The Gauntlet
II:
Marshall vs
Byron
By
The
Mangler
Twenty-five minutes after his match versus Ash, Marshall,
having elected to enter the ring first, walked down the aisle to the ring for
his match with Byron. As he walked down,
accompanied by Wiley, he continued to stretch out the kinks and pains from his
recently completed match against Ash.
His testicles were still tender, so he had elected to wear a small
jockstrap to help hold them against his body so they didn't jostle around as
much.
After arriving at the ring, Wiley returned up the aisle
where he would observe the match. He
didn’t trust the former members of the heel faction.
For this match, Marshall showcased his 5’11”, 200-pound
physique with a thin-strapped, low-cut blue singlet that accentuated his
well-toned pecs. You could see every striation in his muscles. His signature
red kneepads and boots completed his formidable look. As he acknowledged the
fans' cheers with smiles and waves, the anticipation in the arena was palpable.
The ref for this match, Mike, was an original ref with
the UWA. Marshall respected him and was
comfortable with his style. After Marshall
entered the ring, he approached Mike and offered his hand. The ref took the hand and gave it a healthy
shake. He did a foreign body check and
noticed Marshall wince when he gently checked his groin. It was apparent he was still feeling the
abuse from the first match.
“And Marshall’s second opponent for the night is none
other than our very own Muscle headed Ref, Byron,” the announcer intoned.
The curtain opened, and Byron walked into the aisle. He was met with mainly boos from the crowd,
but he also received a significant number of cheers and cat whistles for his
impressive physique. He was wearing a
pair of tie-dye speedo-style trunks, which looked to be one size too
small. His very impressive abs and pecs
were a match for Marshall’s. The crowd
definitely had a lot of eye candy tonight.
On the way to the ring, he stopped and posed for the crowd several
times.
Arriving at ringside, he hopped onto the ring apron,
immediately sprang to the top rope, and somersaulted into the ring, slamming
his feet into Marshall’s chest and forcing him back into the corner. He followed this up with a charging shoulder,
intending to slam into Marshall’s abs.
But Marshall spread his arms along each top rope and used them for
leverage as he powered his lower body up parallel to the ring floor.
Byron’s shoulder passed under Marshall between the ropes
and slammed into the ring post. As
Byron pulled back into the ring, Marshall brought his legs down, locked them around
Byron’s sides, then threw himself away from the post and arched downward,
landing on his shoulders and back and flipping Byron over. He slammed his
shoulders and the back of his head into the mat. When Byron’s head hit the mat,
Marshall unlocked his ankles, allowing Byron to slide across the mat.
Marshall leaped up and started to approach Byron, but the
ref came between them and yelled at Marshall, “Back the fuck up. The match hasn’t started.”
“Well, he fucking started it, “was the reply.
“And I’m ending it until the bell rings,” the ref intoned
as he turned back to a slowly rising Byron.
“What the fuck, Mike?
You let him attack me before the bell?? I thought we were friends,”
Byron groaned.
“Not tonight, pal, we ain’t. And besides, you started it and just got
outplayed,” the ref smirked.
“Fuck you.”
“Maybe later. Now,
raise your hands so I can check you out.”
“Bet you’ve been wanting to get your hands on this
magnificent body for some time,” Byron crowed as he stroked his own chest.
“I’ve seen and had much better,” Mike laughed as he
completed his foreign body check.
“As if,” Byron laughed. The one thing he didn’t lack was the knowledge
that his body was perfection itself, at least in his mind. Body dysmorphia and Byron had never been in
the same room. The ref signaled for the
bell to start the match.
Marshall had been closely watching the exchange between
Mike and Byron and anticipated the ref calling for the bell. He started charging across the ring so that he
was almost in contact with Byron when the bell rang. He nailed Byron with a shoulder block in the
abs, forcing him backward and slamming his back into the corner. As soon as Byron hit the corner, Marshall
grabbed the middle rope on both sides and delivered a series of 5 shoulder
smashes into the abs before backing up.
“Hey, you started before the bell. Follow the damned rules,” Mike yelled.
“I did not hit him until the bell rang, so I’m good,”
Marshall replied.
