La Pequena Luz vs. Kemal Yilmaz vs. David Striker vs. Gavin Taylor vs. Meghan Strader

[Konrad Raab]

SCW United States Championship

2 RP Limit for singles

3500 Word Per RP

Deadline: WEDNESDAY, December 17, 2025 at 11:59:59 pm ET (NOTE THE DEADLINE – this is for both shows)

[Thunderhorse]

(Striker) "Run for the Hills"

[CowgirlsFromHell]

Cowgirls Forever, Forever Cowgirls Part V: Gut Feelings

[Wisteria Waltz]

OOC: In terms of reading order regarding my characters for this PPV, read Amelia's CD first and Luz's (this one) second. While they chronologically take place at the exact same time, something that happens in Amelia's CD will be referenced near the end of this one to tie the two together.
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La Pequeña Luz was a proud woman who wore her heart on her sleeve.

She's known this for as long as she can remember. Anything she wanted to try, she threw herself at it with so much raw passion that it was easy to understand why she grew frustrated or doubted herself if it didn't turn out the way she would've wanted. In her mind, if you didn't give every last ounce of passion you had for something, especially if you loved it, then what was the point of even trying it in the first place?

For as long as she can remember, other people have been more than happy to take advantage of her passion.

She remembers growing up how her kindness was used against her, believing she was making friends only for them to reveal it was all just to get close to her for some cruel prank, or perhaps just to meet her father in the flesh. After all, El Espíritu Angélico was a living legend, while Luna Nevado was just a nobody. She was bullied for some of the weirder interests she was passionate about just because no one else understood them and came to the conclusion that she was just a freak. Even when she had trouble staying focused at school, long before she was properly diagnosed with ADHD, others dogpiled onto her and made her believe she was a failure, that she'd never amount to anything. Even the mere thought that she could follow in her father's footsteps as a luchador was met with jokes and laughter at her expense.

Whenever Luz was bullied at school, nothing was ever done about it. In the eyes of her teachers and the school staff, Luz was the problem, not the other kids. This was the claim that she recalls being reiterated time and time again whenever her mom and dad met with the principal. Her papá never believed it, knowing his daughter much better than that, but not even him being on the level of a real-life superhero in Mexican culture ever seemed to sway the opinion of those who were supposed to be helping and guiding her.

Her mom, on the other hand? She cared for her daughter... maybe a little too much. Unlike her husband, Doctora Camila Nevado was willing to consider the possibility that maybe her little light was, in fact, just a little too much for everybody else and needed to tone it down a bit. Luz had rarely heard her parents fight, but the few times they did, it was always a disagreement over what to do with her. Luz never told anybody this, but the way everyone treated her like she was just a problem that needed to be solved? The fact that her own parents even disagreed over whether or not that was the case instead of just outright supporting their little girl?

Luz lost track of how much further she retreated into her own imagination just to try and make sense of it all.

Losing her father had been the breaking point. Between her parents, he was always the one who stood stronger on defending his little girl and never swaying in the face of blatantly obvious efforts to try and decide what to do with her, as if they knew better than her own mom and dad. The darkness that Luz found herself in after she watched him be carted away from the ring only to be pronounced dead shortly after only fueled her decision to honor the memory of the man who tried to pave the way for her. In retrospect, especially considering what she knows now, her mamá was right to be worried... just maybe not in the way she would've expected.

Now, it was easy to say that Luz's relationship with her mom was in a much better spot than it was back during those days. They weren't constantly butting heads over Luz competing in the ring, especially when she'd witnessed what happened to El Espíritu Angélico and was still willing to take the same risks that he did, and Luz was eternally grateful to know that her mom was supporting her wrestling efforts just as passionately as she supported her husband back in the day.

That didn't mean Luz didn't still carry scars of the past, and she knew they needed to be addressed before she hit a point she truly couldn't recover from, even with her mom, her wife and their entire found family having her back now.

The doubt had already tried rearing its ugly head after Under Attack. That night had meant a lot to Luz, both wanting to celebrate her one year anniversary of being married to the woman who had shown her that she was not, in fact, too much to ever be genuinely loved for being herself and honoring the memory of her father on what she considered the most important holiday of the calendar year for her. Losing her United States Title to Meghan Strader, especially through the interference of Gavin Taylor for his own self-serving interests, had hurt so much worse than she was willing to admit. Being practically forced to actually take some time off had helped immensely, and she and Amelia had proven that when they bounced back as a team to get that win back from the Cowgirls From Hell, but it wasn't the solution to the problem as a whole.

