Victory by knockout only
Current Bracket
Even though most knew her as a great wrestler (which Melody couldn’t deny) and a great person, that last part was for contention for the greenette.
It’s now been 8 months since the rematch between Navi and Kat from last year, the one where Kat swore to break Navi in half if she wasn’t awarded the win, which permanently casted the masked blonde to her in a black light in her opinion.
The next day, she made herself incredibly clear to Kat to not challenge Navi to a match again, and certainly to never respond to her further challenges, with her thankfully being on the same page with her. Even if it didn’t mend her opinion of the woman, (and slightly damaged her friendship with Navi), Melody knew that Katherine Hart was nothing but a woman of her word, so she trusted her for the following 8 month. And, true to her word, aside from a spat in a comment section of her’s and Navi’s Youtube video, she never contacted Nat, much less challenged her to a match.
Fate was, however, a cruel thing, and Katherine Hart reappeared in Melody’s life once more. And today, she had to win for more than just getting to the finals. She had to beat Kat to prove to both to herself and to her, that if the feline wrestler ever tried to go back on her word, Melody would make sure she wouldn’t touch a hair on Navi’s head.
Easier said than done, however.
Their rematch might’ve ended in a draw, but be it any other match type other than I Quit, and Navi would’ve lost. Kat was NOT an opponent to be taken lightly. In fact, it might prove to be her most difficult match in her career yet…
She tried to calm herself however, and looked at the mirror. She looked prepared, but her hands were shaking, and she herself looked afraid, breathing heavily. She tried to steel herself, tried to not let her show her emotions…
...but unlike all the other times when she tried to calm herself down before a potentially difficult match, her heart was still beating like crazy with anxiety, and she was feeling sweat going down the back of her neck, as doubt creeped to her mind as to whether she could beat the masked blonde. Even though she forbid Navi from coming (and considering there was no way she could see the match live, due to it being taped on delay), she really wished she would give her some needed moral support. Even just her friend simply saying “Go kick her ass!” would’ve done a lot more for her current self-esteem than the dead silence of the locker room…
She nearly jumped when a crew member knocked on the door, breaking said silence, telling Melody that it was 3 minutes to her entrance.
“Fuck...there is no way out. I will defeat her...I have to...I must…”, Melody tried to motivate herself, but still shaking as she made her way towards the gorilla position.
And, as she entered the ring a few minutes later to her theme song, she tried to not let her emotions show on the outside. Strangely enough, it was much easier to do to the roar of 100s and 1000s of fans. She made her way down the entrance ramp, high-fiving people as she usually did, before rolling into the ring, and bowing during the critical part of her song…
...but once it slowly disappeared, doubt reared it’s ugly head in Melody’s mind. Referee asked Melody to go to her corner. Melody ignored her, standing in the middle of the ring, staring at the entrance way as she waited for Katherine Hart to come out…
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Katherine had been backstage stretching her back and getting limber for her upcoming match. She hadn’t been feeling the levels of anxiety that Melody had. But she took her foe seriously regardless. The purple clad masked luchadora paused for a moment and adjusted her leotard whilst contemplating aloud. Fate was indeed cruel in that somehow some way, Kat found herself paired up against Melody Serperior, the best friend of the woman she had gone to war with several months ago: Navi Florges.
“The first round definitely wasn’t easy. Susanna was quite the fighter….but I’d gladly fight her again or anyone else over Melody…”
Kat disliked the idea of having to fight Melody. Especially given the brief history the two shared at another wrestling promotion. What would follow the outcome of this match? How would Navi react? What if she appeared in this match. All these questions appeared in Kat’s mind, but she shut them out. This time around, there was no ally of hers for Navi or Melody to assault like last time. If worst came to worst during the match, The Super Kitty would simply have to find a way to live up to her alias. And the aftermath was simply something she’d need to sort out after the fact.
