Glory Braddock vs. Ace Marshall

[Braddock]

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March 26th, 2022
Miami, Florida
Off Camera
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Glory Braddock had hoped to enter Retribution as the SCW World Champion, defending in the double jeopardy match. As fate would have it, she could not defeat Selena Frost one on one to claim the championship. Instead, The British Bombshell would have to settle for getting the chance to teach an overeager, nuisance of a super-fan a lesson in the harsh realities of professional wrestling. Glory Braddock wanted to use Retribution as her opportunity to put a hurting on Amelia Stone, the young newcomer who had attached herself at the hip to The British Bombshell in recent weeks. If she couldn’t be the SCW World Champion, then beating some sense into Amelia would be a satisfying consolation prize. And the match itself was a technical masterpiece. Much to Braddock’s surprise, Amelia did manage to match her hold for hold and counter for counter. But the tide turned when Glory got into her rhythm. She dropped Stone on her head with multiple German suplexes. Braddock looked to put her away with the Shekhinah Glory, force a tap out or make her pass out to the pain.

Unfortunately The British Bombshell lost via disqualification when she refused to let go of the Shekhinah Glory after Stone reached the ropes. At least, that’s how it appeared to the official. In reality, Amelia had pulled a fast one on the official and Glory Braddock herself. Amelia had made it so that Braddock could not let go. It was a con job of the highest order. Braddock lost because, quite frankly, Amelia had used a dirty trick. And to say that Glory has not taken this defeat very well would be a major understatement. In fact, Braddock has been fuming over the events of Retribution ever since she returned to her home in Miami, Florida. And her family has had to deal with the consequences of an enraged British Bombshell.

She has been distant, cold, and on a rare occasion prone to an outburst or two for the smallest of things. Those living with her, namely her husband Kurt, their daughter Dawn, and Glory’s student Fiona, all understand that the loss to Amelia at Retribution is at the heart of this rage. They understand that Glory is not really angry with them, she is just taking her anger out on them. Thus, they have been trying to distance themselves from her as much as they can. This is why Braddock currently finds herself alone in the kitchen, seated on a bar stool at the island in the center of the room. She is dressed in a pink front lace trim night dress with a bow. The hemline stops at her knee. Braddock has a glass of wine in front of her that she is sipping on.

Braddock has gotten used to being alone in the week following Retribution. Tonight’s scene of The British Bombshell being alone in the kitchen drinking wine is becoming a ritual; all because she is still fuming over the events involving Retribution. She is determined to make Amelia pay. She is determined to make sure that Amelia learns her lesson, one way or another. In fact, she is so intensely focused on the past that she doesn’t even notice her husband, Kurt Logan, entering the kitchen. Kurt is wearing red boxer shorts and a white t-shirt. He folds his arms over his chest and stares at his wife, quietly observing her continue to stew and fume in anger. He remains there staring for a few seconds until finally Glory speaks up…

“I know I’m gorgeous but, damn, are you just going to keep staring, love? If so I’d suggest you take a picture. It does last longer.”

“So they say.” Kurt says with a low chuckle. Braddock turns around in her bar stool to face him. She rolls her eyes.

“How long have you been there?”

“Not long. I finished putting Dawn to sleep. I checked on Fiona as well.”

“Good.” Braddock waves him away. “Then you can go to bed too. I’ll be up there…whenever…”

Kurt sighs and shakes his head. “Nah, I don’t think so.”

“Go on, mate. I’ll be fine.”

“I think I need to check on you too.” Kurt approaches the island. He pulls up a stool and sits next to his wife. He pulls up an empty glass and takes some of Glory’s wine and pours him some into the glass. Braddock silently protests but doesn’t fight back.

“I will be fine, Kurt. Now go to bed.”

“I’m not going to bed until I’m convinced you’re fine.”

“I’m fine, god damn you!”

Kurt shakes his head with a sense of disappointment on his face. “See? This is why I don’t think you’re fine. Outbursts like that just isn’t like you.”

“It is when I’m annoyed and you, Kurt, are annoying me right now. So just go on to bed. Like I said, I will be there eventually.”

“When? After you’ve finished that whole bottle of wine?”