Luz knew, somewhere out there, a certain religious zealot still lurked, seeking any weakness to exploit that would break her beyond belief and 'save her from herself,' effectively proving all of her former bullies correct in a way that even they would probably be disgusted by. On a smaller scale, who was to say that someone in SCW wouldn't see her doubts as an opportunity to try and lead her down a dark path, knowing the right thing to say to turn Luz into something she wasn't by convincing her it was a desperate gamble that had to be taken in order to reverse her fortunes.

If the stars aligned, then she believed she had no reason to put this off any longer, and that's exactly why she was sitting here.

As much as part of her wanted to be out training with Amelia, Henry and Darius in preparation for her fiveway dance where she could hopefully regain the U.S. Title, she knew she still had plenty of time to prepare for the chaos she knew awaited her at Shattered Reality. But, just like Amelia was hoping to achieve, Luz knew that if she was going to have any hope of pulling that off, then she needed to fully embrace the belief that she could make it happen. And to do that, she had some loose threads that were long overdue to be tied up.

That was what currently saw La Pequeña Luz sitting across from Dr. Celine Bolton, who had an opening to be able to make her way to Boston for a therapy session with the luchadora face-to-face. Luz wasn't alone, however, as Camila was sitting beside her, looking both intrigued and nervous as to why her daughter had asked her to be a part of this session with the NCA-affiliated therapist who was hoping to help put Luz and Amelia's lingering psychological damage to bed once and for all, for their sake. She had tried to ask Luz about it, but Luz had only told her that things would be clear soon enough.

When Luz was being cryptic like that, Camila felt she had every reason to be worried.

“Alright, I believe we can get started,” Celine said after double-checking to make sure the hotel conference room she had asked to borrow was secure. Admittedly, she would've preferred to be able to do these sessions in the confirmed privacy of her own office, but she understood the difficulty of asking wrestlers like Luz and Amelia to constantly make trips out to England just to spend an hour or two talking with her. “Now... Camila, I believe Luz has said your name is?”

“Sí,” Camila answered.

“Do you know why your daughter asked you to join us for this session she wanted to have today?” Celine asked her.

“I'm afraid I do not,” Camila shook her head. “She was insistent on having me be here with her, but she wouldn't tell me why.”

“I see...” Celine answered as she glanced over at Luz. While she understood why Luz likely kept her mother in the dark about this, she felt justified in giving the masked woman a disapproving look. “Well, when I had my first session with Luz and Amelia, I learned quite a lot about the both of them and what they've been going through... though it was mostly Amelia. I offered Luz the chance to give me some insight into her own past just as her wife did, but she asked that we hold off on discussing that until you were able to join us.”

“Mija,” Camila turned to look at her daughter, and Luz bit her lip at seeing how worried and concerned her mom was. “Did I... did I do something wrong? I thought we had worked everything out.”

“I...” Luz started before she cut herself off, needing a moment to try and sort out her thoughts as her brain felt the need to scramble everything suddenly. “Trust me mom, things between us right now are incredible, and I mean it when I say I'm so happy we worked things out and you stopped trying to get me to give up wrestling. It's just... I feel like there's still some things we never really had the chance to address with everything going on.”

“Would you feel comfortable elaborating, Luz?” Celine gently nudged her before glancing at Camila to reassure her. “The floor is yours, so don't feel like you need to hesitate or hold back.”

Luz took a deep, shaky breath, her hands fiddling with one another in her lap. “Well... my mom already knows this, kind of, but... I was bullied growing up. I was always 'too weird' or 'too much' or a 'loser,' things like that. Other kids would make fun of me, mock my interests, pretend to be my friend as part of some overly elaborate prank.”

“This was all before she was properly diagnosed as being neurodivergent,” Camila clarified, and Celine made a note of that.

“Luz said you were aware of it, Camila?” she asked.

“Sí... kind of...” Camila sighed. “Her father and I found ourselves meeting with her teachers and even her principal more often than we would've liked. Even when we got Luz diagnosed and let the school staff know so they could properly accommodate her... they always made it seem like Luz was the reason why it was happening. They blamed her being bullied on her being the one causing disruptions, claimed her interests were so out there that it was making others uncomfortable.”