“Don’t push it.”
While jawing with the ref, Marshall had been keeping a
close eye on his opponent. When Byron
started to step out of the corner, Marshall threw a forearm smash across the
upper chest, grabbed an arm, and threw Byron across the ring and into the
opposite turnbuckle back first.
Marshall once again charged in to slam a shoulder in the
abs, but Byron anticipated the move and raised a knee such that Marshall’s right
shoulder impacted Byron’s knee. Marshall
felt a shot of electricity go down his arm.
As Marshall stood up, Byron delivered a clothesline, forcing Marshall
down to the mat back first. Byron
followed up by delivering a leg drop across the chest. He
quickly followed with two elbow drops to the abs.
Byron rolled Marshall to his chest, locked Marshall’s
ankles under his armpits, and sat on the mid back, locking in the perfect
Boston Crab. Marshall’s back and abs
exploded with the pain. Mike asked
several times if Marshall wished to submit, but each time he refused.
When Mike went to ask again, Byron released one leg and
drove his elbow down into Marshall’s crotch, eliciting a very pleasing scream
from Marshall. Mike turned to see what
Byron was doing, but by this time, Byron had returned to the Crab.
Tiring of the Crab, Byron dropped Marshall’s legs to the
mat, thereby releasing the hold, and stood up. He delivered a series of stomps
across the back before pulling Marshall to his feet. He scooped marshal up and dropped him to the
mat in a body slam.
He went to stomp down into the abs, but Marshall rolled
out of the way at the last minute. Byron
grunted in frustration but stepped back to allow Marshall to get to his
knees. He then charged in planning to
slam a knee into Marshall. However,
before he got there, Marshall launched himself from his knees and speared Byron
to the mat.
Byron hit the mat so hard that he bounced. Marshall followed the spear by rising to his
feet and dropping a knee into the stretched-out abs. He repeated the move twice more. He pulled Byron to his feet and tried to lock
on an abdominal stretch, but Byron was too close to the ropes. He reached out and grabbed the top rope,
preventing Marshall from locking in the hold.
The ref forced Marshall back from his opponent until the
two stared at each other. They slowly
approached each other before locking in a collar and elbow. Marshall tried to feint to the left and then
turn right, but Byron anticipated him and countered. They pushed and pulled. As Marshall was being pushed backward, he
slipped slightly on a wet spot on the mat.
Byron felt Marshall slip, so he leaned into the slip and
twisted the opposite way, pulling Marshall into a side headlock. Byron realized that Mike was out of position,
so he jabbed a thumb deep into Marshall’s throat, eliciting a loud gag.
Mike quickly ran around the wrestlers.
“Did you thumb him in the throat?” the ref inquired. He had been reffing a long time and knew the
game well.
“Of course not. I
don’t wrestle that way,” Byron said with a straight face.
Byron twisted the right, pulling Marshall up and over and
slamming him to the mat. He followed him all the way down, not releasing the
headlock. He squeezed harder. Marshall managed to force himself to his knees
and was trying to bully Byron to his feet.
Byron responded by dropping the headlock, and when the
resistance ended, Marshall suddenly stood up and stepped backward instead. Byron spun around and drove a spinning kick
into the side of Marshall’s head, knocking him into the corner. He followed up by driving his shoulder into
Marshall’s abs, immediately grabbing him by the head and flipping him over and
into the center of the ring with a snapmare.
Byron ran over and kicked him in the right shoulder
several times before he grabbed the right wrist and fell backward, stretching
the arm out full length. He placed one
knee in the armpit and the other on the shoulder and leaned back, pulling as
hard as he could.
“Fuck,” Marshall screamed as the pain shot through his
already abused shoulder. Byron stretched
and rotated the arm until he tired of the hold.
He slipped around, still holding the arm out by the wrist, and dropped
two knee drops into the shoulder. Next,
he pulled Marshall up by the arm and lifted him for a body slam. Before executing the slam, he made sure to
bend the right arm behind the back and bring his body down so that most of the
force was on the shoulder.