Braddock shrugs her shoulders. “Maybe.” Glory bypasses her glass, instead she takes the entire bottle of wine and attempts to drink it straight out of the bottle. But Kurt pulls it away and puts the bottle out of his wife’s reach. Glory pouts but Kurt remains firm.

“Let’s be honest with ourselves, Glory. You are annoyed but not by me, and not by Fiona or Dawn, who you have also taken out your frustrations on in the past few days. In fact, you’ve been raging ever since Retribution.”

Glory wishes that she had that bottle of wine right about now, because Kurt just touched on a sore spot with her. She settles for the glass of wine she still has and takes a sip. Braddock sets the glass down and then points a finger at Kurt. “That tart has been a nuisance ever since she set foot in SCW. She has been trying to insert herself into every part of my life, she has tried to involve herself in my matches, and she just won’t shut up. That tart…”

“Amelia.”

“Huh?”

“That tart…as you call her…she has a name. It’s Amelia.”

Braddock sighs and nods her head. “Fine. Amelia needs to learn a lesson. Retribution was meant to be that lesson.”

“So that was your grand plan? You were going to beat her up.”

“Pretty much. That’s what happens when you want to learn to be a wrestler. Your teacher takes you to school, gives you a good beating, and you learn from it. Amelia would have been just fine had she just fought me fair and square and taken the beating. But she had to go pull that crazy ass stunt. And now…” Glory is again interrupted by Kurt.

“...now what? Now that Amelia outsmarted you what happens? Are you going to beat her up again?”

“Probably.”

“And you think that will work? Damn it, Glory, you were dropping her on her head and neck left and right with so many German suplexes. It was painful to watch. You could have broken her neck and left her paralyzed. But did you care?”

Braddock sighs and shakes her head. “That wasn’t my plan and you know it.”

“It may not have been your plan but it sure as hell looked like you were attempting to break her neck. Beating people up isn’t the only way to teach someone a lesson, Glory.”

“In this case it works.”

“Says who? Your father?”

“As a matter of fact, yes.” Braddock smirks as she takes another sip of her wine. “Dear old dad would mete out some punishment to unruly students from time to time when he was alive.”

“I bet he beat up your old friend Matthew a lot didn’t he?”

The tension seems to lighten a little as Glory thinks back to her time training with her father. A brief period of that time was with Matthew Taylor, her childhood best friend. Unfortunately Matthew’s personality did not mesh well with the personality of Glory’s father. Matthew eventually quit the school and finished his training somewhere else.

“Yeah, dad beat the crap out of Matty quite a bit. He would get on dad’s nerves, especially whenever Matty made snide remarks about my dad’s preference towards technical and submission wrestling being boring. Anytime dad heard Matty call him boring, dad would beat him up.”

“See, I have always found that strange. I remember your dad, we became close before he died. And from what I’ve heard from you and from him, Glenn Braddock was idolized over in Europe, but especially in the British isles. He was a hero, right?”

“That he was.” Glory confirms with a nod of her head.

“Then what about Matt? Was he one of the few who thought the Great British Hero Glenn Braddock was boring?”

Glory shakes her head. “No, not exactly. Matt at one time worshiped my father just like everyone else. But…”

“He stopped worshiping him after he got to know your father? And he no longer liked him after the first few beatings he took from your father, am I right?”

“I see where this is going…” Glory says with a sigh of frustration. She wants to counter but Kurt won’t let her. This argument is becoming like a game of chess, or a wrestling match even, and Kurt isn’t letting up.

“You’re upset with her, I get that. But you have to understand that Amelia idolizes you. She looks up to you, just like your friend Matthew once idolized and looked up to your father. Amelia just wants to be near her hero. She just wants to do what her hero would do.”

“I would never do what she did.” Braddock insists, shaking her head. “She cheated, Kurt. She deceived the official and she cheated me out of a win. That’s what she did and that’s something I would never do.”

“You sure about that?” Kurt says with a snarky grin on his face, almost as if to dare Glory to question him. The British Bombshell, in typical fashion, takes her husband’s bait. She shakes her head defiantly.

“I would never stoop to those lows.”

