason. (Although, I think the real name of the daughter of Joe Anoa'i is a much prettier name) And, the name just seemed right to me. It suggested a cute, smart, happy little who I figured would be the daughter of Roman Reigns. (Let's face it, any father who is happy to play "I'm a little Teapot" is bound to have a pretty happy, well adjusted kid)
The personalities I've given "Jessica" and "Leah" are my own inventions too, and come only from my imagination and I've kept physical descriptions as vague as possible. Any resemblance to the daughter and fiance of Joe Anoa'i, is purely coincidental.
The other thing you should know is that this story is rated mature mostly because of language and dialog. It isn't slash, but there is some pretty crude sexual dialog said at times. And a lot of swearing. A boatload of swearing. Not because I think Dean and Roman are huge on swearing, but because they're having a hell of a rough night.
This is one of the hardest things I've ever written. First because it's a strange world, professional wrestling. Unlike most fanfiction the lines between the actors and the characters is much more blurry. Second, because even though wrestling is "sports entertainment" I've never ever seen a fictional relationship that seemed as real and as strong as the one between the three members of The Shield, which is why it blew my tiny mind away when the break up happened, and which is why I found myself writing this. It's my way of dealing with what happened and how I think they would have. You might agree, you might disagree, the nice thing about fanfiction is that we're both wrong and we're both right at the same time.
One last thing, I am sorry for the weird "breaks." This was written as one story and I was originally going to post it as one huge part. But it got so big that I realized that could make loading difficult for some folks and would also make it difficult if people wanted/had to read the story in parts instead of the entire thing at once. But it is finished and if all the parts aren't up yet, they will be soon, if reaction is favorable.
Thank you for reading this. And if after this, you decide to continue, I hope you enjoy the story. I hope it creates enough of a reaction that you feel obligated to review it too!
After The Storm
Dean wasn't pissed, Dean was hurt. Roman knew that as clearly as he knew the world, or at least the version he and Dean shared, had been blown to bits tonight. Nothing would ever be quite the same and that was exactly what was hurting Dean so badly.
The problem though, was that Dean hurt was almost exactly like Dean pissed, the only difference being Dean hurt was just a little bit worse. "That fucker!" exploded from his mouth for the fifth time in the last six seconds. "That back stabbing motherfucker!"
Roman looked over at Dean, but said nothing. They were in the rental car and although Roman had wanted to drive, Dean had insisted and eventually, Roman relented, just to give the lunatic something to do that wouldn't involve tearing the vehicle to bits from the inside out. The last time he'd gone crazy in a rental car, they had to lie and tell the rental agency that an angry Ryback fan must have broken in and trashed it as a protest for their treatment of his (or her) favorite WWE superstar. Thank god they had opted for the insurance, or they'd probably still be paying for that one. Roman remembered the look on the agent's face as she inspected the car. "There are toothmarks in the seat cushions!" she had exclaimed, and then repeated it, in a louder voice, for good measure. "Toothmarks!"
Roman had shrugged, doing his best to look boyishly cute, which he could do pretty easily, as long as he got a smile on his face. He took a lot of grief for that, especially from Dean. "You do such an awesome bad-ass, until you get that goofy grin all over your face. Then you go from Terminator to teddy bear. It's annoying." He figured teddy bear was a much better bet with the rental agent and let "that goofy grin" spread over his face.
"Ryback fans are a pretty dedicated lot," he said, debating if he should throw in a "baby girl" or "darling," but deciding against it. The agent was young, attractive, and most definitely checking him out, but he was trying to be contrite, not flirty. "We really worked him over that night. I don't think it was right for them to trash the car, but I kind of understand why they'd be upset."
As it turned out, the agent wasn't a wrestling fan, but her brother was, so a simple matter of signing autographs and digging out one of the Shield T-shirts from their luggage and handing it over and the matter was resolved, but, Roman didn't want to repeat the situation. He was afraid Dean might not just take out his hurt on the car, but turn on Roman as well. And surprisingly enough, Dean was a really good driver, even when he was upset. He might be traveling a little above the speed limit, he might be spouting curses like a fountain, but he was watching the road.
