This Year’s Rookies

Once a year, the owners of the UWF insist on holding open try-outs to find new talent. "It’s good for our image, Pamela," they say. As the head of the Women’s Division, I can honestly say it’s the worst month of the year for me. My counterpart in the Men’s Division feels the same way.

I end up going through hundreds of letters, resumes, and videotapes for three weeks to weed the applicants down to a reasonable number of possibly talented candidates (and I do me WEED), and then I spend a week wishing I were blind as I watch them klutz around the ring. Before I got my current position, I was a wrestler, a recruiter, and a trainer for this company, and I gotta tell you that some of these wanna-be’s are so bad that it’s practically an insult.

The "weeding-out" process is the beginning of my headaches. For two weeks, hundreds of applicants dump their life-stories in my lap, and I have to decide on 80 of them to invite to try-out. That isn’t a hard-and-fast rule or anything; it’s just a system I’ve worked out to survive try-out week with a shred of sanity. From Monday to Friday of the last week, I break the 80 into 16 per day and do a tournament-style elimination. The owners insist on about a half-dozen new recruits wen this farce is over, and this way, I can keep 1 or 2 candidates per day to make them happy. In six years of doing this, I haven’t had a single one of these try-out wanna-be’s last more than six months before washing out, if they made it that far.

Let me get back to the weeding-out process. Now, many of the applicants go right into the trash pile. I mean, what makes a 50-year-old housewife with a spare tire or an underage, 90-pound, high school girl think that they’ll be hired as a pro wrestler? Okay, they aren’t all that bad, but you’d be amazed at how many fit in that kind of category. Once that major chunk of applicants is cleaned out, the hard work begins. What’s left at this point are the 200 or 300 letters and tapes that have to be sifted to find a glimmer of possible talent or skill. These are the applicants that work for indy feds, or participate in private clubs, or do paid sessions, videos, and foxy stuff. They probably know the basics and may have the potential to be pros.

You’re probably thinking that anyone with an indy on her resume gets a call. I got caught on that one the first year that I did this and found out a few things. I found out that girls will call themselves part of an indy when they’re on the "fill-in" list, the list of warm bodies that get called when any two-legged punching bag will do for a match. Or, some girls will try to slip a T&A night club show past as a league. I even get a few that name a local indy that turned them down or fired them, obviously hoping that I can’t check everyone.

But, I do. I’ve got a rule about not getting burned the same way twice. I make lists, and my staff and I call every damned two-bit indy and check to find out what the applicant has or hasn’t done for them. So really, the amateurs from clubs and the foxy girls generally have as much chance as anyone to be in the final 80.

I’m telling you all of this so you’ll understand why this year I’m excited for the first time. Well, maybe "excited" is the wrong word, but I think this year’s try-outs may not have been a complete waste of my time.

Monday had me convinced that I was facing another week in Hell. The group of 16 girls all knew the basics of headlocks and scissors, and a couple had figured out the dropkick and body-slam. Two of them could actually string more than two moves together semi-fluidly. They both made it to the "finals," and I kept the winner. Her name was Wendy Baum, but in my head, I dubbed her "Thunder Thighs." She had narrow shoulders, no chest, and a thin waist, but below that, she ballooned out into a wide ass and really thick legs. That’s how she got to the finals. Her arms were useless, but her legs crushed the other hopefuls.

Tuesday morning, I expected another day of the same, but there were two girls in the group that had caught my attention during the weeding process. The first was an attractive strawberry-blonde named Denise Markham that caught my eye because she and her sister Kelly were both trying-out, and despite Denise being a year older, they could easily pass as twins. I look for marketable qualities like that, but I put the sisters on different try-out days to see what each could do on her own. The other girl was a cute Japanese-American girl, only 5’2" and around 110 pounds. I almost tossed her in the trash pile, but her letter named Lou Creed, a trainer I knew, as a reference. So, I called him and asked what her could tell me about Annie Kobutu. He said, "Who?" Letter and picture in my hand to toss, I described her a little, and he said, "Oh, you mean Pinky! She always wears pink, and I haven’t heard anyone call her Annie for as long as I’ve known her. So, Pinky wants to try-out? That’s good; I’d send her to you. She’s the best in my gym and the wrestling club we’ve got here." Needless to say, "Pinky’s" letter changed direction and landed in the try-out pile.

