A/N: This technically isn't BtB's birthday week- I posted chapter one on Sunday, July 25th, 2010- but the chapters somehow fall that this is 52, and the pay per view that led to the creation of this story is this weekend anyway, so I'm treating it like it is. Thus you all get this chapter AND a bonus story! Enjoy...
Hours after the impromptu fireworks at the cove, Mike, Alex and John return to Mike's house, all three too exhausted to go much further. With mumbled good nights, the three men split up- Mike to his room, and John and Alex to the individual guest rooms. Sleepily relieved that he has a house large enough for extra bedrooms, he sinks down into his own sheets with a content sigh. Though he smells like sea, smoke and cloying sulfur from the fireworks, he's too weighed down by exhaustion to even consider heading for the shower. With a shrug, he buries himself further into the comforting warmth of his bed where he hovers for awhile on the edge of sleep, listening distantly to his house settling and cars driving past outside. Now and again, off in the distance, neighbors set off leftover fireworks and he smirks tiredly, remembering how it looked with the fireworks sparkling off of the ocean, Alex and John watching on in as much awe as him.
His mind is quieting, sounds fading around him, his body's need for sleep overwhelming him when awareness returns like a slap to the face. He jerks up briefly, gazing around his room wildly before he accepts that nothing is off within. Confused as to why he awoke in such a manner, he lays back down and focuses, listening for anything out of the ordinary. It takes a few moments but finally he hears it- muffled footsteps in the hallway, heading away from his room.
Unable to sleep now, he's out of his room within seconds, tracking the shadowy form to the living room. As the person settles in on the chair in front of the TV, slumping forward with a tired, strained sigh, Mike hovers in the doorway, uncertain what to do next. Annoyed by his own indecisiveness, he takes a hesitant step forward. "John?"
His former tag partner jerks, the look on his face almost comical even in the faint, green glow coming from the clock under the TV. "Mike?"
"What are you doing out here? I thought with your jetlag and all, you'd be out till next week," he half-jokes, finally walking the rest of the way into the room and settling down on a chair close to Morrison. For some reason he feels like he's dealing with a caged animal as John glances around the room, his eyes finally settling on his hands as they twist in his lap- an unusual nervous showing from the generally calm and collected man.
He ignores the question, licks his lips slightly. "Did I wake you up? I stumbled into a door on my way out here..."
Waving it off, Mike dismisses it with a shake of his head. "No big deal. But, seriously. Can't sleep?" Unwilling to let John off the hook so easily, he watches as he shifts, takes a deep breath and looks away. Despite still growing reaccustomed to Morrison's body language after so long of distancing himself from the man, it'd take a blind person with no social skills at all to realize something is off, had been off since... since Miz had mentioned him returning to the ring during the BBQ. A sick kind of foreboding leaving him near breathless with dread, he leans forward. "Talk to me, John."
"I didn't want to tell you while we were at the cove," he all but whispers, the house so quiet in the late hour and Miz's focus so tuned onto John that he still catches every word. "Ruin what... what you tried to do there. But..." He looks back over at Mike, his dark eyes gleaming. He holds his hand out and it takes Mike a minute to realize what, exactly, he's doing.
"Strength tests, huh? What are their purpose?"
"What does it sound like? It tests the strength in my hand post-surgery."
Mike doesn't even need to look at John's face to know he's rolling his eyes, flushing slightly. "Oh, shut up. I meant does this mean if you get good results, will you be cleared to return?" He's not sure how he feels about this- with Truth circling the rails more and more each week, Morrison's return could lead to another, even worse confrontation between the two, and if Morrison should return too soon...
"Maybe," he comments, ignoring the edge to Mike's words. He smirks, lifting a hand towards Mike. "Go on," he says blandly when the other man pauses uncertainly. Shrugging, Miz takes it, applying only slight pressure as John doesn't even move from his sitting position, still managing to twist his arm just enough to send fiery pain shooting up into his shoulder.