After slamming Marshall, Byron threw his hands up into a
victory pose and strutted around the ring to mainly boos from the crowd. He turned back toward Marshall, only to be
met with a dropkick, which knocked him over the top rope and out onto the
floor, where he landed chest first.
Byron screamed in pain as Marshall used the top rope to
propel himself out of the ring, landing with both feet into the lower
back.
“Get the action back into the ring, now,” the ref
screamed over the ropes.
Ignoring Mike, Marshall pulled his opponent to his feet,
wrapped his arms around the chest, lifted Byron off his feet, and slammed him
back first against the ring apron. He
did this twice more before dropping Byron to the floor and sliding back under
the rope to break the ref’s count.
However, he did not stay in the ring long; rather, he
rolled back out. He delivered two knee drops to the back before forcing Byron
back into the ring. He quickly followed and ignored Mike's yelling at him to
keep it in the ring. Marshall knew that fighting a former member of The Heel
Faction required him to get in touch with his inner heel as well.
Marshall pulled Byron to his feet, walked behind him,
slipped his arm between his legs, and lifted him into an over-the-shoulder
backbreaker.
Byron screamed in pain as Marshall pulled down on the
neck and the thighs, trying to break him in half. Byron failed his arms but wasn’t able to
dislodge himself. Taking a deep breath,
he ignored the pain and regained control of himself. He reached over with one hand and raked
across the eyes of Marshall.
“Watch the eye gouge,” Mike cautioned.
Marshall was shaking his head but did not release the
hold and he started bouncing to increase the pain. Byron took his hand and placed it behind his
back until his fingers came in touch with Marshall’s chest. He slid his hand until it was near the
shoulder and locked a claw onto the shoulder pressure point. While he couldn’t get full strength to the
hold, it did cause enough pain and discomfort to the already abused shoulder
that Marshall loudly grunted and let Byron slide off his back to the mat. As soon as he hit the mat, Byron took his
left hand, made a fist and punched it upward between Marshall’s legs, slamming
into the balls, eliciting a loud scream from Marshall.
Mike was immediately between Marshall and Byron,
screaming, “I’m not going to warn you again, no fucking low blows.”
Byron looked up at him, gave him the middle figure, and
said, “Oh, blow me,” before he pulled himself to his feet.
He approached Marshall, who was slightly bent over, and
slammed an elbow into his abs, causing Marshall to bend over even more. He
reached one arm between Marshall’s legs from the back while placing the other
under his shoulders. He lifted Marshall into the air before dropping him onto
the point of his knee in an ab-buster. The fans could hear the air rush from
Marshall’s lungs.
When Byron pushed Marshall off his knee to the mat,
Marshall's arms went across his abs.
Byron quickly pushed the arms aside before locking a two-handed ab claw
into the lower abdomen. The lowest point
of contact was at the trunk line. He
reared up onto his knees and pressed down to get as much pressure into the ab
muscles as possible.
Marshall’s abs were screaming obscenities at him after
the abuse he had taken from Ash in his earlier match. He tried to pry Byron’s hands-free but was
unable to do so. He finally realized he
was close to the ropes, so he reached out and grabbed the bottom rope.
“He is in the ropes, so break the hold,” the ref called
to Byron.
At first, Byron ignored the call, but as the ref became
more insistent, he released one hand and unsuccessfully reached up to try and
pry Marshall’s hand from the rope.
Marshall realized that in stretching like that, Byron’s pec was situated
over his face and neck. He flexed his
neck, opened his mouth, and bit down on the exposed nipple.
“Son of a bitch, he bit me,” Byron screamed as he
released both holds and pulled back.
Before the ref could admonish Marshall, he rolled under
the bottom ring rope to the floor, landing on his feet.
Byron got to his feet, still screaming about being bit.
Looking over the ropes, the ref began admonishing
Marshall for his actions.
“Sorry, I was hungry,” Marshall retorted as he paced up
and down the ring edge, rubbing his abs and stretching out his right shoulder.
Eventually, he put his right hand up and grabbed the
second rope in preparation for re-entering the ring. Every time he did so, Byron approached. Finally, Mike was able to keep Byron away
from the ropes, allowing Marshall to get both hands on the middle rope and both
feet up to the ring edge. As soon as he
did, Byron pushed the ref to the side and charged toward the ropes.
