This chapter was both super difficult and super entertaining to write. Entertaining because I might be a sadist when it comes to putting Roman in difficult situations. Difficult because Roman is frustrating to write. And halfway through, my fiancé replaced every single "Roman" with "Ramen"... That was a fun discovery... His shrewd advice was to change Dean's name to doughnut and get rid of Seth completely since he doesn't have a food name. Yup...Tempting

CHAPTER SEVEN: The Chairshot Heard Around the World

June 2, 2014 9:13 PM

"Roman? ROMAN?"

Roman opened his eyes to see Dean standing in front of him in one of the Indianapolis arena hallways. Roman couldn't help himself; he flinched away when he saw Dean. He couldn't see past the mental image of a crazed Dean with furious eyes trying to kill him...

Dean looked at Roman: concerned and kind of confused."You okay, Rome? I came 'round the corner to see you standing there with your eyes closed. Everything alright?"

Roman mentally cursed himself; he needed to keep this moment separate from the alternate timestream. If he didn't, he would drive himself insane, but it was so difficult. That image of Dean was so potent. Shaking his head, Roman tried to eradicate his memory of Dean snarling and reaching for his throat to try and kill him from his head. That was a different Dean in a different time… Roman responded, "Yeah, I'm fine. I was just getting in the zone for the match tonight. It's all good, bro."

Dean just looked at him, the look of concern still very much present in his eyes. "You look rattled… Are you sure you're alright?"

"Yeah, don't worry about me."

Dean nodded, slowly before he froze. "What happened to your neck, Rome?" He carefully ghosted his fingers over the spot where the other, the crazy Dean had grasped his throat and tried to choke him to death.

Roman couldn't help but flinch away from Dean's touch. It was too soon…"It's nothing, Dean. Just some bruises from Payback. No a big deal."

Dean frowned: offended and still very worried. "It's all red and looks like you're bruising... I don't remember you being put into a choke hold last night…"

Roman shrugged it off. "It's from right before Seth did his swan dive. Like I said, no big deal."

"If you're sure…" Dean repeated. He shrugged before muttering, "I guess I'll go prep for the match. See you by our mark." Dean gave Roman a weak smile before wandering off.

Roman slumped against the wall and took a deep breath. Logically, he knew Dean hadn't tried to kill him. It hadn't happened yet, and after he stopped himself from talking to Seth here, it never would. All he had to do was undo his actions. However, he also had to come up with some sort of game plan to try to fix everything. This entire task was beginning to seem more and more impossible. Maybe he had to address different issues when he talked to Seth...

But really, what was the point? Regardless of what he talked about with Seth, surely, whatever he did here would only make things worse… It seemed to be the trend here. Roman could never win. Maybe he would be better off just calling it and returning to his original timeline.

No, it was still worth trying. He owed it to his brothers. He owed it to himself. Didn't he deserve to be happy? And he was happy with two brothers by his side…Didn't he deserve to be happy?

Roman stood up and began to walk over to the Shield locker room to head his past self off. He turned the corner and saw the past Roman go to follow Seth into the locker room. Roman broke into a sprint and grabbed his past self by the back of the sweatshirt hood, preventing him from following Seth into the locker room.

His double spun around, ready to attack; however, he froze when he saw he was being held back by himself. After a moment of contemplation, the double asked his future self in disbelief and frustration, "It doesn't work?"

Roman shook his head. "It definitely didn't work. You'll thank me later for stopping you."

"How bad?"

Roman hesitated before he said, "Seth gets a career ending injury and has to retire, and Dean...goes insane."

The double winced. "More insane than normal?"

Roman nodded, remembering how his head rushed from the lack of oxygen and how Dean seemed to get off on hurting him. "Not the good kind of insane."

"Okay." Roman's double nodded. "Maybe we should stop then. It doesn't seem like anything is going to work. Maybe we're not meant to stop the chairshot. Maybe we're not meant to change the past."

"Stop the chairshot…" Roman muttered to himself, not paying attention to what the double had said. "Stop the chairshot?"

"What? You have a plan?"

"Stop the chairshot." Roman shook his head. "I feel like we're missing something fairly obvious here."