"How could he?" Dean sputtered again. "Back stabbing, mother fucking sonofabitch, did you see the mother fucking smug ass look on his ugly goddamned mother fucker face?" He cut his eyes briefly from the road to look at Roman, then shifted to look back out the front window. "He loved it. He fucking loved it."
Roman tried to make his sigh more internal than external, but a small hiss of air escaped. Dean was pretty bad, maybe worse than Roman had ever seen him before. He was clutching the steering wheel so tightly that his knuckles were white. His hands are going to cramp something bad later if he doesn't loosen that grip, Roman found himself thinking. He debated if he should say something, but changed his mind.
"'Oh, it's not that I wanted to do it, but it was in the script,'" Dean said in a high falsetto voice, but anyone who knew him would know he was giving an insulting, but pretty decent imitation of Seth Rollins. "'I'm sorry if I really hurt you, Dean, but we had to make it look good!'" He stopped the imitation and went back to being Pissed Dean. "That motherfucker! Like I'd admit he did damage, which he didn't. Not gonna give that mother fucker the satisfaction. And he wanted to hurt me. I could fucking tell!"
"It was part of the script," Roman said, before he could think if disagreeing with Dean was a good idea or not. The murderous glare from Dean made him continue quickly, "you weren't the only one who got messed up tonight. My back isn't exactly thanking me."
"Shit, yeah, I know," Dean said, sounding almost contrite as he remembered he hadn't been the only one involved in the betrayal. "They really did a number on you too, are you okay?"
Roman shrugged. "It's superficial, welts, bruises, things like that. I'll be fine, this won't even slow me down, but it stings like..." Like the time I got bees in my pants as a kid, he thought, but didn't say.
"A motherfucker?" Dean finished for him instead.
"Yeah, good way of putting it." Roman chuckled, more to himself. Neither he or Dean were huge on the profanity for absolutely no reason, something that surprised some of Dean's fans, they often figured he swore a blue streak when he wasn't in a situation where he had to keep it PG, but in truth, Dean was smart, pretty well read, and had a decent grasp of language. He could express himself just fine in most instance without having to resort to unnecessary swearing. But when he was mad or hurt, then watch out, because he could swear enough to make Eminem blush.
Roman himself wasn't overly sensitive to swearing, and had done his fair share of it in the past, but he had been trying not to since his daughter had started talking and proved to be excellent at hearing and repeating every word she shouldn't. He remembered the time she had accidentally spilled a glass of apple juice on the kitchen floor. As the glass was falling, she had gasped and yelled, "Oh, shit!" Roman's first reaction was to burst out laughing, but fortunately, he'd caught the eye of his girlfriend and the look on her face made it deadly clear that if Roman even thought about cracking a smile, he'd be in the doghouse for a yet-to-be determined amount of time. Instead they cleaned up the juice, did their best to explain to a toddler why some words were okay to say and some were not, and tried every since to never say words around her that they didn't want her to repeat. For good measure, they set up a swear jar in the house with a dollar penalty. But he knew the best way to never make the mistake was to try not to swear no matter where he was, not just around his daughter so he was doing his best. As far as he knew, his daughter had never sworn again, either, at least not in earshot of her parents.
God, I miss her, Roman's thought wasn't profane, instead it was almost a prayer, or perhaps a statement of fact made to whatever deity watched out over sports entertainers as they traveled in rental cars late at night. I miss both of them. I'm living the dream, but sometimes the price is too high. And I don't want to pay that price, I don't want to lose them.
"Are you gonna be okay?" Dean asked, looking over at Roman again. "I mean, your back and all?"
"Yeah, like I said, this won't even slow me down," Roman said, partially relieved that Dean had pulled him out of his thoughts. One issue at a time, he told himself. Later you can worry about the home front, right now, deal with this. Deal with the end of Shield and let Dean get this out of his system. "It's like having lots of paper cuts. It stings and burns, and isn't fun, but if I can't take this, I'm in the wrong profession." He was downplaying the pain, it was actually pretty bad, but he wasn't going to let Dean know that, he didn't need to give Dean another reason to go off. "Part of me thinks Orton wasn't all that upset about showing me what happens when you mess with Evolution."
"It's a damned show," Dean sputtered, as if suddenly remembering how pissed he was. "It's supposed to be fiction! I mean, Jesus Christ on a Painted Motherfucking pony, it's not supposed to be real!"