In the first round of the "tournament," I knew Denise and Pinky were staying. In general, I give the girls five minutes in that round to show me what they can do. Denise was about as good as I could reasonably hope for in these try-outs. She went in against a girl about 40 pounds heavier than she is, and I gave her a little over the usual five minutes so she could finally pin the big girl. Denise wasn’t bad.

Pinky was more than I ever expected. In the first round, she ended up facing a top-heavy, blonde twit calling herself "Candy Sweet." Pinky smoked across the ring at the bell and buried both feet in Candy’s fun-bags with a dropkick. Candy landed on her ass squealing like a piglet, and I immediately began thinking of her as "Candy-Ass." Pinky pulled her up and whipped her into the opposite corner, following her in with another dropkick to the knockers. Candy-Ass ends up on her butt again. Pinky picked her up and gave her a hip-toss into the middle of the ring. She dove across Candy-Ass with a splash on the blonde’s bumpers, hooked a leg, and got an easy pin. The total elapsed time was less than a minute. I don’t keep records of these try-outs, but if I did, that performance would’ve broken them.

The second round was like the first. Denise managed to pin an opponent that was about her size after a bit of a struggle, and Pinky leveled her opponent in record time again using a hurikanrana and a moonsault, two moves I’ve never seen in these try-outs before.

The third round was easier on Denise; her opponent wasn’t fully recovered from the second round. Denise was obviously in better physical condition and pinned her after a few minutes. Pinky had a tougher time. Her opponent was the biggest girl in the group, probably 60 pounds heavier than Pinky. While the Japanese girl was definitely more skilled (by a long shot), she had a few bad moments when the big girl, Mandy, used her size to overpower and pound on Pinky’s little body. Still, it showed me that Pinky was resilient, too. She took a beating for a couple of minutes but came back to score a decisive win.

The final round was Pinky versus Denise, and Pinky naturally controlled most of their match. Denise wasn’t big enough to overwhelm the Japanese girl, and Pinky simply outclassed her in skills. Except for a few brief turnarounds, Denise was stuck on the defensive and worn down until she could be pinned. When it was over, Denise looked both pissed off and depressed because she was sure that her wrestling career had been torpedoed. I thought she’d kiss my feet when I told her that she was staying.

That brings me to Wednesday, when Kelly Markham was trying-out, and she lucked out. By luck of the draw, the girls in Wednesday’s group were all roughly the same size. Kelly didn’t have to worry about any big girls overpowering her, and she advanced to the finals displaying about the same level of skill as her sister Denise, managing to win after some struggling.

Thursday and Friday were like Monday. The skills on display… sucked.

The "winner" on Thursday was a skanky, bleached-blonde stripper that showed up with her sleazy boyfriend. She walked in wearing a T-shirt with the words, "BEEN THERE," and an arrow pointed at his crotch on the front, and the back of his shirt had the words, "DONE THAT," and an arrow pointing at her ass. I didn’t doubt the truth of either shirt. She wanted to call herself "Harley Girl" and wear leather panties and a matching bra, and I let her for the try-outs but told her that she’d need something more substantial if she ended up sticking around. She did by cheating her way to and through the finals, scratching, choking, and even biting. Normally, I would’ve thrown her out, but she was such an arrogant little slut that I wanted to keep her around as ring fodder.

Friday’s "winner" was a tank. If I hadn’t seen her changing in the locker room, I might have thought she was a man. She was only 5’6", but she was over 200 pounds of thick muscle, like an Olympic power-lifter. Freda Williams, that was her name, was a black 55-gallon drum with arms and legs. With the power that she obviously had, I expected her to slaughter her opponents, and she did knock them flying once she got her hands on them. But that was the point. She was SLOW. She got hit ten times for every shot she took, and barely half of those shots made any contact. If it weren’t for all of that muscle working like armor, she would’ve been whittled down to nothing, but it protected her against the other wanna-be’s until Freda could land that one solid shot that was all she really needed.

That gave me six new "wrestlers" on Saturday, the big day. On Saturday, we almost always have a show somewhere, and I put the wanna-be’s in the ring before the show officially starts, in dark matches. Fans are usually still finding their seats while these matches happen, but it gives me a better idea of what I’m stuck with by seeing how the crowd reacts and how the rookies perform in front of a crowd. Since I’m usually in some vantage point where I can see everything and the only person who knows anything about the newbies, I match them up as much for my entertainment as for the fans’ enjoyment.

