The ball hit the whitewashed wall with a satisfying thud and then rebounded in a graceful arc, returning to the gloved hand that had thrown it. Ember’s hand.

Sitting with his back against the opposite wall, his knees brought up close to his chest, Ember threw the tennis ball down against the ground once more, barely noticing as it rebounded off the wall and flew back towards him; once more his hand reached out and caught it, almost as if he was running on auto-pilot. In many ways, he knew though he wouldn’t actually admit it to anyone – himself included – he was.

The tennis ball flew towards the wall once more, blurred and hard to see in the gloom of the darkened hallway in which Ember sat, but unerringly – again and again – Ember caught it without effort.

“Don’t drop the ball”. The words were barely audible, hardly more than a whisper, and Ember didn’t even seem aware of the fact that he had spoken them. Like a mantra he repeated the simple phrase over and over, in time with each throw of the ball.

The last few weeks had been incredibly stressful for Ember and he knew that he was tired, that he was as close to a breaking point that he had ever found himself. So much had happened – too much – that it was hard for him to process it all, let alone actually deal with it. His personal life was being torn apart and turned upside down but to the outside World he was unchanged; weakness was not something that he allowed himself to feel so there was no way that he would even consider allowing it to show to anyone. Even Khaled, his only friend, didn’t know what was going on behind Ember’s eyes – as the saying went they eyes were the windows to the soul, which was way Ember always kept them covered. Khaled may be his friend, the closest thing to family that he had, but even he wouldn’t be allowed to see even a shred of uncertainty when he looked at Ember.

Behind closed doors, in the comforting solitude that Ember knew so well, the cracks were not so well covered up; the façade of normalcy and supreme confidence slipped and even while Ember didn’t consciously admit that he was troubled the signs were there for anyone and everyone to see.

If there had been anyone, of course, who was allowed to see.

Finding out that he would be teaming with Khaled in their first real match had come as a bit of a shock to Ember. He had just returned home after a meaningless battle with Jonathon Winters; made meaningless by the actions of Mal Somers. Both Ember and Winters had reason to dislike Somers before – Ember due to the fact that he was the pretender to his own throne, the WWA appointed savior that would attempt to wrest the World title away from him come Rage in the Cage and Winters because Somers, the so-called ‘good guy’, had thrown him from a great height at Birthday Bash without caring that he could have injured him, or worse. Now, though, due to the fact that Somers had robbed both men of a true victory, they both had reason to detest him.

… but instead Ember had forgotten all about him, had even forgotten about the loss in the GTT that had so bitterly stung his pride much more than his body had been physically hurt when a five hundred pound sumo wrestler had landed on him.

All that floated around his mind, all that he could think about – and had thought about for the last few days – was the fact that it seemed that the old adage of bad things happening in threes was fated to come true. He had lost in the GTT, he had failed to beat Winters and now the third blow was sure to come.

He was going to be facing Denrol and Tracer Bullet, the self-proclaimed Franchise Players. Between them they held more victories and more titles than anyone else in the WWA. When people on the street were asked to name someone from the WWA it was usually their names that came up. The wrestling specials on cable TV always played highlight reels of their matches when showcasing the WWA. They were the best of friends and had worked together on many occasions.

… and he and Khaled, in their first official match together, were booked to face them. Ember had smiled wryly when he had read their names on the booking schedule that had been faxed to him. No-one seemed to believe him when he talked about the conspiracy within the WWA – the conspiracy seemingly aimed at punishing him for one crime and one crime only.

Being himself.

The fact that by being himself he did what he wanted to, when he wanted to and refused to play by rules that the WWA set didn’t really seem important, nor did the fact that in exactly one year he had run roughshod over the federation and taken the World title for his own. All that mattered to Ember was that no matter how hard he fought, how much he backed up his words, the WWA was always pushing him further and harder than anyone else.

During the GTT he had wrestled for the WWA every week; he had wrestled at the Birthday Bash between rounds of the GTT and still managed to go through the whole WWA roster to claim the World title; he had faced – and beaten – both Tense and Adams and then functioned as the special referee at a supercard.

… leading up to facing the only unbeaten wrestler in the WWA.

Now, mere weeks before he would be locked in a cage with the handpicked challenger to his title, he was going to have to step foot into the ring against two men who held no love for him.

He knew that there were some factors in his favour; he had faced, and beaten, both men before so he had to have the psychological advantage, and he didn’t have to worry about losing his title as it wasn’t on the line. He also knew that Khaled would be in the ring with him and there was no-one that he trusted more than him to have his back.

… normally.

The problem was that Khaled was pre-occupied with a search for someone that Ember wasn’t sure could be found. They had tried to track down whoever it was that was playing the mind games with Khaled, but so far there was nothing to be discovered. A wild goose chase had taken up most of the evening and Ember had only been back in the house for a couple of hours after returning from lurking outside Leviathan’s house. He had tried to tell Khaled that it couldn’t possibly be him, that they had finished his career and scared him off for good, but Khaled wasn’t convinced until he saw the man for himself and realised that the fire had died out of his heart and soul. Leviathan wasn’t the man that Khaled was looking for.

… and that was the problem. Until Khaled found out who it was Ember wasn’t sure that he would be able to focus on the match at hand and if he wasn’t one hundred percent then Ember would be going into what was billed as a tag match as a handicap match instead. If Khaled didn’t concentrate, if he didn’t focus on the matter at hand he would …

“… drop the ball.” The tennis ball bounced off Ember’s hand and rolled down the darkened hallway as Ember stared at it, his mantra interrupted. Holding his knees tight against him he hugged himself close, staring at nothing but the darkness. With a deep breath he slowly stood up and reflexively ensured that his mask was in place.

Squaring his shoulders he reached down and picked up the ball, holding it tightly in his gloved hand. Tag match or handicap match, it wouldn’t matter. Khaled or no Khaled - though he hoped that he would be there mentally as well as physically so that the WWA could finally see the Deadly Alliance in all their glory - he would be at the match and he would face Bullet and Denrol and, just like he always did, he would give his opponents the fight of their lives. He would ensure that they knew that they had been in a battle and then he would take care of Khaled’s problem for him.

Bad things, he knew, did indeed come in threes – unfortunately for the Franchise Players Ember fully intended that it was them that suffered the final blow.