"Have you heard from him yet?"
John Morrison sighs, resting a palm against his forehead as he stares at the edge of the cell phone pressed to his ear. He's been asked this every day since Monday and to be honest, it's gone beyond a little annoying now. "I'm fine, how are you?" he snips. When Miz doesn't respond, he sighs again. "I haven't heard from Teddy since Raw. I'm sure he's busy with... Smackdown things."
"Smackdown things?" his tag partner's voice goes highpitched like it does when he's about to explode and John winces, a headache forming. "Like what, tea parties with Hornswoggle? He's dodging us, Morrison."
There's no good answer for that- Morrison knows that Teddy has his focus elsewhere, say on his own superstars, but Miz won't appreciate hearing that and he does understand it because Miz is in an annoying position, trying to gain the tag belts and being ignored by the one man who's promised to help, but he can't do or say much else. "I'll try to get in contact with him but I don't want to annoy him, that won't help matters any."
It's Miz's turn to sigh this time and it almost blasts Morrison's eardrum as he flinches away from the phone. "Fine."
"See you in Washington?" he asks after a minute of tense silence.
"Yeah." With various media appearances and it being a long trip, flying in was a no-brainer this go around. The phone clicks unceremoniously after that clipped response and, after staring at his phone in aggravation for a moment, John returns to packing with a thoughtful grimace.
Ice feels like heaven right now as John leans against the wall at the trainer's office, his leg propped up on a chair. He's had knee problems for awhile now since the MCL tear awhile back. Tweaking it in a match is never fun but here, now, when Miz is expecting him to help win the tag belts... well, he and Mike may have issues but he doesn't like to leave people in the lurch, no matter what the circumstances are. Thankfully the trainer says it doesn't appear to be worse off, he just needs to take it easy, keep it iced, elevated. The usual things he's heard since the initial injury.
He's drifting off when the trainer's door is pushed open. "What do you need?" the trainer sounds crisp, professional. It's a superstar he doesn't particularly care for or doesn't know very well. A rare thing, considering the trainer's a friendly guy and very hands on, gets to know every superstar that goes through his door.
Morrison's curiosity's piqued so he opens his eyes to find Miz staring at him with a strange but familiar look on his face. It's brief but it's there- worry mixed with maybe a bit of anger before he catches John staring at him and makes his face blank. Miz always had impressive poker faces- except for his eyes, which betrays every thought. He sits up quickly and waves the trainer off, shifting his leg so the ice is more thoroughly on his achy knee. "It's ok," he offers after a moment. "I just need to ice and rest it; I'll be fine."
"I heard the rumors," he says quietly, John almost needing to lean forward to hear. "That you had knee problems, but..."
He grins a little. "My pants do pretty well at hiding the brace." He shifts his leg again and figures he may as well be forthcoming with him as Miz's eyes track his movements. "An MCL tear a while back," he explains. "It wasn't severe but sometimes, like tonight, I mess it up."
There's a quiet kind of respect in Mike's gaze now and John closes his eyes, dropping his head back against the wall. He's unaccustomed to seeing that look on his face since their split. The moment passes as quickly as it comes and Miz turns to the door, pausing briefly. When John turns to look at him once more, Miz is staring at him with an intensity that will perhaps one day help him to become world champion. "If you can win a match against Jericho despite all of this, winning the tag titles should be simple."
His lips twist sardonically and he nods to himself as Miz leaves. "Yeah..."
A little later Morrison watches Miz unveil his magazine cover in the ring as he goes through his career up to this point. Considering he skips a lot- like his start on ECW, and the brief time he went after the ECW title- John is almost relieved that he doesn't skip over their initial runs as a tag team, even if he starts harping on the Janetty/Michaels comparison again... but he doesn't exactly go into a tangent against Morrison. He shakes his head, smirking a little. The truce is holding, as strange as it may seem, some of the bitterness fading away bit by bit with it.
He sits up when Daniel Bryan comes out and challenges for the US title. Miz doesn't seem too affected, even accepts after a little digging by the former NXT rookie. Despite Miz's reaction, Morrison can't help but to feel that this will change everything. He slowly gets up, stretches his knee out a little, bending it. Finding that it's a little painful but not horribly, he sets off for the gorilla position to meet Mike. When he stumbles through, a mulish look on his face, Alex is with him and John stares at him until he wanders off, grumbling under his breath about the gall of Bryan.
"What?" Mike asks upon noticing that Riley's left and Morrison is now standing before him, a solemn look on his face.
"What are you going to do about Daniel Bryan?"
Miz snorts. "What do you think? I'm going to show him who the pro was way back in NXT season one and why." He peers at John's face despite the badly lit area and shakes his head. "Don't tell me you think that runt has a chance of beating me. In case you haven't noticed, I'm unstoppable right now. I have the US belt, money in the bank and I would be number one contender for the tag belts if those Smackdown punks weren't so pathetic." He laughs lowly, slapping John on the shoulder a little rougher than is neccessary before pushing past him. "Don't worry about me, Morrison. Focus on your own role in all of this."
John sighs, his shoulder stinging now. "Oh... I am. Are you though?" he mutters, turning to watch Miz leave seemingly without a care in the world.