Anticipating such a move, Marshall yanked forward with
his arms propelling him between the top and middle rope, head first, resulting
in a spear delivered to Byron’s abs.
When his opponent’s head slammed into his abs, Byron was
forced to take a couple of steps backward.
Marshall responded by grabbing both ankles and yanking toward him
dropping Byron to the mat on his back.
Still holding on the ankles, Marshall pulled the legs
apart and delivered a stomp down into the exposed balls eliciting a loud scream
from Byron and a warning from the ref. After delivering the stomp, Marshall turned
Byron to his chest and sat on the lower back while bringing the ankles under
his armpits. He locked in the perfect
Boston Crab. He made sure to slide his
butt up the back to increase the angle of the bend.
“Aaahhh, fuck, fuck,” Byron groaned. Suddenly, he yelled, “My balls, my balls,”
causing Mike to position himself so that he could see what Marshall was doing
with his hands, which was nothing.
Byron summoned all his strength and used his forearms to
pull himself until he could grab the bottom rope.
“He is on the ropes, so break,” the ref demanded. Marshall complied by dropping the legs,
spinning around, and delivering a series of stomps to the back while Byron
still held onto the ropes. Mike demanded
that Marshall step back, but he ignored him and continued to stomp. He only backed away when Mike started
counting.
“When I say break, I mean break NOW,” the ref screamed at
Marshall.
“I’ve got till the five count before breaking,” Marshall
screamed back.
While Marshall and the ref argued, Byron pulled himself
to his feet. He stepped so that he was
not directly behind Marshall and the ref but turned towards them. Seeing that Marshall was concentrating on his
argument with the ref, Byron moved quickly into the ring so that he was behind
Marshall and slammed his arm up between his legs and into his balls.
Marshall screamed and dropped his hands down to his groin. Byron immediately wrapped his arms around his
waist, lifted him, and fell backward in a suplex, slamming the back of his head
and shoulders to the mat. He quickly dragged
Marshall to his feet, bent him over, locked his head between his thighs, lifted
him up, and dropped him down in a pile driver.
The ref ignored the low blow and simply observed the
action. Byron pulled a very groggy
Marshall to his feet and threw him across the ring and back first into the far
turnbuckle. Before he ended this match,
he would inflict more damage on Marshall’s abs.
He charged in shoulder first and delivered a series of slams into the
abs. He could hear the air escaping
Marshall’s lungs.
He stood up, grabbed Marshall’s arm, and slung him across
the ring into the opposite turnbuckle.
He pointed at Marshall and then drew his hand across his neck to
indicate that the end was near.
Byron posed before the crowd before turning to finish
Marshall off. He charged into the corner
planning on driving his shoulder into the abs again before applying a finishing
hold. Unfortunately for him, Marshall’s
instinct was still intact and kicked in.
Marshall used his upper arms, stretched along the rope,
as leverage points as he lifted his legs high in the air, repeating the first
move of the match so that Byron’s shoulder impacted the ring post instead of
his abs. When Marshall executed the move, his abs and his right shoulder
protested mightily. Marshall was still very winded, and he knew that he had to
try and end things quickly.
As Byron staggered back, Marshall locked his legs around
his sides and then threw himself forward and into a roll, causing Byron to flip
backward and slam the back of his head into the mat. Marshall held onto the
hold with his feet and hooked each of his opponent’s legs behind the back of
the knees. He leaned forward and placed his knees resting on Byron’s shoulders,
pressing down with all his weight. He had Byron wrapped up with his shoulders
firmly on the mat.
Mike dropped to the mat, and his hand slammed down three
times—although somewhat slowly, many thought. Byron had not been able to get
his wits about him and power out of the hold, so the match was over. The ref
signaled for the bell.
As the bell rang to end the match, Walker, one of the
league officials, approached Wiley.
“Hey Wiley, I need to talk to you for a moment.”
“What, now?” he asked.
“Yeah, it will only take a few minutes. I waited until the match was over so that you
could watch out for Marshall. We don’t
have to leave the area; just step over here where it is a little quieter.”