"Yeah, I know exactly what you mean. I still don't get what keeps going wrong. It's like we're forgetting something. Like there's some variable we're overlooking..." The double rubbed his beard in contemplation.

Roman sighed. "It's alright. I'll think of something. It's just- stop the chairshot. Huh… " Roman frowned as he realized he was approaching everything terribly wrong.

The double frowned. "Why do you keep repeating that?"

Shaking his head, Roman fixed his gaze on the double. "I think I know what we have to do."

"What?" The double asked, hurriedly, knowing time was not on their side.

"We've been focusing on preventing the chairshot from ever happening. Right?"

"Right," the double repeated, slowly, unsure of where Roman was going with this.

"What if the key was to stop the chairshot, not prevent it from happening?" Roman asked with a sly yet sneaky grin as his lips twisted into a sick snarl.

The double stared at him. "I don't think that makes sense. If you stop it...Seth will have already tried to betray us, and doesn't that go against everything we're trying to do?"

"But he won't succeed."

"Yeah, but Dean will probably have issues with accepting him after he tried to blindside us with a steel chair. The Shield will still be cracked. We could never be what we were if you let the chairshot happen. We won't ever be whole."

Roman shrugged. "I don't know what you're talking about. I just want my brothers back. Maybe I should stop sweating the small details…"

"Are you saying," the double paused, unsure if he was interpreting the situation wrong. "What the hell are you saying?" The double's eyes were wide with disbelief.

"Maybe we're too focused on Seth liking us...We're too eager to be the nice guy in this situation. What have we learned so far? We've lost in every scenario so far! We can't win like this! We need to try something radical, and if that means, we won't come out the hero? That's fine with me."

The double stared at Roman. "I don't know about this…"

Roman looked at the double before he felt a smirk quirk at the ends of his lips. "Well, it's not like that really matters; does it?"

The double stared at Roman, almost nervously. He was talking to himself (his own counterpart) right now; he should trust him entirely, but why was he so apprehensive? Something about his counterpart was unnerving him; there was something ferial in his eyes, something desperate. "What do you mean by that?"

Roman shrugged. "I mean, suppose we made another paradox by having us both here at the same time? Remember what happened last time we did that?"

The double's eyes widened. "You have to help me! We can figure out a way around this together! Don't do this, Roman! You're better than this! I'm better this!"

"It's too late for that," Roman said, emotionlessly as he watched the double clutch his stomach and the exposed portions of his skin began to bubble and ripple.

His double fixed him with a betrayed look. He said in a raspy voice, "What happened to you?"

Roman looked at him, unimpressed. "My own brother tried to kill me. And I know what you're thinking; it wasn't Seth. No, it was Dean. You know, the brother that's been by my side this entire time. He tried to strangle me to death because I didn't chose him."

"That was another timeline! You can't blame him for what happened," the double said as he grasped at his abdomen harder trying to reason with himself.

"You're right. It was another timeline, but that doesn't make Dean any less capable of it." Roman shook his head.

The double began coughing, violently and clutching his chest. His body began to sag as his organs began to liquefy.

Roman glanced around the hallway, concerned someone would hear the commotion his double was making and would come to investigate. However, he didn't need to worry since the next time he glanced over at his double, he was already almost completely melted. A deep sigh escaped from Roman, and he hurried off towards where his counterpart in this timeline was hanging out and getting ready for tonight's match.

Just as Roman turned around the corner leaving the scene of the crime, Seth came out of the locker room, deciding to head over to their entrance mark a little early since he was practically climbing the walls over what he was about to do. He leaned against the wall next to the door and sighed. Seth frowned when he noticed the red tinged puddle on the ground. Shaking his head, he slipped his headphones on and shuddered slightly. For whatever reason, the mystery puddle really unsettled him.

Seth began walking towards the entrance mark with his eyes still focused on the puddle, and he bumped into a pretty woman with brown eyes and long wavy hair, almost knocking her over. He carefully caught her and righted her. "I'm so sorry, miss. I wasn't paying enough attention to where I was going."

Marty smiled at Seth. "Don't worry about it, darling. I'm fine, right as rain. Good luck to you tonight, dear. Lord knows, y'all will need it."