"Damn!" he grumbles, releasing him quickly. "Fine, fine, you're recovered. Geez."
His mouth suddenly dry, he reaches forward and, mimicking the memory movement by movement, clasps John's hand, watching closely as he tries and fails at repeating what he had done only a month prior, the only obvious sensation creeping up Mike's skin being how hard John's right arm starts shaking at the attempt. "Stop," he whispers, recoiling like he's been burnt. "God, John. What happened?"
"When Truth attacked me..." he breathes, "threw that trunk into me, I... My hand and arm was kind of numb that night and the next day, and I went to my rehab specialist before the Singapore tour." He barrels on as Mike gapes, speechless that it's been going on that long without him knowing. He looks up, steeling his jaw against the numerous emotions scratching at the surface as he peers at the former world champion. "They examined everything- my neck, the incision, my arm, everything and anything that could be the cause. It doesn't require further surgery- that's the good thing."
"And the bad?" Mike croaks, not even recognizing his own voice around the furious buzzing in his ears.
"More rehab, more time off," he explains. "Two months, or more."
"Why the hell didn't you tell me?" he hisses, his eyes flashing angrily as he leans forward. John flinches slightly as Mike slams his fists heavily against the arms of his chair, boxing him in effectively. "Dammit, John, you stubborn, selfish idiot, I told you returning that night was a bad idea, but no, you snuck around then and you're still sneaking around now. What, were you not going to tell me and just think I'd forget about it for TWO PLUS MONTHS?"
"I was going to tell you-" he mumbles, eyes downcast as Mike stands up.
"Somehow, I don't believe that," he retorts in a quieter fashion, remembering with a guilty jolt that Alex is also in the house, attempting to sleep. "Dammit." Too pissed to remain in the same room as John, he marches off into the kitchen and leans against the table for a moment, trying to calm down.
Only a few minutes pass- not nearly enough time for his raging temper to abate- when Morrison pads quietly into the room. "Tell me where you put my bags and I'll be out of here."
The chuckle that bursts from his lips is shaky and a little hysterical as he slaps a hand against the hard wood surface of the chair nearest, not even caring as it echoes through the room like a gunshot. "Oh yeah? Back to the apartment? How are you going to get there, walk? At 2 AM? In LA? You're stupider than I thought."
"I'll call a taxi," he says stiffly, wisely keeping his distance from Mike. "Where are my bags?"
"They're where they are staying until morning," he bites out furiously. "Now that you've unloaded on me finally, I'm sure you can make your way back to the guest room and sleep peacefully." His voice fades, anger slipping from between his fingers as he glares over at John, taking in his worn out, jet lagged appearance.
"Mike-"
"John, dammit, just go get some sleep. We'll talk in the morning... or something..." He huffs vaguely before pushing past John and heading resolutely up the hallway to his own room, certain that sleep will elude him but knowing that if he stays in the same room as Morrison for much longer, he might do something even more damaging than what Truth had done up to this point.
The next morning, Mike wakes up to find John and Alex still out, his house quiet and stifling with heat as early July presses down on California. He takes it in for a moment, remembering Ohio and how cold it used to be, even mid-summer warmth not enough to touch the chill remaining within him from the winter months. Of course now that I do live in LA, I choose a career that takes me through all the northern states during the coldest parts of the year anyway, he thinks with a mirthless smirk as he heads over to the AC controls, not wanting to leave his house guests uncomfortable as they sleep on. He pauses after turning the temperature down a bit, listening to the machine clicking on in response, and reflects on what John had told him the night before, how badly he had reacted. "Crap," he mumbles, sinking down into the same chair he had been sitting in the night before.
