And Then They Hunt the Wounded Down
Notes:
-this is the beginning of an ongoing story. It's not done yet.
-I don't own the characters, it's not real, it's just a story, etc.
-it's rated for language.
-------------------------------------------
::Hunter::
You want to know a secret? You know Edge's entrance theme? I wrote those words. Really.
I never intended for it to be anybody's theme. Hell, I never intended it to be seen. By anyone.
After I wrote it and decided it struck way too much of a personal chord, I crumpled it up and
chucked it into the nearest trash can. I sure as hell never expected the damned thing to come
back... Yeah, I know. You probably don't believe me. That's okay... You think you know me.
I'm really not the asshole I play on tv. Aw, who am I kidding. I'm every bit that asshole and
then some.
I've been told that I'm not exactly the easiest person to get to know. I know I'm not the easiest
person to like, either. That doesn't bother me. In fact, I try my damndest to keep it that way. See,
once you get past the initial roadblocks I've built up, and you get inside my fucked up mind,
there's only two ways to go. Most people take one quick look around and run screaming for the
nearest exit. But the ones who don't get out right away actually start to drown in my shit. I've
seen it happen. I mean, look at Steph-- She really was a sweet kid before, but a couple of months
with me and she morphed into Super Bitch.
The only person who ever really saw me and stuck around anyway was Shane. Way back
before Stephanie and I, before DX, back when I was still floundering in the mid-card, buried there
as punishment for my bit in the whole MLG incident, Shane got an eyeful of the real me. And he
didn't run. He didn't drown either. He threw me a lifeline.
To say my relationship with my father was rocky would be the ultimate understatement. We
were so far beyond rocky that rocky would have been roses and sunshine. Even as a little kid, I
could never do anything right. I remember helping him clean out the garage once. I was seven.
Seven damned years old and that bastard picked me up and threw me clear across the garage for
dripping paint from a leaky can on His Floor. I can still remember lying there half-dazed yet oddly
mesmerized by the incredibly strange angle my right arm seemed to be hanging at while he ranted
about what a hopeless moron and how much damned trouble I was; I couldn't even clean a garage
without making it worse.
That's the way it went with him. I went from being "nothing but trouble" to "not worth the
trouble" to "a mistake". Maybe if it was just the beatings, I'd have been able to handle it better.
You can get used to that kind of pain. But the things he's say... And I never knew what was going
to set him off. I started to feel like a whipped puppy, always looking over it's shoulder, fearing
the next kick or scolding. I guess I looked like it too. Kids at school started calling me Hunted
instead of Hunter. Yeah. Real damned cute to a kid who's getting his ass kicked in the one place
he was supposed to feel safe. Bastards.
Well, I'll give the old man this much– If I hadn't been doing anything and everything just to
get the hell out of the house, I probably never would have become a wrestler. And I never would
have gotten to know Shane. We didn't start out friends. Not that we were enemies. We just didn't
really travel in the same circles. To be honest, I never really paid much attention to him before
that day in the locker room.
It happened during a show and a particularly hellish confrontation with my father. The old man
had me backed against a wall with a death-grip around my throat when the locker room door
swung open, slamming into the wall with a crash that even made the old man jump. There he
stood, glaring at my father in all his "Boss' Son" glory.
"I'm sorry," he said, sounding anything but. "Visitor's are not allowed in the locker rooms."
My father let go of me and as I sank to the floor gasping for breath he tore into Shane with
such a furry that I couldn't help but cringe. But damned if that kid didn't stand his ground. He
didn't even bother to respond in words. He just held the door open and patiently waited for the
unwanted "visitor" to leave. He acted as though he expected nothing less than my father's total
compliance. A trick, I figure, he picked up from his own father.
After a few choice words which Shane wisely ignored, the old man left and I, still on the floor,
was overcome by a nasty case of the shakes and an overwhelming desire to cry. (I know, I know.
I'm a pathetic son-of-a-bitch.)
He never asked me to talk about it. He just sat down, right there on the floor; near enough to
let me know he was there, but far enough to give me my space.
It felt like hours before I finally pulled myself together enough to look up, but when I did, the
look in his eyes... It wasn't a look of pity, or disdain or any of the other usual stuff. It was the
complete and total understanding of someone who has been there.
