The Counter-Invasion
By: Jay Winger

Timeline Note: This chapter picks up the Monday after the last one.

Teaser: Cards are glimpsed, plans nearly exposed, but Rose keeps his cards close to his vest as he continues his plans.

Rating: R - for violence and profanity

Disclaimer: All things WWF and WCW are property of WWFE, Inc. All things ECW are property of whomever the frell owns ECW. All things CIW are property of me. The characters of "The Storm" Matthew Skinner, Claire "Rain" Whittaker, Billy Rose, Brad "Brick" Dickerson, the band Cold Steel, et al. are also my property. Please ask before you use them. Viper, Rattler, Soul, Cobra, Python, and all other creations of Boulder are his property and are used with his permission.

Previously: The leaders of the Alliance made it clear to the Dudleys that failure to defeat The Storm and Billy Rose in their table match would not be tolerated. Upon his arrival, Rose is confronted by The Storm and Brick, who make it clear they won't like it if whatever he has planned is bad for the WWF. When Vince McMahon went to Rose to find out what he was up to, Rose just told him "You'll thank me for it." Dudleyz def. The Storm & Billy Rose in a Table Match by 3-D'ing Rose through a table. Before they could leave, however, Scion and Brick attacked them, with Bubba Ray getting a Breaker Chokeslam through a table and D-Von a Downdraft, then Scion's Jesus Wept senton bomb. Rose then flashed a mysterious hand-sign -- all fingers extended but the middle finger and thumb, which form a circle -- to the fallen Dudleys. When he left the arena, Rose saw Shane McMahon watching him, and taunted him with the same hand-sign before leaving.

Chapter 5: We Are Alive

Raw: January 6

The Storm -- otherwise known as Matthew Skinner -- paced in the Z-Men's commandeered restroom. It was a tad crowded in there, since not only were Zed & Zeta there, so were Dee, Rain, Scion, Brick, and Stone Cold. "I don't know what Rose has planned, but I think he's going to go public with it tonight."

"You think he's got bad intentions?" Austin inquired.

"You kidding? This is Billy Fucking Rose we're talking about," Skinner replied. "He's up to something bad. Maybe not right away, but whatever he has in mind has to be bad news."

"Relax, man," Zed spoke up. "You nearly gave yourself a coronary last time you got all worked up about Rose."

"Yeah, crank the adrenaline down a few dozen notches, okay?" Zeta said.

The Storm seethed, then snapped, "Shit! I have to get some air." He stomped out of the restroom and toward the cafeteria.

Rain, Austin, and Brick shared a look, then followed. Zed, Zeta, Dee, and Scion looked at each other, then shrugged.

* * *

Billy Rose arrived in his limo as usual, except this time when he got out he was accompanied by a raven-haired woman in a dark expensive business suit. She followed him as he headed for his locker room. His red shirt was buttoned up, and he wore some black T-Shirt underneath, but its logo or design was covered up. He walked past his locker room, however, and headed straight for the VIP Room with the "Mr. McMahon" sign on it.

Rose smirked as he entered. "Hiya, Vince," he said by way of greeting. He picked up a piece of paper that had the schedule of matches on it. He'd gotten a copy of it earlier in the day, and was pleased to see no major changes on it. "Looking at this, I have to go get ready for the Dudleys' match."

Vince blinked. "Um, Billy, a few things... first, who's this woman, second, you're not in the Dudleys' match, and third, what the hell are you talking about?"

Rose smirked. "All will become clear, but just so you're not totally in the dark, my associate, Jenny Black, here, will bring you up to speed, even as I do the same for that fat bastard Heyman out in the ring." He walked straight out of the room, while Jenny started explaining things to Mr. McMahon.

* * *

The Dudleys match that night was against Scion and Brick, in retaliation for their running out to help The Storm and Rose last Thursday. The Dudleys had taken control of the match, isolating Scion and working him over in their corner. Brick watched with a forbidding expression, and everyone who looked at him knew the match was all but over when he got tagged in.

But that never happened. Bubba Ray and D-Von both took a swing at him and managed to knock him off the apron and into the barricade. They were prepared to set up Scion for a 3-D when Billy Rose walked down the ramp, smirking.

"What's he doing out here?" J.R. wondered.

"About to get his ass kicked by the Dudleys!" Paul Heyman replied. "He has no right to be out here."

"Billy Rose seems to be smirking about something," Jim Ross said, noting that usual expression on his face. "What's he-- wait a minute." On the ramp, Rose slowly raised his fist up until it was level with his head, then flashed that same hand-sign he had last Thursday -- all fingers but the middle finger and thumb extended, with those two forming a circle. "That's that same gesture he made last week on Smackdown." He held this hand-sign for several moments, and then things went crazy.

From the front rows of the audience at ringside, people seemed to just boil out of it, jumping over the barricade and rushing into the ring, blindsiding the Dudleys, swarming about them. Rose laughed, strutting along to ringside as the Dudleys were besieged upon by numerous people.

