"We excuse our sloth under the pretext of difficulty"- Quintillian
To be fair, no one had ever claimed Alex Nooks was a hard worker. In fact, the complete truth was that no one expected him to do much after his husband, John Morrison, was fired. They were right, it turned out, Alex Nooks had grown morose and faded into obscurity.
He let it slide. He thought that fading into obscurity was what he was destined for. It wasn't that it was what he wanted, on the contrary. He loved being in the lime light, loved being on the road. Yet he missed John, missed his husband dearly. His work suffered because of it. His constant thoughts of his husband made his work suffer but would he do something?
The answer was no.
He sat by while others who didn't deserve pushes came to light. Though he kept up a happy smile and a kind demeanor, inside he seethed. Brodus Clay? Antonio Cesaro? John had taught him to deal with people like this, how to be more popular than all of them. Yet he stayed in the background, kept away from the crowds.
Perhaps that lack of attention and his actual ability drove the group known as the 3MB to his door.
Alex had been gearing up for a Superstars match when Drew McIntyre, Jinder Mahal, and Heath Slater showed up to his door. They badgered him about his sticking in the middle of the pack when he could so obviously be a main eventer. They invited him to come join them as a member of the stable, to break away.
He refused.
The 3MB did not take their rejection well. On another episode of Superstars, the 3MB came to watch. It didn't bother Alex, if anything it made him work that much harder.
After the match he found himself being confronted once again by the group that called themselves the 3MB. They claimed his success was due to their help, that without them he was doomed to always being on the low card, being not worth the fans time.
Again he refused.
The next time they interfered in one of his matches, it was detrimental to the outcome. They pounded him to a pulp for denying them. Alex tried to protect himself but in a 3 on 1 fight there was not much that he could do. The last thing he remembered that night was Drew's boot colliding with his head.
He knew that if he had friends backstage, if he had friends on Superstars, they would have helped. Yet they weren't. Most of his friends had quit, been fired, or had been on the road. They called afterwords but he had been to tired to talk to them.
He laid in his hotel and wondered why he didn't feel the need for revenge like he should. He wondered why he didn't care that three nobodies attacked him for no reason other than the fact that he refused to join the team.
Then it hit him.
He didn't care about that because he didn't care about his job. He hadn't cared about his job since John was fired. It was that he was depressed, Alex was probably the happiest man in the company. He just didn't feel like doing much with his career so he chose not to.
Funny thing about not wanting to find your motivation. Sometimes, just sometimes, your motivation just so happens to find you.
The 3MB had found Alex.
This feud with the 3MB had eliminated his sloth.
Not that he cared though. He was just fine only doing what needed to be done.