* * * *
Notes:
-this is the beginning of an ongoing story. It's not done yet.
-I don't own the characters, it's not real, it's just a story, etc.
-it's rated for language.
-------------------------------------------
::Hunter::
You want to know a secret? You know Edge's entrance theme? I wrote those words. Really.
I never intended for it to be anybody's theme. Hell, I never intended it to be seen. By anyone.
After I wrote it and decided it struck way too much of a personal chord, I crumpled it up and
chucked it into the nearest trash can. I sure as hell never expected the damned thing to come
back... Yeah, I know. You probably don't believe me. That's okay... You think you know me.
I'm really not the asshole I play on tv. Aw, who am I kidding. I'm every bit that asshole and
then some.
I've been told that I'm not exactly the easiest person to get to know. I know I'm not the easiest
person to like, either. That doesn't bother me. In fact, I try my damndest to keep it that way. See,
once you get past the initial roadblocks I've built up, and you get inside my fucked up mind,
there's only two ways to go. Most people take one quick look around and run screaming for the
nearest exit. But the ones who don't get out right away actually start to drown in my shit. I've
seen it happen. I mean, look at Steph-- She really was a sweet kid before, but a couple of months
with me and she morphed into Super Bitch.
The only person who ever really saw me and stuck around anyway was Shane. Way back
before Stephanie and I, before DX, back when I was still floundering in the mid-card, buried there
as punishment for my bit in the whole MLG incident, Shane got an eyeful of the real me. And he
didn't run. He didn't drown either. He threw me a lifeline.
To say my relationship with my father was rocky would be the ultimate understatement. We
were so far beyond rocky that rocky would have been roses and sunshine. Even as a little kid, I
could never do anything right. I remember helping him clean out the garage once. I was seven.
Seven damned years old and that bastard picked me up and threw me clear across the garage for
dripping paint from a leaky can on His Floor. I can still remember lying there half-dazed yet oddly
mesmerized by the incredibly strange angle my right arm seemed to be hanging at while he ranted
about what a hopeless moron and how much damned trouble I was; I couldn't even clean a garage
without making it worse.
That's the way it went with him. I went from being "nothing but trouble" to "not worth the
trouble" to "a mistake". Maybe if it was just the beatings, I'd have been able to handle it better.
You can get used to that kind of pain. But the things he's say... And I never knew what was going
to set him off. I started to feel like a whipped puppy, always looking over it's shoulder, fearing
the next kick or scolding. I guess I looked like it too. Kids at school started calling me Hunted
instead of Hunter. Yeah. Real damned cute to a kid who's getting his ass kicked in the one place
he was supposed to feel safe. Bastards.
Well, I'll give the old man this much– If I hadn't been doing anything and everything just to
get the hell out of the house, I probably never would have become a wrestler. And I never would
have gotten to know Shane. We didn't start out friends. Not that we were enemies. We just didn't
really travel in the same circles. To be honest, I never really paid much attention to him before
that day in the locker room.
It happened during a show and a particularly hellish confrontation with my father. The old man
had me backed against a wall with a death-grip around my throat when the locker room door
swung open, slamming into the wall with a crash that even made the old man jump. There he
stood, glaring at my father in all his "Boss' Son" glory.
"I'm sorry," he said, sounding anything but. "Visitor's are not allowed in the locker rooms."
My father let go of me and as I sank to the floor gasping for breath he tore into Shane with
such a furry that I couldn't help but cringe. But damned if that kid didn't stand his ground. He
didn't even bother to respond in words. He just held the door open and patiently waited for the
unwanted "visitor" to leave. He acted as though he expected nothing less than my father's total
compliance. A trick, I figure, he picked up from his own father.
After a few choice words which Shane wisely ignored, the old man left and I, still on the floor,
was overcome by a nasty case of the shakes and an overwhelming desire to cry. (I know, I know.
I'm a pathetic son-of-a-bitch.)
He never asked me to talk about it. He just sat down, right there on the floor; near enough to
let me know he was there, but far enough to give me my space.
It felt like hours before I finally pulled myself together enough to look up, but when I did, the
look in his eyes... It wasn't a look of pity, or disdain or any of the other usual stuff. It was the
complete and total understanding of someone who has been there.
* * * *