"Exactly," Roman said, tugging at the seat belt to give himself some room. He reached behind him for the cooler that always traveled with them, and fished two bottles of water out of the ice. "It is fiction. The Powers That Be thought that breaking up the Shield was a great way to pop ratings after the dip the week before, and we had to do it. It isn't really Seth's fault, he just got to be the one." He put one of the water bottles in the holder between the seats, the one closest to Dean. The other bottle he opened and eliminated half of it in one gulp. Nothing like a little beating to make a man thirsty, he thought.
"Oh, bullshit!" Dean exploded. He grabbed the bottle from the holder and unscrewed it by biting down on the cap and twisting the bottle with one hand. The cracking sound of the cap separating filled the car. When the bottle was open, Dean spit the cap out. It bounced on the dashboard a couple times, then slid down to lean against the windshield. He took a gulp of water, swishing it around in his mouth, then rolled down the window and spit it out onto the road and into the night. "Yeah, okay, the Powers That Be might have wanted us to break up, but when we were asked about it, Seth practically jumped out of his seat to volunteer for this. Did you see him? Did you see him?" He paused for a moment to slam the bottle back into the cup holder. "Oh, I'll do it," He cooed in that Seth-talks-with-his-nuts-in-a-vice falsetto that on a night past, would have had both Roman and Seth laughing like loons, "I'd like the chance to be a bad guy again."
"It made sense though," Roman pointed out, even thought he knew with the mood Dean was in that this was treading on dangerous grounds. "There was talk earlier about Shield imploding because of you. Or of me breaking up the group because I've got my eye on the championship. But never Seth. No one expected Seth to turn traitor. That's what made it work." Dean opened his mouth to speak and Roman quickly continued, hoping to stop another coprolalia rant. "It came totally out of the blue. Seth's not stupid, he knew that if he did it, it would give them the most bang for the buck. Like it or not, cliche or not, Seth turning traitor was best for business."
"Fuck business!" Dean snarled. "We dominated Evolution Sunday night. Dominated them. The Shield was never stronger, never better. This was the worst time to break it up!" He finished up the bottle of water and crunched it in his hand, the cheap, thin, plastic making crackling, noises. When he had crushed it into a disfigured lump of plastic, he tossed it over his shoulder into the back seat.
"I agree with you on that," Roman said. When Dean was right, he was right. "The smarter thing would have been to keep The Shield together for awhile longer. But, again, the Powers That Be didn't agree."
"Yeah, they sacrificed one of, if not the best faction to ever exist in this whole stupid company, for a cheap ratings pop." Dean scowled, staring straight ahead of him, onto the road. "And Seth motherfucking Rollin's went right along with them. He fell back into the Seth Speak, "'Think about it, nobody expects me to betray Shield, after all, I'm the leader!'" He shook his head. "When the fuck did he become the leader?"
I will not get sucked into that argument, I will not get sucked into that argument, Roman chanted to himself. Who was considered the leader of Shield had been an ongoing debate, mostly between Dean and Seth. Personally, he had always looked at it as a shifting position. If crazy was needed, then Dean was the leader. If brute force and strong silence was needed, it was him, and if it was diplomacy, Seth was in charge. Besides, what did it really matter? When the lights went off and The Shield packed it in for the night, it was supposed to be Seth, Dean, and Roman, three friends forever, three brothers by choice. "I think," he began, slowly and carefully choosing his words, "Seth might have figured The Powers That Be thought of him as the leader because he was the diplomat, he was the one who would do anything to keep us going, even when you and I were supposed to be at each others throats. When we almost broke up that one time, it was Seth who figured out a way to keep us together."
"By letting me smack him." A quick look of satisfaction played across Dean's face for a moment, as he remembered that punch, but it was quickly replaced by a scowl of anger. "I got one punch, he got to beat the crap out of me tonight."
"Again, he had to make it look convincing," Roman said. "Are you really that surprised?" He looked over at Dean, wondering if he should ask about something that had been praying on his mind since RAW had ended. "Dean, seriously here, we knew this was going to happen. We knew it all day. Why are you so shocked? I mean, we discussed it, we planned it, it went down pretty much like we said it would. Why are you acting like this came out of the blue? I mean, I know the audience thought it did, but we knew for hours."