That’s how "Harley Girl" ended up starting things off against Freda.

To start things off, the slut walked out in black leather shorts and top with biker boots. The shorts were so short and tight that it looked like she dyed her ass black, and the top was basically a leather triangle that tied behind her back and neck. She still looked like a stripper, but it was a lot better than her leather "fuck me" underwear. From the nipples of her round tits showing under the top, I could tell she was excited about the match. (I suspected that she had implants, but she insisted that her boobs were "all-natural" and signed a paper to prove it. If she was lying and had a "blow-out," it would be her fault.) Her scum-bag boyfriend was in the front row and did a little tongue-wrestling with her before she wiggled her ass into the ring and shook her cans at the crowd.

Harley Girl looked a little less excited when Freda came out. Even though the stripper was about 2 inches taller than Freda, the black woman outweighed Harley by 80 pounds, easily. And, she looked like a wrestler. Her neck-length hair was pulled tightly back into a short ponytail at the back of her head, and she wore a blue wrestling singlet under a UWF T-shirt with matching boots and pads. There was no T&A on display, not that Freda had much to show. Freda’s pecs were so big that her breasts were almost non-existent, and her sizable ass was square like a man’s.

Freda was excited, too. She jogged to the ring to get there more quickly, though it was only about the same pace as a brisk walk for most folks. The big woman rolled into the ring under the ropes, and Harley Girl did just what I expected her to do, attack Freda before she could get back to her feet. Freda didn’t have the disposition to be a heel, and Harley couldn’t be anything else. So, the bleached-blonde slut started kicking away at the powerhouse immediately.

I wasn’t sure if Freda even noticed the kicks until she turned her head and saw it. Those muscles really were like armor. The attack didn’t slow Freda any more than normal. She got to her feet unharmed and swiped her thick left arm at Harley Girl like a grizzly bear, but she missed by about a yard as the slut jumped out of the way.

The next two minutes were like watching a Chihuahua fighting a Rottweiler. Harley leaped in scratching and kicking and then got the hell out of there before Freda could get her bulk moving in Harley’s direction. Neither girl was making any real headway, but it was kind of interesting to watch. At least, the seats were roughly one-third occupied, and the fans weren’t booing. The faces I could see looked like they were getting a chuckle out of watching the skinny skank hopping around the two-legged truck.

Personally, I was waiting to see if a theory of mine was right, and it only took another minute or so to find out it was. Harley Girl didn’t have much patience. Her only hope of beating Freda (and I mean ONLY hope) was to keep up the hit-and-run tactics as long as she could and pray that Freda ran out of gas first. Instead of doing that, Harley decided to jump on Freda’s back and wrap her skinny arms around the black woman’s thick neck. It was a blatant choke, but that was minor next to the monumental error that Harley Girl was making. Even Freda was fast enough to catch someone riding on her back.

You could have declared the winner the moment that Freda clamped those huge hands on Harley’s puny arms. The choke-hold was broken in about one second, and Harley Girl was pulled over Freda’s head and slammed on her back like she was weightless. Harley arched up her back feeling some pretty serious pain, but Freda grabbed some blonde hair and yanked her right off of the canvas.

I had given Freda a little advice, and she used it. With her muscles and lack of speed, I suggested that an old-fashioned bearhug was just the move for her, and apparently, she agreed. Once Harley Girl was upright, those massive arms clamped on around the blonde’s torso just below the ribs and squeezed as Freda effortlessly lifted Harley off of the mat. The biker slut had time for a brief scream before all of the air was crushed out of her lungs. Freda didn’t pin Harley’s arms, so the fans were treated to the spectacle of the skinny white girl beating her bony fists uselessly against the great slabs of muscle in Freda’s shoulders and back.

Harley Girl had a few working brain cells, though. Before she was completely drained by the bearhug, she realized that hitting Freda’s back wasn’t helping and used an eye-rake to surprise the black woman and get free. It would have been and impressive, if underhanded, escape if Harley had any strength left, but she went straight from Freda’s arms to the canvas and laid there hugging her aching ribs and trying to breath. She stayed down at Freda’s feet for the entire 20 to 30 seconds that it took for Freda to clear her vision.