Looking into the ring and seeing Marshall stand after his
victory, Wiley turned and walked over a few feet to engage with Walker, who
made sure to position Wiley with his back to the ring.
After the bell rang and Marshall stood slowly to his
feet, Mike raised his hands in victory.
He turned to all sides of the ring so everybody could cheer their
approval.
Byron rose from the mat and charged the ref pushing him such
that he lost his balance. He slammed a
forearm smash across the back of Marshall, propelling him forward into the
ropes chest first. Byron followed closely behind, grabbed Marshall's right arm,
threw it over the top rope, and grabbed it again between the first and second
ropes. He pulled the arm between the ropes and drove the wrist up Marshall’s
back while delivering a series of blows on the right shoulder.
“Break it up, break it up,” Mike demanded as he
approached Byron.
Byron complied by releasing the arm, standing back, and
raising his hands in the air. As he did
so, Marshall pulled his right arm back over the rope and began to rotate his
right shoulder to get some relief. Not
giving him any time, Byron slammed another forearm to the upper back, grabbed
the right arm, and, again, bent it at the elbow and behind the back. He charged Marshall across the ring, bending
him over as they went, and threw him between the first and second rope where
his shoulder impacted the ring post.
Mike was berating Byron for his actions.
“The match is over, so stop it,” he screamed, standing in
front of him.
Byron appeared to be paying attention, but as soon as
Marshall, still bent over at the waist, pulled himself back into the ring,
Byron sidestepped the ref, grabbed Marshall by the hair, pulled him around, and
locked his head between his thighs. He
forced Marshall’s right arm behind his back and lifted Marshall by the
waist. He released the head from between
his thighs and dropped Marshall, right shoulder first, across his outstretched
knee.
At this time, Wiley, finishing his meeting with Walker,
turned and saw what was happening in the ring.
He charged down the aisle, slid under the rope, and went after
Byron. The ref got between the two
wrestlers, ordering Byron to exit the ring.
Byron danced around so that he was near Marshall, dropped a knee across
the right shoulder, and then slid under the ropes before Wiley could get to
him.
Byron turned back to taunt Marshall and Wiley as he
prepared to exit the area. When Wiley turned to check on Marshall, Byron
reached under the rope, grabbed an ankle and pulled Mashall under the ropes
until his knees were bent and hanging down the side of the ring. Byron drew back a fist and slammed it up into
Marshall’s balls.
Wiley came through the ropes to the mat around the ring,
but Byron had already retreated up the aisle.
Wiley turned back to check on Marshall and failed to see Byron give Mike
a small thumbs-up and a wink. Mike gave a little smirk before turning to check
on Marshall. Byron then ran up the aisle
with his arms raised, ala Rocky, laughing as he did so. As he passed Walker, he gave him a discrete
thumbs-up sign. The official just
smiled. Byron entered through the
curtain into the back area, where The Executioner watched the action.
“Nice job,” he said, giving Byron a fist bump. “A win
would have been better, but you still did a great job.”
“Well, if the bastard hadn’t cheated,” Byron
replied. “But he should be nicely
softened up for you.” As the two walked
into the heel dressing room, The Executioner looked at Adam, Kayden, and Ash.
“You guys are up,” he said.
“Hell yeah,” the three cheered as they exited the locker
room.
Back in the arena, Wiley helped Marshall out of the ring
and started up to the locker room with him. Marshall was walking slowly but
under his own power. The league official
Wiley had been talking to earlier intercepted them.
“Hey man, you need to watch the post-match attack on
another wrestler,” Walker said as he stood before Wiley. Marshall continued to the back.
“Well, if the ref hadn’t allowed the post-match abuse on
Marshall, I wouldn’t have had to get involved,” Wiley said.
“That was between the combatants, and the ref was
handling the situation. It’s okay you
went to assist Marshall, but trying to attack Byron was definitely out of
bounds,” he screamed at Wiley.
After all the abuse of the rules from The Heel Faction
over the last few months, Wiley blew his top, and the two men got into an
argument concerning the reffing and coming to the aid of an ally.
Marshall exited through the curtain and walked slowly to
the locker room.