During the start of their first run as a tag team, Morrison had not been overly forthcoming, only admitting things when they needed to be told, private to the point of rigidity. To some it had seemed like aloofness, but, as much as it annoyed him sometimes, a part of Mike had understood the motivation behind keeping things close to the vest like that- with the cutthroat business they're in, it's almost a survival technique. Over time he had relaxed around Mike, just for his slow-grown trust and familiarity to be thrown back into his face with the results of the 2009 draft. He slinks forward, scrubbing at his still grit-tired eyes, huffing in aggravation. It always goes back to that damn draft... He had betrayed Morrison in a moment of self-preservation and, despite not regretting where exactly they've ended up, he can't help but wonder how things would have been if he had just handled that one split second even a tiny bit differently.
His thoughts derailed by footsteps, he looks up to find John padding through the hallway connecting the kitchen to the living room, looking sleep dazed and a little off-balanced as he settles in at the kitchen table, cringing against the sound of the chair legs scraping against the tile as it slides back with his weight.
"Smooth," Mike comments quietly, taking a deep breath as John mumbles tiredly, his words fading into nothingness before he can comprehend them. Taking a deep breath, he stands and joins Morrison at the table, trailing circles in the surface of the wood with a fingertip, not yet brave enough to look into John's eyes. "Sleep alright?"
"Uh huh," he sighs, his eyes still open only slits. They sit in awkward silence for a few moments as Morrison rubs the matter out of his eyes, blinking every so often while the warm blanket of sleep fades away, leaving him more and more aware with each passing second. "You mad at me?"
Mike doesn't respond for a long moment, his eyes remaining locked on the invisible path he's marking with his finger along the rich cherry wood between them. Even so, he can't help but notice out of the corner of his eye as John looks away, slumping slightly at the lack of an answer. "Not really," he finally muses, lips twitching as John glances at him, surprised. "Last night, I was pissed, yeah... but..." He sits back against the high back of the chairs, shaking his head at himself for doing this- for giving John an out. "Me knowing wouldn't have done any good while you were in Singapore, I suppose. Just... don't do anything else stupid to hinder your recovery. Next time, you might not be lucky enough to avoid surgery."
John nods, lips twitching. "Yessir, Miz, sir," he says, and despite the sarcasm, his eyes reflect sincerity so Miz lets it go.
"I had the weirdest dream," Alex mumbles awhile later as he joins the two men, his hair doing the opposite of Miz's without hair gel and sticking up even more than usual. "We were in Australia on tour and... hmph," he sighs, slumping down in a chair next to Mike's. "It felt so real," he proceeds, pillowing his head with his arms as he struggles and fails to wake up, his body slumping against the edge of the table as he dozes back off.
"Are there squirrels in Australia?" John and Mike exchange amused glances, both relieved that the awkward tension is gone.
That Monday, Miz picks at his wrist tape as he waits for a moment to come out and tell the audience his agenda for MitB- though by now, it has to be obvious, even to these Bostonian people. Money in the Bank had snuck up on him, smacking him upside the head as he reflects where he had been a year ago- alone, with only the US title to cling to as a sign of his accomplishments.
Admittedly, the Anon GM had been a pain for the last year, but without him and his meddling, Morrison and he wouldn't have even come close to ironing out their issues and he might not have felt the need to go into NXT season 2 to get paired up with Alex. Even the biggest waste of spaces can have some purposes, he thinks as he finally makes his way to the ring, barely finishing a sentence when, starting with Jack Swagger, his opponents this Sunday comes trickling out one by one, interrupting each other in a ridiculous chain that somehow only happens in WWE.
Of course, a six man tag match follows, the Anon GM's sounder making Miz's twitch. This is what I get for thinking almost fondly of him, huh? he thinks, struggling to concentrate on the tag match playing out before him even though he knows Sunday should be his focus and an injury now would be a very bad thing. Once A-Ri beats Swagger, serves him right for interrupting me, Mike sees another split second opportunity.