Now, the big black girl was pissed and yanked the biker slut up by the hair. Freda sent Harley sailing into the ropes with a thunderous chop to the chest that made MY tits hurt. Mouth open in a silent scream, the blonde bounced back into another, more powerful bearhug, this time with her arms pinned. Out of curiosity, I hit the button on a stopwatch in my pocket. It took 37 seconds before the big squeeze made Harley’s eyes roll back into her head. The ref called for the bell immediately, and Freda dropped the limp bitch. (Big surprise, Harley’s legs automatically fell open as she landed on her back.)

As Harley Girl was half-carried into the back and Freda took her bows, I mentally summed up what I’d seen. Harley Girl was a jobber-heel, period. She had nice legs and suspiciously-good tits for a girl with her figure, but she was neither pretty enough, charismatic enough, or skilled enough to grab the fans. For six months, if she lasted that long, I could use Harley to fill empty spaces in cards by getting her narrow ass kicked. Freda was a little different. Right, now, about half of the arena was filled, and Freda was getting applause from most of them. But, I know the difference between applause because the face won and applause because the fans are excited. This was applause because the face won, and the fans knew it was their "job" to cheer when the face won. Freda was a tanker, a big, abuse-absorbing brawler that was hard to knock down, and she’d have to get better responses than this to still be around the UWF after six months. To get the fans, she’d have to take down a REAL heel, and while she had the power, I had my doubts that she had the skill to do it.

Having added that up n my mind, I watched Freda walk out of the rapidly-filling arena. It was time for the rest of my newbies to show their stuff.

With a pair of "twins" like Denise and Kelly, it would have been stupid not to put together a tag match. Being strawberry-blonde and attractive, I originally thought about making them a "face" team and giving them Harley Girl and either Freda or Wendy as opponents. I changed my mind when I went to talk to them and caught them bitching about Pinky. Denise was still pissed about losing to the smaller girl and the scare that it gave her, and Kelly wanted a piece of the Japanese-American girl on her sister’s behalf. Boy, it hit me like lightning when I heard them talking. Men (about three-quarters of our audience) like twins, but they LOVE "bad girl" twins. I told the Markham girls to get matching outfits and play up the twin gimmick and show me how "bad" they could be in a tag match against Pinky and Wendy. They were already thinking up ways to work over Pinky as I said it (I could tell), and Wendy wasn’t likely to be much help to the little cutie.

The Markham Twins came out first, and they’d done a good job getting prepared. They were as close to identical as possible, down to their makeup and hair, and the outfits looked really good. They were wearing black, one-piece, thong swimsuits and black boots over skin-tight, silver bodysuits, and like I said, they were attractive girls so the tight outfits flaunted it. Denise and Kelly may not have been in the same league as, say, Sugar and Spice, but the guys in the audience had their eyes glued to the twins’ butts and breasts. The cocky grins and color scheme made it clear that the Markham girls weren’t going to play nice, just like I wanted.

Next, Thunder Thighs, a.k.a. Wendy Baum, came into the arena. I had to shake my head when I saw her because she’d chosen her outfit badly. I need to describe her a little more so you’ll understand. First of all, her figure could be well-described as shaped like a pear or a butternut squash, narrow up top and suddenly widening down below. On top of that, the brunette had the kind of pale, freckled complexion that gets a sunburn in the presence of a picture of the sun. For some reason, she chose to wear a modest, white one-piece with matching boots and pads. It made her look like a brunette ghost, for one thing. To make it worse, she just shouldn’t have chosen a one-piece costume. She needed something two-piece. Not a bikini, that would never work for her, but a pair of shorts or bike pants and a sport top would’ve been much better for her. You see, the one-piece she was wearing was a nice fit on her lower half, but it looked loose around the chest. There was way too big a difference in size for the outfit to fit all of her well. It made a small bust-line look a lot worse than it was. Thunder Thighs came out looking perky and happy enough, but the fans didn’t care much. One look had just about convinced them that Wendy was some hapless jobber coming out to make the Twins look good. I felt sorry for her, but those first impressions are crucial.