"I don't know!" Dean sputtered. "I-I guess it didn't really sink in until it happened, you know?" He stared out the window, refusing to look at Roman. His gaze fixed on a bright patch of light up ahead. "Gas station," he mumbled, "Let's stop. We need gas and I need to stretch my legs and take a leak."
"Leave one, you mean," Roman said, referring to a joke Dean had made once when the three of them had been traveling together. Dean had been dozing on and off in the back seat, and Roman had been driving, when Seth had spoken up, saying they really had to pull over as soon as possible because he really had to pee.
"Do we have to?" Roman had asked. "It's less than an hour to the arena, can't you hold it?"
"No!" Seth had sputtered, stomping his feet on the floor in frustration. Clearly he'd been telling himself that he needed to wait, but had finally reached the point where that wouldn't work anymore. "Dean talked me into drinking one of those mega giant Mountain Dews at the airport. "Seriously, Roman, my back teeth are floating. We've got to pull over so I can take a leak."
"You could take one of mine," Dean had suddenly blurted out, sitting up and draping his arms across the front seats. "I have one I'm not using."
Roman and Seth had looked at each other and laughed. "Stop it!" Seth ordered, trying to stop himself, "It's cruel and unusual punishment to make a man in my condition laugh."
"Think about it," Dean had leaned forward so his chin was almost resting on the middle console. "We say we take a leak or take a dump, but we don't really take them, we leave them. George Carlin was right. We should say we leave a leak."
Thinking back, Roman knew it hadn't been that funny, but the three of them had been working so much, and had just come off from a horrible red eye flight where none of them got any sleep, which was why Seth had drank the Mountain Dew that was the cause of this whole exchange anyway. He'd needed the caffeine. They had been so punch drunk that Dean's philosophizing about the proper way of expressing the need to empty one's bladder while paying tribute to George Carlin became hysterically funny. Dean never did understand why Seth and Roman had thought it was so amusing, so it became a joke more between Seth and Roman. When they were alone and tired, if any of them mentioned taking a leak, one of the two of them were quick to suggest it should be leave instead. I'm going to miss that, Roman thought. Not the joke, but the dynamics it represented. There were things that Roman shared more with Dean, and things that he shared more with Seth, just as Seth and Dean had things between the two of them that did not include him. Where in some situations, this might cause friction in a group, in the case of the three of them, the fact that they had separate relationships with each other as well as the group dynamics almost seemed to strengthen them. Now he wondered if that would pull them apart, too. God, I'm getting as maudlin as Dean.
Dean pulled the car in and up to one of the pumps. "Good, it's a *WaWa," he said, unbuckling his seat belt. "I'm gonna go take care of business and grab something to drink. Do you want anything?"
"Apple juice," Roman said, unbuckling his own belt. "The good stuff in the bottle with the brown label. None of that overly sugared, barely seen an apple, crap. If all they have is the crap, get orange juice instead. I'll fill the tank while you're gone."
Dean looked at him with a slightly lopsided grin on his face. "Miss your daughter, eh?"
"Well, yeah, I always miss her," Roman said, puzzled that Dean would mention it. It was pretty much a given.
"Yeah, but you're really missing her now," Dean said, stating it as a fact.
Just when I think he's too wrapped up in his own world to see anything else, he comes up with something like this. "What makes you say that?" he asked, refusing to admit Dean was correct.
"Apple juice," Dean said. "When ever you're really missing her, if you can, you'll drink apple juice. And always 'the good stuff.' Your daughter must be crazy about it, especially 'the good stuff.'"
"You spend way too much time trying to figure me out," Roman said, rolling his eyes and pretending much more annoyance than he was really feeling. "Go, take care of things. I want to get to the hotel and have some time to sleep." He opened the door and got out of the car, fishing for his wallet in his back pocket as he walked around to the pump.
*I was reminded by a beta reader that everyone doesn't know what WaWa is, because they aren't everywhere in the world or even the USA. WaWa's are these gas stations that also sell food. Not just prewrapped sandwiches, they make subs to order and often have sides like mac and cheese or real mashed potatoes. They sell fountain drinks, specialty coffee drinks and smoothies, and many other things. They are like a cross between a gas station and a truck stop.