“You’re right…you’ve done worse.” Kurt states. Glory wants to speak out in protest but Kurt speaks over her. “Remember Angela Jameson? You two were quite the bitter rivals during your rookie year. So much so that you used knowledge of her peanut allergy to your advantage, using peanuts of all things in the middle of a match to disrupt her senses and allow you to win.”

“She deserved it…”

“She wasn’t exactly a fan favorite, I will grant you that. And because the fans didn’t like her at the time, you were celebrated for your actions. But were your actions fair? Were they just? And that was your rookie year, just like Amelia is in her rookie year with SCW.”

“That was 2008, Kurt.”

You’re right,” Kurt grins knowingly “but what about just last year when you tricked a crooked and corrupt referee into eating some of your infamous laxative laced muffins in order to teach him a lesson?”

“Again, that stupid referee had it coming.”

“But was it justified?”

Braddock is frustrated with Kurt’s line of reasoning and it is evident by her harsh tone of voice. “Kurt, I get your point, but you don’t get mine. I have grown since then. I am not the same person. If Amelia truly wants to model herself after me, then she should quit acting so bloody childish. But take Fiona, for instance. Now she also admires me but do you see her acting the way Amelia does? Fiona is respectful, patient, and she obeys the rules.”

“I warned you about playing favorites between those two.” Kurt points out sternly.

“And I don’t give a damn!” Glory shouts angrily. “The fact is that Fiona is a far superior student!”

“Says you. To me they seem even, in fact I’d say Amelia has the slight edge over Fiona because at least she has legitimate in ring experience now. You have yet to turn Fiona loose. You just prefer Fiona because she doesn’t annoy you. But let me ask you this, babe…why did you take Fiona under your wing anyway? You let people Amelia find their own way and you admitted that was a mistake. But Fiona you are not going to make that mistake. You are mentoring her. Why?”

“What does any of this have to do with that annoying tart Amelia Stone?”

“Just answer the question.”

Braddock sighs out of frustration. “Fine. I want to guide her in this business, I want to teach her everything I know.”

“And…?”

“And what? There’s nothing else.”

“There’s more, because you told me. You told me, your cousin, your sister, all of us about it. You hope that by taking someone like Fiona…a young wrestler in training, someone with passion for this business…and working with her, that you can rediscover the old Glory Braddock. You looked in the mirror months ago and you hated the person you had turned into. You wanted to find that old persona.”

Glory shrugs her shoulders. “You’re right. And you know what? I think I’ve made great success. Fiona is learning so much so quickly. And being backstage at SCW, MWE, and anywhere else that’s willing to let me wrestle even if it is just a one-off event, just being there to witness everything that goes on backstage gives Fiona so much knowledge and experience that is valuable and will help her in her career.” Glory takes her glass of wine and finishes the last bit of the drink in her glass. She grins broadly with a look of victory, a sense of pride in her own success. “Yeah, I think I’ve done a good job.”

“Well you’re half-right.” Kurt says with a soft chuckle. “I mean, you’re right about Fiona. She has made a ton of progress and she is learning a lot. But as for you…” Kurt sighs with a sense of disappointment “...you haven’t exactly made much progress on your own personal goal.”

“What do you mean?!”

“You claimed that you had changed and that you didn’t like the person you had become. You wanted this experience with Fiona to help you rediscover that old Glory Braddock. And for awhile it appeared as if you were making progress, but ever since this deal with Selena Frost, the world title, and Amelia, you’ve been regressing. Now looking at you, seeing how you have acted since Retribution, it seems as if you haven’t changed one bit.”

“What? Just because I’m angry, because I’m pissed and want to teach that tart a lesson, you think I’m some kind of monster now? You’re out of line, Kurt. You…”

“Shut up, Glory.” Kurt says sternly. “Just shut up for a moment and let me finish.”

Glory is taken aback by this outburst from her husband. Kurt is rarely this angry with her. In fact, the last time he ever got this angry with her was when he learned she had cheated on him. They managed to work that one out. Now Kurt again has told her to keep quiet and Braddock does as she is told.