Then, Pinky came into view and exceeded my expectations again. I had mentioned something about her dark hair needing some pink to go with her color-gimmick. She must have run to the nearest salon because she’d bleached out the black and dyed her hair the color of bubblegum, and it looked perfect! Her outfit did, too. Pinky had a pink, Lycra, sleeveless top that showed her flat midriff and perky B-cups, and with it, she had hip-hugging bike shorts, knee-pads, and ankle boots, all in pink, of course. With a big smile plastered across her cute face, she looked sweet and sassy as she bounced along to the ring, and the crowd ate her up. Nearly all of the fans were in the arena now, and almost all of them were cheering the newcomer like she was a favorite. Pinky zipped up on the ring apron and hopped inside over the top rope, and immediately, she grabbed her partner by the wrist and raised it as she worked the crowd. The little Japanese girl had so much personality that it was able spill over onto Wendy and drum up some cheers for her.

That’s when the Twins jumped into their roles with both feet by springing a Pearl Harbor Job. They shot across the ring and nailed their opponents from behind with double-ax-handle blows. I couldn’t tell which Markham was which, but I assumed it was Denis that jumped Pinky because they had "history." The one that I thought was Kelly bent Wendy over with that shot to the back, and then she grabbed Thunder Thighs by the hair, whipped her around, and threw her out to the floor between the ropes. Wendy was lucky that she went out feet-and-ass-first because she landed hard on the rubber mats outside the ring. If she’d gone headfirst and landed that badly, she’d probably be unconscious.

Of course, the interesting stuff was happening inside the ring. Once Wendy was gone, that Markham sister joined in on Pinky with the one I guessed was Denise, who had her hands full. Pinky weathered the surprise attack better than her partner and had responded by throwing back her elbow into her attacker’s stomach. Now, Pinky was trading forearm-chops with Denise, and Kelly jumped on her from behind, tying up Pinky’s arms. The two sisters joined forces, each locking one of the smaller girl’s arms into a hammerlock. That way, they could keep Pinky bent over as they pounded her ribs and gut with knee-lift after knee-lift. The Twins kept hammering the Japanese girl even after the referee called for the bell to start the match, and they only quit when he started a count on them.

The Twins conferred for a second, and one of them headed to their corner. I guessed it was Kelly letting Denise have first crack at the girl that almost knocked her out of the try-out. Whoever stayed in the ring had Pinky on her hands and knees trying to catch her breath, and the blonde took quick advantage of the situation. Wrapping her left arm around Pinky’s head in a face-lock that was probably a choke, the Markham sister used a closed fist to land a few kidney punches and then planted Pinky’s face into the canvas with a DDT.

The blonde rolled Pinky onto her back and straddled her to continue the punishment with another blatant illegal move, a two-handed choke that had Pinky kicking her feet against the mat. The referee started a count, and then he had to do it twice more when the blonde broke the choke and went back to it.

By this time, Thunder Thighs had managed to get her broad backside off of the floor and get to her corner. Once she got there, she got into the act by yelling encouragement to Pinky and complaining to the ref about the choking. Across the ring, the sister in the corner was yelling, "Bring her here, Denise! I want a piece of her, too!" So now, I knew that I’d guessed right about the twin in the ring.

Denise must have figured that Kelly deserved some fun because she got off of the smaller girl’s chest and pulled her up with two handfuls of pink hair. Keeping Pinky bent over slightly, Denise ran the Japanese girl into the corner and slammed Pinky’s face into the top turnbuckle. She Tagged Kelly and pulled Pinky back a couple of steps, bending her over again with a hammerlock. Kelly came in and took full advantage by putting the toe of her right boot into Pinky’s ribs four times before the referee made Denise get out of the ring.

Pinky was hugging her ribs as Kelly dragged her a little further from the corner, and Wendy complained about the double-team. Kelly yanked Pinky upright by the hair and leveled the smaller girl with a nasty short clothesline to the throat. With Pinky on her back and choking, the younger Markham sister stomped the girl in pink twice in the gut and went to stomp her in the chest.

That’s when Pinky got back in the match. Catching Kelly (and everyone else) by surprise, the pink wrestler clamped both hands onto the blonde’s foot and did a pull-and-twist that yanked Kelly over Pinky’s body to land face-down on the canvas. Seemingly in the same motion, Pinky rolled over onto Kelly’s legs and twisted the captured foot about 90-degrees out of alignment in a perfect ankle-lock. Kelly’s face changed from a cocky smirk to a bug-eyed shriek as the submission hold went to work on her leg. Still moving fluidly, Pinky stood and pulled the trapped foot with her, gaining better leverage and making it harder for Kelly to escape.