“She’s definitely seen her fair share of hardcore matches. I know for a fact that I could never do the piranha thing...Yeah, Melody probably has the advantage in this type of match. This won’t be easy.” Kat continued. She recalled some of the previous matches Melody had. Melody certainly had done some extreme things. Despite this, Kat steeled herself. She knew that she’d need to bring her A game if she intended to advance to the finals of the LAW Ko Tournament. The Super Kitty rotated her shoulders and began to make her way to the arena.
She emerged to the sound of her theme song and stood tall with her hands on her hips. The audience greeted her with a chorus of applause. Kat wore her usual confident, competitive smile as she waved to the audience for a few seconds. The veteran wrestler would begin to make her way down to the ring. She met Melody’s intense glare with stare of her own. Her blue eyes visible from a large distance. Kat had walked with posture and poise and that showed she came to throw down hard. That even if it was just bragging rights, this tournament would help to highlight the frontrunners and standouts at LAW, and The Super Kitty intended to be among them. Once she made it to the ring, Kat would roll under the bottom rope and pop up to her feet.
Kat would face Melody and continue to smile. She paused for a couple seconds before slowly walking towards her and meeting her in the middle of the ring. To build tension, Hart would walk straight towards Melody and get into nearly a point blank range. She’d let only a short moment pass before stating: “Listen, I wanna be totally clear with you. Whatever history or bad blood you and I may or may not have, I wanna put that aside for tonight. I came to wrestle an honest match, not wail on a woman that I’ve got beef with...So can we agree to wrestle as professionals and not rivals?”
If allowed to finish her statement, Kat would put her forward in the small space between them. The purple clad heavyweight wanted to be clear about the fact that she didn’t want a grudge match. And before the bell could sound, she’d show that she wanted to make Melody very aware.
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Even though she was afraid, even though she wished Navi would be at ringside, to at least act as a second in the corner, Melody knew she couldn’t allow Navi to be here tonight, in any way, shape or form. Whatever happened tonight, whether she managed to beat Kat, whether Kat beat her, Navi would still be pissed when she would watch the tourney on TV, but regardless of what her friend thought, she would see through it alone…
As Kat made her entrance, she, at first, looked the same as the Greenette in the ring - all smiles and high-fives…
...however, unlike Melody, that seemingly was the Super Kitty’s attitude, as she stood up, face to face with Melody with a big, confident smile on her face, contrasted with Melody’s intense facade, trying to appear tougher than she truly was mentally on the outside, while being an anxious wreck on the inside.
Melody would allow Kat to say her piece as both women intently looked at each other. What Kat was asking was an incredibly difficult thing to do. The fact that Kat was her opponent tonight weighed on her mind a lot more than the tourney itself, and putting aside her bias was an incredibly difficult thing to do...especially in a match where the only way to win was knocking the daylights out of one another.
But, Melody doubted that an outright truthful answer would garner a positive response from Kat. Nodding, Melody would answer, her expression unchanging: “I will be as professional as I can possibly be...”, she would say, almost wanting to add: “But I still hate your fucking guts”, to finish the sentence.
With the ref asking the two of them to take their respective corners, Melody would finally oblige the stripe-shirted official. With the ring of the bell, the match was underway!
The two women wouldn’t immediately run at each other. Even though she was nervous, she knew she had some advantages in a hardcore match such as this, having more experience in the match type compared to the Masked blonde. Her striker style also helped the matters of trying to knock Kat out a whole lot. Realising several advantages in her side, Melody’s forced intense expression changed to a more focused one, the greenette calming down, making it much more believable to people in the arena and at home that Melody was prepared to go toe-to-toe with Kat.
As such, Melody would be the one to open the contest, attempting to launch a quick kick to the side of Kat’s body!
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Katherine took her opponent’s words and attitude at face value. She figured that without Navi at ringside, or on the premises as far as she knew, it would be easier to wrestle this match like it were any other. The history between Navi and Kat - between Melody and Kat as well, none of that had to play a part in this tourney, right? That was the notion Kat held onto. That was the ideal execution of this match. And that notion that had about a zero percent likelihood of being seen through.