“I was still actively competing when you debuted in 2008. I remember what you were like then. You were fun loving, energetic, full of life. Sure, you had a passion for wrestling just like your father, but you were more balanced by a desire to have fun and enjoy yourself. The Glory Braddock I started dating had the greatest sense of humor I had ever seen. She was a laugh riot, a real comedian, and a prankster. But then you did something that rarely happens to a wrestler, you won a world championship during your rookie year. Sometimes I think that was actually the worst thing that could have happened to you, because ever since that moment you began to change. In order to maintain your top spot, and get there again, you threw yourself into training and put yourself ever so closer to your father. Then six years into your career you began to be mentored by Aphrodite Noel.”

“I don’t want to talk about her, love. I know how you feel about her but…”

“I know you care about her. You love her so much that you have become fiercely loyal to her. And sure, she did teach you many things about how to survive the corporate and political side of professional wrestling, something your father never taught you. And all that’s good, but between her and your father, they nearly got rid of the one aspect of your personality that set you apart from everyone else, the one thing that kept you balanced…your sense of humor.” Kurt reaches out and brushes his hand through his wife’s long blonde hair. “I miss that sense of humor. I miss the fun loving Glory Braddock that I dated.”

“I’m still fun loving.” Glory insists. “I go to karaoke whenever I can.”

“Yeah, but that’s about it. And you don’t even go very often. You find excuses not to go and those excuses usually revolve around training for some wrestling match. Don’t you see? You have become super-serious regarding everything and anything that has to do with wrestling. You didn’t used to be that way.”

“Wrestling should be respected, Kurt. You know I believe that.” Glory says that but is not as confident in her words as she used to be; she seems to think that her husband may have a point.

“You can respect and honor professional wrestling while at the same time having fun and enjoying yourself. You used to believe that, too. That’s the Glory Braddock you are trying to rediscover. And you were close to finding her until Retribution. Amelia humiliated you and you snapped. Like I said, you regressed all the way back to that super serious wrestler like your father. And like your father you are hell bent on teaching her a lesson. You want to beat Amelia up until she learns to respect wrestling the way you do. But what you fail to see is that Amelia is just like you were once upon a time. She has that fun loving innocence you once had.”

Braddock chuckles lightly. “I’ll grant you the fun loving part, but I was nowhere near as talkative.”

“Fair enough. But the point is she still has what you once had. But if you go through with your plans, you very well could beat that innocence out of her. She could become just another dime a dozen wrestler in the industry today. Or worse still, you could kill her love of wrestling and run her out of the business for good.”

Glory rolls her eyes. As much as she hates to admit it, Kurt has a point. To hear him say it, Amelia does seem to have some of the same personality traits that Glory once had. But The British Bombshell lost them over time. She had changed. Glory thought that she had changed for the better and her fifteen world championships would under normal circumstances prove her right. But at what cost?

“So what should I do about Amelia?”

“Look, you want to rediscover your old self. Maybe mentoring Fiona isn’t the only way you can go about achieving that? Maybe if you mentor Amelia, maybe if you stick with her, some of her will rub off on you. And that fun loving Glory Braddock can come back. That fun loving Glory Braddock with a sense of humor, that’s what this world needs right about now.”

“Maybe…but can I really force myself to mentor Amelia? I mean she’s so annoying and…”

“People said that about you during your rookie year too, babe.” Kurt says winking. Glory laughs out loud. She nods her head.

“Yeah...I was annoying back in 2008 wasn’t I?”

“Just like Amelia can be a little annoying today. She truly does idolize you, Glory. And what you do with her right now could determine her future. All I’m asking is to keep an open mind about Amelia. Give the girl a chance. Maybe she could actually teach you a thing or two?”

“But Retribution…”

“Don’t go all self-righteous on me now, Glory.” Kurt says with a wink. “You would have done the same thing once upon a time. Admit it.”

“This Glory Braddock is annoyed by it and wants to punch her in the mouth.” A slow grin forms on her face. “But the old Glory Braddock thinks what Amelia did was funny as hell.” Glory nods her head. “Fine…I’ll do it. For you, Kurt, I’ll try.” She leans in and kisses him on the lips. “I’m sorry for putting all of you through grief these past several days.”