With Kelly screaming and beating her fists on the mat, the ref moved in to check for a submission, but I had a pretty good feeling that he was wasting his time. Based on that, I looked at the corners to see how Wendy and Denise were reacting to the sudden reversal. It was apparent that they were both shocked by the very professional moves, but Wendy looked absolutely amazed. She did come from what I considered the worst day of try-outs, after all, and it looked obvious to me that she was in complete awe of Pinky’s skills. Denise, on the other hand, had first-hand experience of the Japanese-American’s technical expertise and seemed more angry than anything once she got over the initial surprise.

So, it wasn’t surprising to me that Denise came into the ring while Wendy stood on the apron like she was in a daze. Looking to hit Pinky with a clothesline, Denise ran across the ring with her right arm extended, but Pinky saw or felt her coming and turned that around, too. Dropping Kelly’s ankle, Pinky did a sidestep-and-duck that got her out of the way and boosted Denise into the ropes. The blonde came off of the ropes into a big back-body-drop, expertly executed so that Denise landed on top of Kelly. Naturally, the crowd went insane cheering for the girl in pink. Hell, I caught myself clapping! That was a sweet move!

Maybe more impressive, at least to me, was the fact that Pinky didn’t make the mistake of stopping to soak up the cheers. She grabbed a wrist and an little hair to get Denise up, swung her around, and tossed her toward the blondes’ corner with a judo-throw. Denise went ass-over-elbows and rolled under the ropes to the floor. Once one Markham was out of the ring, Pinky turned back to the other one. Kelly was getting up to her hands and knees. Pinky bounced off of the ropes and slammed the soles of her pink boots into the side of Kelly’s head with a low dropkick. The younger Markham flopped over on her back, and Pinky kicked up onto her feet. She might be small, but so are bullets. Bounding over Kelly’s body, she jumped up, sprang off of the middle rope, and hit a gorgeous lionsault across the Twin’s torso.

Here’s where Pinky made a mistake in my book, but I guess it was understandable. I’m sure she could’ve pinned Kelly right then, but Pinky picked her up instead and brought her to the corner to tag Thunder Thighs. Like I said, I could understand why she did it. It was Pinky’s first pro match, and she wanted to be fair and let her partner have a chance in the ring. It was a rookie blunder not to win the match while she had the opportunity, and I hope she’ll grow out of it.

Mistake or not, Pinky put Kelly in a headlock and dragged the blonde to the corner. Her hand slapped Wendy’s, the pear-shaped rookie came through the ropes, and Pinky turned Kelly over to her partner’s headlock. Right off the bat, I could tell that Thunder Thigh’s skinny arms weren’t as strong as Pinky’s arms, despite Pinky being smaller. In Pinky’s headlock, the blonde’s eyes had been all scrunched up, and Kelly had really been struggling to get loose. Wendy’s hold didn’t get half of that reaction, and Kelly was able to shove the pale girl off of her and into the ropes, chest-first. In a slingshot off of the ropes, Thunder Thighs staggered backward toward the Markham Twin and got hit with a solid knee to the lower spine. Those thick legs buckled, and Wendy dropped to both knees and her left hand, with her right hand holding her sore back. Talk about an invitation! Wendy’s right side was wide open, and Kelly mashed the pale girl’s next-to-nothing right boob with a vicious kick, putting her on her back with a shriek.

There she was on her back, clutching her tit and her back, and she didn’t even put up a token struggle when Kelly grabbed her thick ankles. Thunder Thighs just kept fighting the tears and let the blonde drag her like a piece of meat near the Twins’ corner, where Kelly tagged in Denise. The older sister came into the ring ant took possession of Wendy’s right leg wile Kelly kept the left, and together, the went to town, driving their boots into the meaty thighs of their victim. They got that flesh shaking like Jell-O in an earthquake while Wendy cried and squealed on the mat. The Markham Twins had their fun with the blubbering rookie until the ref started a count on them, and only then did they finish by yanking Wendy’s legs into a quick, painful split.