The masked woman happily shook hands with her green haired opponent. She nodded to Melody as she agreed with Kat and asserted that she’d keep things professional in the ring, tonight. Kat hopped in place as a bit of a warm up before the ref asked both women to return to their respective corners and the audience clamored in anticipation of their showdown. Regardless of the two agreeing to not to lose themselves, the reality of the situation was that neither lady was willing to leave that ring without knocking out the other and robbing them of their consciousness. And Kat couldn’t help the feeling that a win for Melody over her in such a match up would bring the green clad wrestler more satisfaction than she was willing to admit.
As the match began, The Super Kitty took notice of Melody’s change in facial expression as she left her corner. Katherine knew she was facing an opponent that was more at home in a hardcore environment. And she was about to become more familiar with Melody’s affinity for striking. As Melody closed in, Kat brought her arms up to blonde. She knew she’d need to use her size and strength advantage, but as usual she’d fall back on her greatest assets: her experience and technical prowess. Melody’s kick came quickly and found it’s way into Kat’s side. The masked woman would grunt as it connected. Katherine would try and wrap her arm around Melody’s shin, and attempt to follow up. It was rare that a move on Kat went unpunished, at least when she could help it.
“NGGH!”
If successful in grabbing Serperior’s leg, the luchadora would attempt to pull her opponent in, hook Melody’s standing leg with her own, and thrust into her chest with an open palm! She to send Melody off balance and floor her! If successful in forcing Melody down onto her back, Kat would merely stand over her and smile. She’d allow Melody the chance to rise! To some it would seem that Kat was either too confident or too merciful. But the truth was, she was just getting herself warmed up.
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Almost smirking when the kick connecting, Melody’s face changed to one of surprise as Kat would manage to catch her leg in the aftermath, not allowing the greenette to pull it away!
She yelped in panic as Kat pulled her forward, and pushed her down with her palm! Worried that the Super Kitty would follow up her attack, Melody braced herself…
...but Kat just stood over her, allowing her to get up.
Melody remembered that it was this attitude that Navi hated in the woman. Overconfidence and hope to appear as a hero is what fueled the French blonde’s massive hatred of the woman, considering the fact that Kat always refused to fight Navi, at her 100%.
For Melody, however, it was a weakness that she could right now exploit.
To show to the Super Kitty that there is no time for a warm up in this match, Melody would lift herself to a crawl, before outstretching her left leg, trying to sweep Kat’s leg from underneath her!
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Katherine had succeeded in grabbing the leg that was swung at her and taking advantage by forcing her foe down. The sudden start to the match got the crowd going. A cockier wrestler might have taken the chance to raise their arms or boast. But Hart wasn’t about to get a swelled head. She rolled her shoulders and looked down at the green-ette. Kat hadn’t sought to press the early advantage, and failing to do so would soon cost her!
In the past, the masked woman had refused to use her full strength and capacity against Melody’s best friend, Navi, and by extension Kat found herself holding back against Melody, herself. Miss Serperior was quick to punish Kat for this. She pushed herself up to a crawling position and quickly lunged at the purple clad woman with a leg sweep! Kat would be taken down and find herself on the same level as her foe - on the canvas!
The Super Kitty would attempt to reposition herself after falling. She scrambled to find her way up to her knees, hopefully before her foe could follow up. If Melody was willing to engage her in such a position, Kat would ask her in a serious tone: “You really wanna fight me down here?”
Hart wasn’t always outright boastful. But she usually was brimming with confidence when it came to competing in the ring. She believed in her ability to grapple with the very best of ‘em. And in a match against a more hardcore wrestler like Melody, Katherine knew that the canvas definitely a place where she could secure an advantage.