“Sadly, not the first time I've heard that,” Celine nodded, the look in her eyes clear this was far from the first time she'd handled anything pertaining to a school system refusing to accommodate for anything that they didn't consider 'normal.' “How did you and your husband handle all of this?”

“Papá always tried to stand up for me,” Luz noted. “He saw the way things were and refused to accept that me being bullied was my own fault... not that it made any difference. Him practically being a living legend of lucha libre who even used wrestling as a platform to help champion charitable causes to support kids like me swayed them at all to rethink their stance.”

Camila looked a little surprised that Luz had answered for her, but what struck her the most was the sudden bitter tone in her daughter's voice. Luz hadn't used that kind of tone in her presence outside of any conversation where The Empire was unfortunately the subject. Beyond that, it was a tone she hadn't heard even subtly directed at her since before they had reconciled several years ago... or so she had thought, anyway.

“Cariño...” Camila almost choked up for a moment, but when Luz looked at her, the next words out of her mouth really hit Camila like a ton of bricks.

“Why didn't you fight for me like he did, mamá?”

Thinking back to the day when the crazed leader of The Empire's splinter cell had kidnapped her and Valentina and threatened to end both them and Luz, Camila was suddenly wondering if accepting her fate and taking that bullet several months ago would have hurt less than this. The sheer, sudden hurt in Luz's voice felt like she'd been stabbed in the heart with a dagger that was constantly being twisted to maximize the pain she felt with every heartbeat. For the longest time, she had always wondered, feared even, that her daughter held some sort of resentment towards her for even considering that her principal may have actually had a point. She had her reasons, but... hearing the sheer hurt in Luz's voice now that she knew for sure made her truly realize just how deep this all ran and why her daughter often pushed herself too hard.

Celine, to her credit, didn't interject. She just sat there, watching those words sink in for both daughter and mother, giving this a chance to naturally progress.

“I...” Camila choked out. “I'm sorry, mija, I truly am. You're right... I should have stood up for you when you needed me most, more than I did. I knew your father was right, that the faculty who were supposed to be looking out for you just saw a problem child they wanted to get rid of by any means necessary. He and I were in agreement at first, but... the more it kept happening...”

Camila sighed, taking off her glasses and wiping a tear from her eye before she put them back on.

“You'd think I'd have known better to let them make me doubt you, Luz. Ohana means family, and family means nobody gets left behind... and I let them twist that and use it against me.”

Luz couldn't help but do a double-take at that, even glancing over at Celine, who just looked like she was trying her best to follow along.

“Mom?” Luz slowly asked. “Did you... did you just quote Lilo & Stitch?”

“Sí,” Camila huffed, sounding a little embarrassed. “I was... maybe a bit of a nerd in my own right growing up. Believe it or not, Disney movies were something your father and I bonded over when we first met, while I was watching over his recovery after Caleb pulled that one awful stunt that almost ended his wrestling career altogether. I, too, had a hard time growing up because of some of the things I was interested in... it's no excuse, but hearing about what you were going through and being offered solutions to try and 'help'? I thought that maybe you could avoid going through what I did, that it might put an end to your bullying. I should have listened to your father... he knew it wasn't going to work. He, too, had been bullied growing up, but once he donned that mask and became El Espíritu Angélico, it was like his old bullies were ready to throw themselves at his feet and beg for forgiveness he said. I never got that chance... and I see now how you probably thought I didn't care about what you were going through, that you felt it was easier to bottle everything up rather than feel like you could talk to me about it.”

Luz slowly nodded, her body shaking a bit. “When we lost papá... when you made it clear you didn't want me to become a luchador like he was, I truly thought that you believed I was... I don't know, a mistake, a failure, someone who had to be changed just to fit in with the rest of the world...”

“No, Lu- Luz,” Camila briefly hit the brakes on how high her emotions were starting to run, nearly breaking the sacred lucha libre tradition by revealing Luz's real name in the presence of Celine. After she took a breath to calm herself, Camila's hand reached out to gently cup her daughter's masked cheek. “If anyone made a mistake, it's me... and I'm truly sorry I didn't see it sooner. The greatest mistake in all of this is that I tried to change this beautiful, brave, radiant luchadora into something she wasn't, all in a misguided effort to protect you. Lo siento, mija... can you ever find it in your heart to forgive me for all the years of pain I never meant to cause?”