Kelly went out to the apron, Denise continued to destroy Wendy’s only decent weapons, her legs. Alternating between the two heavy limbs, the blonde would lift one of the legs and drop onto the inner thigh, crushing it between the mat and her knee. Thunder Thighs went past screaming into outright howling as her pale, white skin turned an angry red with bruises that would probably be deep purple by morning.

Even worse for the rookie was the reaction of the crowd to the beating. Sure, there were people booing because of the double-teaming and nasty tactics, maybe a third of the audience. Unfortunately, the majority of the audience was either booing Wendy and caller her a loser or chanting for Pinky to get back in the ring. It was sad, really. Thunder Thighs was probably getting the worst beating of her life, and nobody cared. They wanted the real wrestler, Pinky, back in the action.

In a couple of minutes, Wendy’s thighs were two big, quivering bruises, ad Denise tagged in her sister again. Kelly climbed to the top turnbuckle, and while she did, Denise moved so she was standing over Thunder Thighs’ stomach, holding the jobber’s legs up and open. A classic "heel" team move, Kelly jumped down and planted her knee into the open target, presumably aiming for the lower belly but hitting a little lower than that, judging from Wendy’s convulsions. An accident, I’m sure. The referee went ballistic and counted, of course, and Denise went back to the apron, Leaving Wendy’s remains in Kelly’s hands.

The next minute got very interesting. Across the ring, Pinky was trying to lead the crowd in a chant of "WENDY" to support her partner, but the fans chose to chant "PINKY," instead. Kelly was picking up Thunder Thighs’ left leg, probably to pick up the destruction where Denise left off, and noticed the "Pinky" chanting. She turned to Denise; I guess she was checking with her sister if they should let Wendy go and let Pinky back in the ring. Now, that would be a really stupid idea, and grudge or no grudge, Denise seemed to realize it would be throwing away a huge advantage and shook her head. Then came the biggest surprise of the match. Wendy moved! Thunder Thighs managed to raise her right leg while the Twins were talking and kicked Kelly right in the butt, causing the sisters to crack their foreheads together. Denise lurched backward and fell off of the ring apron, but in the process, the sisters grabbed for each other and Kelly got pulled down neck-first onto the top rope by her falling sister. Denise lost her grip and hit the floor, and Kelly got a slingshot off the rope that put her on the canvas, whacking her head hard.

All of a sudden, three wrestlers were down, and the fourth was reaching and screaming for her partner to tag. Things slowed down, a lot. Wendy managed to roll herself over and began to crawl toward Pinky, moving at a snail’s pace because her legs definitely weren’t obeying very well. Kelly was massaging her throat and head, and Denise was rubbing some kinks out of her back. All in all, they gave Thunder Thighs enough time to cover most of the distance before Denise saw what was happening and shouted at Kelly to do something. Boy, it looked like a photo finish. It was a real toss-up whether Kelly would reach the jobber before she got the tag.

I guess that’s why Denise, bless her evil heart, jumped into the ring and distracted the referee. While he was looking the other way, Wendy’s fingers brushed Pinky’s, and the girl with the bubblegum hair exploded into the ring. She swung in over the top rope, barely touched the mat, and planted a side-thrust kick deep into Kelly’s solar-plexus. Never letting her foot touch the canvas, Pinky did a pirouette and slammed a spinning heel-kick to the jaw that flattened Kelly.

And then, the referee planted himself in front of the cute Asian wrestler and ordered her out of the ring. Denise had gone back to her corner as soon as Pinky jumped in the ring, and the ref had turned around to see the pink wrestler "laying the smack-down," as they say, on Kelly while Wendy was still on the mat a questionable distance from the corner. He had to question the tag and order Pinky back to the corner. It’s how those guys are trained. Pinky argued, naturally, and tried to resist, especially when Denise took advantage of the distracted referee. I was waiting for this. Kelly was deep in a fog on the canvas, So Denise came in, got her headed back to the corner, and put the boots to Wendy. Hell, the sisters were virtually identical. When the ref got Pinky out of the ring, he turned around to see what looked like Kelly putting Thunder Thighs in a camel-clutch. The fans were on their feet screaming about the illegal switch and the rip-off of Pinky’s legal tag. I was beginning to wish I’d put this match on the official card.