Two tall men, identical in appearance aside from the tattoos one had on his arms, whipped D-Von into the ropes. One then caught him by the leg and hoisted him high in the air. As he came down, the other twin added his own strength into a big tandem powerbomb. Bubba was being attacked by three men, one with dark red hair and a pointed goatee, one with his blond hair tied back in a ponytail, and a well-muscled black man with a flat-top haircut. Finally, they let him go, and the red-haired man grabbed Bubba by the head as though for a bulldog. He ran at the corner, jumped, planted his feet on the turnbuckle, then pushed off, flipping over Bubba's head, twisting in mid-air, and coming down in a big neckbreaker.

"What the-- What the hell is going on?! Who are all these people?!" Heyman was screaming.

Nate Starr was among the people who had jumped out of the crowd. He grinned, then jumped to the top rope, then launched off in his Super-Starr Press onto D-Von. A smallish man with slicked-back black hair directed a larger man with a mop of hair on the top of his otherwise shaved head to stand Bubba Ray up. The smaller man stomped his foot a few times, then delivered a superkick in the vein of Shawn Michaels to the white Dudley. As Bubba staggered from the blow, the larger man caught him by the neck with both hands, lifted him up, then threw him to the mat in a variant of the Baldo Bomb.

Rose laughed again, then took a microphone from the timekeeper. "Hello, Heyman!" he grinned. "I suppose you're wondering what the hell I'm doing out here, and just who all these people are? Well, I'll tell you!"

He climbed onto the announcers' table, then stood and proclaimed, "Ladies and gentlemen, for the past two and a half months, you've heard all about WWF versus WCW, WWF versus ECW. You saw Shane and Stephanie McMahon team up to make life extraordinarily painful for their father, the WWF. You listened to Shane and Stephanie whine about how they were tired of waiting for Vince McMahon to die. You listened to Paul Heyman rant about wrestling and the 'Tribe of Extreme.'"

Rose had said this first part with a patronizing smile, but his expression soured as he went on, "But I'm here to tell you that long before Paul E. Heyman made extreme wrestling a viable force in this industry, there was a forgotten league that was extreme long before ECW stood for Extreme Championship Wrestling. There was a wrestling league whose wrestlers would have given their right arms to get their league the nice, fat television contract that Paul Heyman had. They would have given their left arms to get a contract with WCW. They were there, pouring their blood, their sweat, their very souls into the ring night after night, week after week, month after month, year after damn year, and not a soul in the world cared about it, because that little wrestling fed was obscure, forgotten. And why was it forgotten? Because everyone's extreme wrestling quota was already filled by the second-born, it was filled by ECW!"

Rose turned and glared down at Heyman, who was staring up at him, mouth hanging open. "Well, they aren't going to be forgotten anymore! They've sat by for too long while they watch the great pretenders get all the glory." The Californian lifted his head and looked out at the crowd. "Ladies and gentlemen, I am out here to announce that as of this moment, I, Billy Rose, am hereby levelling the playing field in the favor of the WWF! I am hereby bringing in that forgotten wrestling league. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you..." He gestured to the ring. "C... I... W!"

The fans, who had been watching Rose with bizarre silence, started to cheer. The Mental Elite then turned back to Heyman with a smirk. "And just as WCW launched it's invasion, CIW is hereby launching it's counter-invasion! Just as ECW took the invasion to the extreme, CIW is bringing it to a whole new extreme!"

Rose dropped the mike straight in Heyman's lap, then ripped open his red shirt to reveal his T-Shirt sported a sharp-pointed legend that read: C I W. The I looked like a railroad spike, and electric bolts decorated the letters. The assembled CIWers in the ring all pulled off their overshirts to reveal they wore the same T-Shirt, as a song by Offspring started blaring on the P.A. "You cannot stop us, you cannot bring us down, never give up, we go on and on, you'll never break us, never bring us down... we... are... ALIVE!"

As the fans started cheering more loudly, a few scattered "C-I-W!" chants going, Rose jumped off the announcers' desk and walked triumphantly up the ramp, as the CIWers followed. They all gathered at the top of the ramp, faced the ring, and then, simultaneously, they all raised that same hand-sign, the CIW hand-sign.

* * *

In the back, Matthew Skinner watched this on the monitor. He ripped off his sunglasses and snarled at Rose's triumphant smirk. "You fucking son of a bitch," was all he said before he stalked back to his locker room, grabbed his bags, and left the building.

-more to come-

Next: CIW has arrived in the WWF. Feuds are struck up as the WWF/CIW Coalition takes on the WCW/ECW Alliance.

If you have any ideas for possible feuds/relationships for any of my characters, drop me a line at jay_winger_2k@hotmail.com.

-=Jay 2K Winger=-
Live and Almost Legal
February 8, 2002