Camila's answer came in the form of Luz throwing herself at her mom in a hug, the chair she'd been sitting in toppling over. Camila didn't even hesitate to hold her daughter close, quietly mumbling “lo siento” over and over again.

“Luz,” Celine suddenly said, garnering both women's attention. “I'm sorry to interrupt, but... how do you feel now that you've gotten this all out in the open?”

“Honestly, Dr. Bolton?” Luz replied, a smile slowly forming on her lips once more. “I feel like my head's the clearest it's been in a long time. Like I don't have to keep pushing myself because of some invisible expectation that never existed in the first place. And mom?” She glanced over to Camila, who stilled for a moment. “I'm sorry too... I know I wasn't an easy child to raise, and I feel bad that you even had to worry that I was suffering like you did.”

“That's still no excuse to hurt you the way I did cariño, even if that was never my intention,” Camila clarified.

“I know, and I do forgive you,” Luz responded. “It'll... probably still take my brain to fully come to terms with that, but now that I know both you and papá were nerds just like me growing up...”

“I think this is a case where time can heal whatever wounds are left for the both of you,” Celine noted. “It won't be an overnight change, but it will be a change that I think the both of you will certainly appreciate. That said, I believe we still have some time if there's anything either of you want to discuss with me.”

“Actually...” Luz realized. “I did have something that's been bothering me ever since we survived the leader of The Empire's splinter cell. I've been-”

What felt like the perfect opportunity talk to both her mom and Celine about the nightmares she'd been having since around Rise to Greatness suddenly met an interruption in the form of her phone ringing. Luz cringed at the anime tune she'd chosen for her ringtone, but it got a giggle out of her mom and that alone made her breathe a sigh of relief.

“Sorry, I thought I'd silenced it,” Luz apologized to Celine before she pulled out her phone and answered it. “¿Hola?”

“Sorry to bother you if you're still meeting with Dr. Bolton, Luz, but I'm getting a bad feeling from Paul and I needed to tell you.”

Luz immediately snapped to attention at Henry's voice from the other end, and her reaction immediately caught the attention of Camila and especially Celine.

“I know he said he wanted to come with you guys to see how Ames trains,” Luz noted. “What'd he do?”

“Well...” Henry then proceeded to fill Luz in on what Paul had said and how it had not only gotten him a little heated, but also apparently caused Amelia to briefly spiral into a panic attack. As Henry explained the situation, Luz put her phone on speaker so Celine could hear, and the more she heard about what Amelia had apparently relayed to Henry to pass along to Luz, the more she felt like her hand was going to snap the pen she was holding in half.

“She managed to pull herself out of it and says she owes your father a thank you for the assist?” Henry finished, sounding confused, and Luz couldn't blame him. “She certainly seems like she's found a new spark that's really shown in our sparring matches, but... I don't know, I want to give this Paul guy the benefit of the doubt if Uncle is after him, but something about him just feels... very off to me.”

“Thanks for the heads up, Henry,” Luz replied. “Maybe we can talk more about it when you guys get back?”

“Then I guess we'll see you shortly, because Amelia's ready to call it a day on her training,” Henry responded.

While Amelia seemed like she might've found a sense of inner peace and strength that her parents had buried long before now because of Paul's innocently insensitive fan opinion, this revelation had the exact opposite effect on Luz. She was just wrapping up a therapy session that had gone a long way in helping her finally come to terms with some old mental scars she'd been hiding for way too long, she and her mom may have finally found some long overdue closure...

So why did she still feel like she'd made another huge mistake?

[Corner G]

https://allstargavintaylor.wordpress.com...ng-antiga/

(Good Lord, what have I done?)

[Kemal Yilmaz]

Kemal playing for a reserves football team in Germany just to improve on his stamina part three: Considered to play a proper football match for the FC Koln Reserves team.

[Corner G]

https://allstargavintaylor.wordpress.com...-or-psyop/

(Sweet merciful Jesus...)

[Kemal Yilmaz]

Kemal and Konrad having discussions on passing the European Fiery Nation leadership torch along with going for the United States championship and addressing his reasons to use Gavin Taylor to get to that goal.