Seth watched her walk away, confused. What the heck was that supposed to mean? Then he noticed the puddle on the ground was completely gone. Seth shook his head and walked away. His pre-betrayal jitters were obviously getting to him...

A couple hallways over, the Roman of 2014 was happily listening to his Ipod while he scrolled through a blog post about healthy smoothies on his phone. He was completely in his own little world. Suddenly, he was grabbed by the front of his vest and heaved to his feet.

Whoever was attacking him was wearing a Shield hoodie sweatshirt with the hood pulled low over his face. However, when the attacker pulled his right fist back to coldcock him, Roman caught a glimpse of familiar gray eyes glaring at him.

"What the hell," Roman muttered before the fist made contact with his jaw as he lost consciousness.

Roman from the future caught his past self as he slumped. "Jeez, why am I so heavy?"

Wondering what he should do with his own unconscious body, Roman considered the fact he should have made a more conclusive plan before he bludgeoned himself in the head. He sighed and considered his options. He definitely needed to hide his past self somewhere but where? In the locker room? Under the ring? Wherever it was, he needed to make the decision quickly because he'd bet this would be impossible to talk his way out of if two of him showed up on TV. Vince would have a cow or would dream up some strange twin storyline.

With another glance around, he noticed the same janitor's closet he had hid in earlier. Stashing an unconscious body in a closet? It was cliched, he would admit, but you couldn't knock on the classics. He dragged the body forward and shoved the door open, and not-so-carefully, tossed his past self in. Roman winced when his past self smacked his head on the side of the closet. Oh well…

Okay, it was time to think through this plan. What did he need to make this work? For starters, he needed to look the part: ring gear.

Roman quickly pulled off his past self's boots and pants, and he traded his sneakers and jeans for them. Why is this so weird, he wondered. It's my body; it's not like I'm invading someone else's privacy.

He pulled off the handy hoodie and traded it for the tactical vest. Roman briefly considered tying his past self up just in case the man would awaken early and halt his plans entirely. He ultimately decided against it since he didn't have anything with him to tie himself up with, and he did hit him pretty hard. Roman didn't think he'd be getting up anytime soon, so there would be no need to take that precaution.

Roman took a deep breath and checked the time on the golden pocket watch. Perfect, he had just enough time to head over to the entrance mark to meet Seth and Dean.

The next ten minutes were a weird blur for Roman: surreal at reliving things he had already seen and done but also very foreign. Everything felt like it was from decades ago. The sound of Sierra, Hotel, India, Echo, Lima, Delta, Shield was so strange to hear; he never even realized he missed it. He felt like he was underwater with everything sounding muted and far away. Roman was there, he was going through the motions, but his mind was far away. He was almost reeling with the possibilities of what his actions would yield.

Finally, he found himself in the ring with Dean and Seth. He couldn't help but contain the adrenaline coursing through his body, and he began to pace to try to burn some of it off while Dean began speaking.

"How do we look? Cause we feel great. Bruised, beaten up for sure because last night we faced our greatest challenge to date: a no hold barred elimination match against Evolution. When the napalm settled, we did exactly what we always said we'd do - eliminate every single member of Evolution without a single elimination of our own. That's what I call domination." Dean dropped his mic and stalked off, shooting a small smile at Roman as he turned around. Roman couldn't find it in himself to smile back at the Lunatic Fringe, his mind still reeling from the man trying to kill him.

Next up was Seth. "Adapt or perish? That was the whole deal right? Last night at Payback, the Shield adapted while Evolution perished. And earlier tonight the whole world was a witness to their implosion. And the reason Evolution perished was because even though they are three of the greatest superstars in the history of this industry, last night they were not one like the Shield. In the end, they were just three strangers that just happened to be standing on the same side of the ring."

"They weren't brothers," Roman said. He stared at Seth until the Architect looked over at him. Roman knew his past self had put a hand on Seth's shoulder as a display of brotherhood, of solidarity, but he didn't. In that moment, it didn't matter that those events hadn't happened yet (or might never happen); all that mattered was Roman remembered them. Seth frowned, and Roman could see confusion in the young man's eyes.