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With her leg sweep complete, Melody managed to get Kat on her level! If she wanted to hold back, fine, Melody thought. She wasn’t Navi, she wouldn’t get mad because of that. She would simply showcase with her skill that Kat shouldn’t have underestimated her.
Silently smirking at Kat’s question, the Greenette would extend herself from a crouch to a full stand, rotating on her right foot, while keeping her left foot of the ground…
...and, upon the completion of the revolution, Melody’s left foot would aim squarely for the side of kneeling blonde’s head! Melody wasn’t an idiot to challenge Kat to a grappling contest, both because of her lack of skill for mat wrestling and because grappling skills weren’t very effective in a match where one had to KO their opponent.
A good kick aimed at head though? Does wonders if you are looking to KO your opponent.
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Kat had mixed feelings coming into the match. She hid them well under a thick layer of confidence and positive spirit, but she did have concerns about fighting Melody, especially in this type of match. But so far, her interactions with LAW’s standout green clad wrestler led Hart to believe that the ill will between the two could be feasibly cast aside, for this match at least. Despite Kat’s expectations of the contrary, the two had actually agreed to keep things professional. And now, in the middle of their back and forth exchange, Kat was happy to see Melody smile at her.
When Kat saw Melody begin to rise, she sharpened her senses and widened her eyes. The spin that Melody had done to build up momentum, gave the Super Kitty time to plant one foot on the canvas. By the time Melody had spun around, a combination of sufficient observational skills and reaction time would see to it that Kat raised her forearm to the side of her face just in time to block the brunt of the kick! The force of the blow would have Kat pause for just a second before being able to act, but once she was capable of doing so, she’d attempt to place a hand on Melody’s raised shin.
The Super Kitty would attempt to keep things lively. She’d try to throw Melody’s leg to the side with all the force she could muster in an effort to spin the green-ette around. Immediately, Kat would follow up by rising and spinning along with her opponent with the intention of hitting Melody with a Discus Lariat as the two completed a full revolution! If successful, the display would dazzle the fans and Kat would raise an arm and smile widely to acknowledge them after hopefully striking down her foe.
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Melody let out a growl as she felt her leg colliding with Kat’s forearm, the Super Kitty successfully blocking the side of her face from the potential damage from the hard kick to her head.
Almost immediately, Melody tried to pull back, but once again, the masked wrestler grabbed her foot, refusing to let it go for the Greenette to prepare another attack. Instead, she would throw it to the side, forcing Melody to spin in the opposite way she did previously!
Reacting to the momentum shift quickly, Melody prepared her foot. Even if her previous kick missed, there was a good chance her heel could collide with Kat’s face! She raised her leg, expecting Kat to be on her feet by that point...
However, her attempted kick attempt flew right over the rotating Super Kitty’s head, chill going down Melody’s spine as she felt her heel collide with nothing but air!
Right as her forced revolution was completed, and she expected to come face to face with Kat, she saw Kat’s forearm swiftly approaching her head, before…
SMACK!
With Kat’s signature DIscus Lariat hitting her right across her face, Melody dropped on her back as a result of the impact, groaning in pain. She tried to shake off the daze by the move as quickly as she could to attempt to push herself to her feet, however. This was only the first attack by Kat in this match, no way would she go down so easily!
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The two women engaged in an impressive display of strikes and dodges. After successfully blocking the bulk of the force of the green-ette’s kick, Katherine was able to throw it to the side and spin her foe around, inadvertently setting Melody up to deliver another swift, hard kick! But fortunately for Kat, she was able to duck under the foot that sought to jar her cranium.
Serperior’s leg would graze the top of Katherine’s mask as Kat got up and spun before taking Melody down hard with her Discus Lariat! The force of the blow took the middleweight down hard, and the audience would react when Katherine raised her arm in the heat of the moment.