Anyway, the ref, seemingly oblivious to the switch, moved in to ask Thunder Thighs for a submission, but Denise broke the hold. The new target appeared to be Wendy’s back. Denise started with two knee-drops to the lower spine and then bounced off of the ropes to drill an elbow-drop into the injured area. Next, the blonde managed to get Thunder Thighs somewhat upright long enough to hit her with a snap-suplex. By this time, Wendy was weeping in pain, and now, the suplex had thrown her closer to the Twins’ corner again. Kelly had cleared the cobwebs out of her attic, apparently. The two sisters had a quick pow-wow, and Denise tagged Kelly. The younger sister went to the top turnbuckle again while Denise muscled Wendy up, scooped her off of the mat, and dropped the jobber across her thigh in a back-breaker. The referee was counting, and Kelly jumped off the turnbuckle, kicking her legs out in front and open. It was a nasty finisher. One of Kelly’s legs hit Wendy just below the hips, and the other hit her in the chest. The jobber got folded in half over Denise’s leg and screeched like you wouldn’t believe. Denise shoved her to the mat, and Kelly dove on top for the pin.

As the ref dropped to count the pin, Denise stood in the center of the ring, practically daring Pinky to try to stop the pin, but the girl in pink stayed where she was. I wasn’t too surprised. Could Pinky get past Denise? Definitely, and Pinky knew it. Could she do it fast enough to stop the count? Tougher, but it was possible. Would Wendy thank her for extending the length of the match? No chance in Hell! Wendy was broken, in body and spirit, and letting her get pinned was the best thing Pinky could do for her.

So, the match was over. The referee slapped the mat three times and held up the Twins’ hands in victory. Pinky skirted around the blondes and kneeled down next to her partner, trying to help her get up and out of the ring. The fans, they were screaming obscenities and booing at the tops of their lungs. They LOVED it! They were all fired up and shouting at the heels to let them know they’d done a good "bad" job.

The match was over but the action wasn’t. I was watching closely, so I knew it was Denise that strutted over to the kneeling Pinky and her prostrate partner. She was obviously taunting the Asian girl and shoved Wendy’s unresisting form with a foot, and that got Pinky on her feet and shoving Denise back a step away from Wendy. As the two of them glared at each other, Kelly moved in behind Pinky, ready to strike, but Denise must have done something or Pinky felt/heard something because suddenly the pink wrestler whipped her right leg back in a mule-kick to Kelly’s gut. Denise snarled at the sight of Pinky, again, turning one of their tricks against them and charged forward to clothesline Pinky. Pinky went from the kick to her knees, dropping under the clothesline, and Denise leveled her own sister! The mistake shocked Denise for a few seconds, long enough for Pinky to hop back to her feet and run to the ropes. Denise turned around to see pink boots coming at her, locking around her head in a hurikanrana that laid her out on the mat. She didn’t get to stay there. Pinky pulled her up and whipped her to the ropes, following right behind. As Denise’s back hit the ropes, Pinky’s feet hit Denise’s face with a dropkick that sent the blonde flying over the top rope to the floor. Kelly was getting to her feet, but that lasted only a moment before Pinky came off the ropes with a handspring into a flying elbow. Hauling Kelly up to her feet, Pinky got her in a fireman’s carry and tossed her over the top rope, right on top of Denise.

The crowd did a complete reversal, going from howling boos to wild cheers as Pinky cleaned house in the ring. The Twins staggered to their feet, obviously planning to continue the fight, but a few other referees came running out and dragged them out of the arena to prevent it. Pinky got a huge ovation as she joined a few officials and medics in getting Wendy on a gurney and out the arena. I wondered if I’d ever see Wendy again after tonight. It certainly wouldn’t surprise me if she called it quits.

I didn’t have any trouble adding this one up in my head. Pinky was going to be big! Tiny as she was, she was so fast and skilled that she could’ve won this match single-handed if I hadn’t saddled her with a jobber partner. Hell, letting Wendy into the ring was the only mistake she made in this match. I didn’t have any doubts that I could put her on a card next week and get a damn good match from her. The Markham Twins, I was real happy with them, too. They were definitely better as a team than they were in singles competition, and they had the knack of being heels and using their identical appearances in their favor. They’d need some work before I’d put them on a card, and even then, I’d have to start them slow. Maybe when Spice got off the injured list, I could put the Twins in a match with her and Sugar. It’d be good experience for them and a good "rehab" match for Spice.