Roman continued, "The men standing in this ring are brothers. We bleed for each other; we stand with each other. This is evolution," Roman said as he held out an open hand before he closed it into a fist and said, "And this is the Shield. Randy Orton! Get your ass out here and let me break your jaw with this symbol of excellence."

And there it was: Evolution's entrance theme. Triple H and Orton confidently strutted down to the ring as their ring music, underscored with a chorus of boos. Triple H held his trusty sledgehammer close, ready to weld the awful weapon.

Seth slide out of the ring and grabbed some chairs from the tech guys. He set the chairs on the floor of the ring and slide back in before standing next to his brothers, holding onto one of the chairs.

"In case you haven't figured it out yet, what I do better than anybody is adapt. Last night was Plan A; tonight - tonight is Plan B." Hunter paused before he smirked and said again, "There's always a Plan B."

Dean and Roman took a couple steps forward ready to attack, leaving Seth standing alone behind them, leaving themselves unprotected against their teammate. He could picture Seth tensing his arm muscles before pulling the chair back and preparing to perform the "chairshot heard around the world".

Roman waited a moment before he spun around, catching the steel chair aimed directly for his back.

Seth's wide eyes stared at him as he held onto the opposite end of the chair. The Architect looked completely shocked, and he was comprehend what had happened. Roman slowly shook his head at Seth and yanked the chair out of his grasp. Yet again, Seth tried to betray him; Roman knew this was going to happen, and yet he couldn't stop the sheer rage from engulfing his entire being.

Seth wanted to end their brotherhood. This thought seemed to take tangible form and flash red in front of his eyes. Roman pulled the chair back and released a devastating hit to Seth's torso; the physical hit didn't quell his fury, so after Seth hunched forward, he followed it up with smack to Seth's back. The Architect crumpled to the mat.

"What the hell are you doing, Roman?" Dean's livid voice rose just loud enough to be heard over the rumble of the crowd. The Lunatic Fringe grabbed Roman's arm, trying to stop the Samoan. "What the hell do you think you're doing?" he yelled.

Roman looked at the Lunatic Fringe. He was doubting Roman's actions! Roman was doing this for him; he was doing this for Seth; he was doing this to make them a family his eyes narrowed into a glare over at Dean and shoved him back with the hand not holding the chair.

Dean's eyes widened in disbelief as he fell backwards, not expecting that type of physical response. Roman had hit Seth with the chair, Roman, of all people, for God's sake. Now the Samoan was advancing towards him with the chair in hand. His big brother raised it over his head and sent it sailing down towards Dean, and Dean could only watch with disbelieving eyes.

"Ooooooaaaah!"

Smack.

Smack. Smack. Smack.

Smack

Dean groaned. His arms holding, grasping onto his abused torso. His entire body ached. And it was far from over. He looked up in apprehension as Roman lifted the chair again, and he closed his eyes, unwilling to see the dead look in Roman's eyes: an expression void of any form of empathy or remorse.

Smack Smack Smack

But the next hit never hit Dean. Dean opened his eyes to see Seth leaning over him: his expression twisted in pain as Roman rained chairshots down on his back.

Roman grabbed the back of Seth's vest and flung him across the ring like a ragdoll. He snorted at the now-bent chair in his hands before he flung it out of the ring, almost hitting someone in the crowd but just narrowly missing them. Roman stalked over to the other chair and snatched it up.

Smack Smack Smack until the chair broke over Dean's back that time. Roman glowered at them, willing them to get up, holding the bent and dented chair. But neither could; neither would. Both Seth and Dean were as broken and bent as the chair Roman held in his hands.

Roman exited the ring and walked up to Triple H and Orton. Orton held out his hand for the chair, but Roman ignored it. Instead, he glared at the two and dropped the dented chair at their feet. He glared at the two men before he stalked backstage, hearing the boos surround him and someone in the crowd yelling "WHY?" at him.

Before he turned the corner to go around the curtain, he saw Orton and Hunter getting into the ring. Triple H was readying his sledgehammer for a hit on his fallen brothers… but Roman kept walking and never looked back.

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