Katherine would look down and measure her foe. She loomed over Melody as the green clad woman began to push herself up to her feet. Kat would attempt to grab hold of Melody’s head as she worked her way up. The Super Kitty would attempt to keep the offense going. As Melody rose, Kat would attempt to take her down by flipping the sports bra clad woman with a Snapmare. If she were successful in taking Melody down to a seated position like she was trying to, Katherine would rise and attempt to kick her leg back before throwing it forward and aiming a kick at Melody’s spine! She’d let out a battle cry as she did, in the hopes of kicking with enough force to deal some considerable damage!
“HYAHT!”
The Super Kitty would attempt to stay on her foe by bending down and and quickly trying to grab hold of both of Melody’s arms. Kat would attempt to drive her knee into the area she just kicked and try to pressure Melody with a Seated Surfboard Stretch! If she locked in the hold Kat would grunt while trying to maintain it. Despite trying to keep things professional, Kat would fail to resist the urge to ask while she applied the hold: “If you’re here...at LAW...Navi must be, too, right?”
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Right as Melody got to her hands and knees, her mind starting to clear after Kat’s stiff Discus Clothesline, she attempted to pull herself up quickly, before The Super Kitty continued her offence on her…
However, Melody’s head would be caught just as Melody found her way to her feet by her opponent, flipping the greenette over her shoulder onto her rear with a snapmare, following it up with a hard kick to her spine!
“AAAAH!”
Despite her attempts to ignore the pain, and to simply keep going, Kat would be quickly on to her, driving her knee into the hurt spot on her opponent’s back, and grabbing her arms, and pulled on them to dig her knee into her hurt back as painfully as she could for a Surfboard Stretch!
Naturally, the Greenette would fight back, trying to pull her arms away from Kat, somewhat succeeding in elevating the pain from the hold...but not by much. In a contest of strength, Melody was naturally losing to the mask clad blonde. Much more interesting to the greenette was Kat’s strategy. Stuff like chokes and sleepers in a match like this, she could understand - deprive the flow of blood or the flow of oxygen to the brain to KO the opponent sounded like an effective way to get a win in a contest such as this…
Surfboard, on the other hand, was a work-over hold. No one ever tapped out to it...mostly because they couldn’t, with their wrists trapped by their opponent, but point being, it was meant to work over their opponent’s back.... And there was only one move in Super Kitty’s arsenal that could possibly follow up on that and KO the vulnerable Greenette - her Bow and Arrow hold.
Melody flashed back, for less than a second, to the few months back, when Kat wrestled Navi in their I Quit match to a draw, as the bloodied blonde was KO’d by Kat’s Bow and Arrow...and Kat refusing to release the hold. The painful memory made Melody growl. No way would she allow the Super Kitty end her in a similar manner.
And right in the middle of remembering, Kat asked Melody a particular question:
“You know she is...ggghhh...you were taunting her on Youtube a few months back, when she got into the Middleweight Tourney…”, Melody said, as her attempts to break out of the hold got more and more aggressive, practically trying to rip her arms out of Kat’s grip, yet trying to hide the anger in her voice: “Why are you asking?”
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The Super Kitty continued building momentum. After taking her green haired rival down with a snapmare, she followed it up by blatantly targeting Melody’s back with a swift kick followed by a Surfboard Stretch. Indeed by now, Kat’s game plan was clear. The blonde heavyweight began trying to work her foe’s back, seemingly in an effort to augment the damage she could do with her Bow and Arrow submission finisher. The same hold that KO’d Melody’s best friend in Navi in Kat’s previous in-ring encounter. It was a move that Katherine had a lot of confidence was. She had managed to knock out a few wrestlers with that hold and it seemed that she was looking to add Melody to the list.
Being the veteran she was, Kat had opted to use the Surfboard as a means of getting close to Melody to inquire about Navi. Such a chance wouldn’t be granted to her by a choke or a sleeper, as those holds constrict the neck and inhibit the victim’s ability to breathe and talk. It didn’t seem like it at the time, but Kat’s question was genuine. Whether it was a huge oversight on her part of a case of denial, she hadn’t known - no she hadn’t accepted that Navi had joined LAW. Getting away from the arrogant, rebellious, upstart Navi had done Katherine a lot of good. But now wasn’t the time to consider those feelings. Regardless of what Navi’s presence meant for Kat, she had a very real and very difficult battle to face right now in the form of Melody Serperior.