It's not the same, It's an act, he knows this, he thinks repetitively as he rushes in and hits a quick Skull Crushing Finale on his former protege just to get a brief glance of Kofi Kingston lunging for him before he goes flying over the top rope and out of the ring, crashing teeth-rattling hard. It only dazes him, however, for a moment so he's aware when Alberto Del Rio runs down and starts using a ladder to take them all out. He has no problems staying where he's at on the outside, watching as various wrestlers get taken out by the intense Mexican... until he witnesses Alex get slammed out of the ring, too.
It's instinct as he lunges up, remembering how it felt watching Morrison trying and failing to even squeeze his hand the week prior, the flash of fear he felt those couple of weeks when words like tendon tears were thrown around and nobody seemed to know what was going to happen. He thinks later that his brain ceases to function for awhile as he takes one shot with the ladder before it's thrown at him like a dart, ramming into his midsection with an intensity that lays him down on the ramp. He clutches his arm close to his ribs as pain throbs through his mid-section, each breath shallow and agonizing.
The six men all end up hanging around the trainer's office later, Truth going on and on about some conspiracy crap and asking if there were spiders in the room as the trainer struggles to examine him. Mike leans against the wall, still holding tightly to his ribs as he tries to ignore the yammering man across the room. He doesn't even need to open his eyes to know when Alex ends up close to him, automatically turning his head towards him with no prompting.
"You ok?" he asks after checking to make sure that everyone else is distracted by Truth's loud ranting.
"Nothing I haven't had before," he mumbles, squinting one eye open enough to look around. "I'll be fine."
After almost a half an hour- most of which is spent with Truth freaking out until finally the trainer, relieved beyond words, declares him fine and urges him out of the room- only Evan remains as Mike is released with orders to take it easy and go to the ER if things get worse, a couple tender ribs and bruising on his arm the most of his problems. Despite it all, even taking a step hurts and he huffs as he returns to the locker room to find Alex waiting for him. He can hear Punk's voice vaguely even from here with the door shut so he can imagine everyone crowded around different monitors in the hallways, stuck on his every word and Vince McMahon's response. If I didn't hurt so much, I'd be out there too, he thinks bitterly, his soreness overriding his curiosity.
Alex watches his stiff, awkward movements, his balance off as he struggles to brace his ribs with his good arm, sorting through his clothes for a few moments before leaning forward. "Need some help?" he offers quietly, reaching out for Mike's bag once he's done. He waits patiently as the proud man struggles with his limitations, finally nodding wearily. Alex snags the bag and stands, smiling slightly. "I'll take it out to the parking lot, everyone's distracted so no one will care but just in case..."
"Ok. I'll be out in a couple minutes." Mike watches, his eyes downcast, as Alex shuffles out of the room, Mike's stuff in one hand and his own in the other. He winces as he moves wrong, struggling to pull on some clothes so he can just go to to the hotel already and get some sleep. It seems to take forever, each movement aggravating his ribs further, the marks the ladder had left on his skin still visible despite nearly an hour having passed, but finally he succeeds, releasing a relieved breath.
After taking a few moments to catch his breath, he struggles to his feet. Good thing I don't have to carry my bag, he thinks as he carefully makes his way through the hallway, amazed at the silence following Punk's latest rampage. Guess I'll look that up on Youtube later or something, he thinks as he pushes his way through the exit doors.
When he arrives at his rental car, Alex holds a hand out, eyes glinting stubbornly as Mike looks up at him uncertainly. "Keys."
"Wait, what? I can drive myself, Alex."
"Sure you can, seeing how you've not moved your hand from around your waist in the last hour. Now come on, keys."
"But-"
"No buts, if you're worried about someone seeing us, well... I guess you can ride in the trunk."
"What about your rental? WWE management won't like it if you just leave it here," he grumbles faintly, rolling his eyes at that thought.
"I came here with Evan, I'm sure even he can handle getting himself to the hotel safely. Now, come on, Mike. Stop stalling."
"You're worse than Morrison sometimes," he mumbles, handing over the keys reluctantly.
"That hurts, man."