After a few days stewing on it, Mike's gnashing his teeth, not even caring about the veneers he had put in after losing his teeth months ago. He's just so angry about what Ziggler's done that he can't even find the words, which has never happened before. He stares at Maryse as she kisses Heath goodbye, turning back to him. "Are you still speechless?" she wonders, reaching out to adjust his shirt. "AJ called and said you've been uncharacteristically silent at home."
His eyes are blazing as he stares at her and she releases a breath, not surprised by his anger but thrown by this lengthy silence from him. "Alright, I'll do the talking tonight then," she shrugs, patting his arm and walking with him back towards Shane and Daniel's office. They don't bother knocking, Maryse and Mike both glaring at Daniel as he turns to face them. She talks while Mike glowers behind him, stuttering a little because his intensity is overwhelming. She course corrects and continues to rant against the decision to let Ziggler defend his Intercontinental title against Raw.
When Bryan suggests that Mike accept his rematch for the following Smackdown, Miz purses his lips and looks like he wants to say something but Maryse accepts the match for him, Mike staring at her in shock once he realizes what she's done. Daniel looks smug as she drags him out of the office, walking back to his private locker room. He's still speechless, but now for an entirely different reason. "Look, I know you weren't planning on that, but if he's challenging someone else, better to get your rematch out of the way. You can win it back next week and defeat Sami easily, or you can risk not getting the belt back at all if it goes to Raw." Maryse pats his back, rubbing a little here and there. "I would've waited for your imput but you haven't been talking since you arrived here, so. I did the best i could. Forgive me?"
He closes his eyes, shrugs listlessly. "I should be the one apologizing," he mumbles, his voice gravelly. "It's stupid. I should've talked to Daniel myself. It's fine." He tries to smile at her but the expression fails, fades back into a grimace. "I guess at least I have a week to figure out a strategy against Ziggler. I've wrestled him enough times, should be easy, huh?"
"That's the spirit," she says, beaming at him. "Now, I would ordinarily stay with you but I need to check on a certain tag team champion... see if Rhyno won his election."
"Fine," he sighs. "Go ahead." She leans in and kisses his forehead before rushing off, Mike sitting back and trying to think. Losing the IC belt and getting overlooked for Sami eats at him because it seems like he's going to be kept off of the Survivor Series card entirely. "How stupid. I probably should've booked that third Christmas movie that I passed up while I was still champion... Oh well." He closes his eyes and crosses his arms over his chest. "Maybe we'll just go to Vancouver that weekend. Sara is a little older, she'll probably enjoy it."
Now that he has some sort of a plan, he feels a little better about things and settles back to call home, check on his girls and run his thoughts by AJ.