Being physically stronger than Serperior allowed Kat the chance to maintain the hold for a short time. She kept her knee pressed harshly into the woman’s spine. The back of the green haired middleweight’s sports bra gave a good visual indicator of where to aim to help focus on her spine. But despite the pain and the predicament of having both her arms pulled back by Katherine, Melody found the will to press on! As Melody continued to try and power out, it became obvious that Kat couldn’t keep her locked up forever. The luchadora would try to maintain the hold and watch her opponent’s writhing and struggling. When Melody made her next attempt at powering out, Kat would fall onto her back and spread her legs. She’d attempt to wrap her thick, powerful legs around Melody’s arms and transition to catch her in a lotus lock!
“I...I didn’t wanna believe it…” Hart would say, begrudgingly as she tried to lock in that second hold.
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Melody continue to try and get her arms out of Kat’s grasp, the masked luchadora hardly pressing her knee into her back, trying to get her arms out of her grasp to try and mount an effective counter attack. The greenette’s mind was also clouded with anger as Kat reminded her about her feud with Navi earlier in the year, both with her talk and her strategy, making it difficult for her to come up with an effective escape from the Surfboard aside from powering out of it...and for a while, she seemed to have succeeded in that regard, as her arms slowly slipped away from Super Kitty’s fingers…
….only for Kat to reestablish it, and transition from this hold to a different one. The blonde would fall on her back, wrapping her larger legs around Melody’s arms, hardly pushing on them inwards, as well as pressing on her neck to push her head forwards for a Lotus Lock!
“AAAAAH! ...what...is there to not believe? She managed to move on from your feud...even managed to get quite far in a title tourney for the middleweight division….grrrrrrr....”, Melody would praise Navi, while figuring out a way to escape from the painful hold. She folded her legs, attempting to pull herself up and on top of Kat. Had this been a regular match, the danger of the pin would’ve likely forced the Super Kitty to give up the hold. Alas, this was not possible in a KO match such as this.
As such, she had a different idea in mind. Pushing at the mat with her legs, she tried to turn over the loop made by the luchadora’s legs. If all went well, and if she managed to get her arms out of Kat’s grasp during her escape, Melody would end up on her legs, behind the Super Kitty!
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Kat tried to wrestle control of her opponent away for time being. It almost seemed as if the masked woman was making an effort to keep their conversation going. After locking in the lotus hold, she’d slowly get over her realization that Navi now occupied her league and return her full attention to the green warrior she was in the ring with. Katherine had just begun to up the pressure on the hold, tensing her legs around Melody’s arms and shoulders before Melody had begun an attempt at a reversal. Kat hadn’t seen was her opponent was going for at first. By the time she had realized that Melody was pushing in an effort to force her onto her back and flip behind her, Serperior had already freed herself.
“I got caught up in the fact that she couldn’t pin me like that. Melody’s probably better than I’ve been giving her credit for.” Kat thought to herself as she popped up to her feet and turned around. She raised an eyebrow at Melody before saying aloud: “Not bad, Mel! Never pegged you to be the technical type.“
The Super Kitty would raise her fists and take a fighting stance. She’d begin subtly gesturing towards Melody, beckoning her by curling her fingers and inviting her make the next move.
“What else ya got?”
Katherine tried to shift focus from discussion on Navi back to their contest. Hart had been the one that asked to keep things professional, yet here she was getting sidetracked, even if it was just for a moment. The Super Kitty affixed her gaze on Serperior. She smiled her at with her usual, confident and competitive countenance and eagerly awaiting Melody’s next move. Kat prepped herself for another strike, but after that last escape, she felt like Melody could come at her with just about anything.
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