Chapter 9

The alcohol burned going down his throat, but it was the best thing Dean had felt in a long time. It made him feel alive, at least for a few hours until he crashed and burned. He pressed his lips together to stop a maniacal laugh from spilling from his mouth. Those two words probably weren't the best to use in light of the current situation.

It had been a week since the arena had burned to the ground. There was nothing left but ashes and a foundation, along with a whole lot of unanswered questions. Roman had managed to make it out of the building with Sasha in the nick of time, but it had been an extremely close call, and Trips and Steph had been furious. It was not a good time to be on the Authority's shit list, but unfortunately a lot of them were. Hunter and Stephanie had already held a press conference vowing to find the culprit, and word going around was that they had hired people to do some digging. No one had any idea what might happen next, and that meant that everyone was on edge.

Dean swallowed his third shot of whiskey and slammed the glass down on the counter before eyeing the bartender, a stocky man with a balding head and a ruddy face. The man glanced from Dean to the empty glass and back again before letting out a sigh and refilling the glass. It was obvious that he disapproved of how much Dean was drinking, but the money was too much to resist.

He had just lifted the glass to his lips when a very familiar voice drifted to his ears from a TV in the corner.

"Thank you for coming out here today."

Dean slowly swung his barstool around to glance at the screen. Hunter stood in front of a podium at what looked to be another press conference, a thick stack of notecards in his hands. Stephanie was by his side, looking even more somber than she usually did, and Dean could detect a look of cold fury in her eyes. Completely uninterested in anything the duo had to say, the Lunatic Fringe twisted back around in his seat and reached for his glass of whiskey again.

"My wife and I were on vacation, but our detective agencies who we've hired to investigate have been doing some diligent work on our behalf and have made some interesting discoveries that we felt needed to be addressed today. I can now confirm that we have a list of suspects that we'd like to and shall be investigating shortly."

Dean rolled his eyes. They were probably bluffing in order to save face in front of the public. This person had clearly gone to great lengths to conceal their identity, so no half-assed detective team was going to find them.

Stephanie's voice suddenly emanated from the TV, indicating that Hunter had handed her the mic. "These are some of the suspects that we'll be speaking with very soon. The first suspect is Dean Ambrose."

The bar seemed to tilt at an odd angle, and Dean shot out a hand to steady himself, effectively knocking over the glass and spilling whiskey everywhere. As the bartender rushed to clean up the spill, he spun on his stool to stare dumbly at the pixelated faces of Hunter and Stephanie on the TV screen.

"Mr. Ambrose has a very rich history of being dark and violent, and due to his...benevolent nature with the Authority, he's definitely capable of an atrocity of this nature."

They continued to speak, but he couldn't hear anything over the buzzing in his ears. He pushed himself up and away from the bar, stumbling to the door and falling out into the stifling summer heat. He could hear the bartender shouting, but he scrambled to his feet and took off running down the street. Faces blurred and melted together around him until the only thing he became aware of was the pounding of his feet against the pavement and the harsh rasp of his breath in his throat.

When he came back to himself, he was standing in the lobby of the hotel that the roster was staying in, ten blocks away from the bar he had been in. He was drenched in sweat and his chest heaved, and he realized that the strong stench of alcohol clung to him like a plague. Remembering that he was now being hunted, his eyes darted feverishly around the lobby, searching for anyone who might give up his location. When he didn't see anyone, he speed-walked to the elevator and slipped inside. His fingers reached out of their own accord and pressed a button, and as the red numbers began to climb, he leaned back against the mirrored wall of the car and attempted to calm himself.

The Authority had plastered a bright red target on his back, that much was certain. What he didn't know was who had it out for him, and who stood to gain from giving him up. There were the obvious enemies, such as Seth Rollins, Randy Orton, and Kane, but there were also the people who would turn him in simply to elevate their own careers, and there was no way of knowing who those people were. Everyone was a suspect, and he could feel his paranoia growing by the second.

The elevator let out a loud dinging noise as it reached its designated level, causing him to jump about a foot. The doors slid silently open, and he crept to the doorway and peered out. Once he had confirmed that the hallway was clear, he stepped out, prepared to be jumped at any second.

His feet carried him down the hall until he reached the door at the very end. He didn't recognize the room number, but figured he must have come here for a reason. He took a few steps back after rapping on the door, instinctively twisting himself so that he was facing the nearest exit.

The door swung open after a pause, and Dean found himself face-to-face with Natalya. They stared at each other for a few seconds, both of them equally confused, until the Canadian Diva's face twisted in disgust. "What are you doing here?"

The way she spoke, as if he had just kicked one of her stupid cats, brought searing anger boiling to the service. "The hell if I know. It's not like I came to see your mannish face."

"Dean?"

That familiar accented voice made him freeze, and he subconsciously straightened his shoulders as Natalya was pushed unceremoniously aside by Emma. Those clear blue eyes fixed on his face, and he felt something crack inside.

Emma's eyebrows drew together in concern and confusion when he didn't respond. "What's wrong? Are you alright? You look horrible…" She took a few steps forward, stretching out a hand toward his face.

Dean's mind flashed back to the sick thud Emma's head had made when she had been thrown into the wall by Randy, and he quickly backed away before she had a chance to touch him. "I have to go," he rasped, continuing to back away but keeping his gaze fixed on her. If he was going to do this to her, then the least he could do was look at her face.

"What? What are you talking about?" Emma asked, a look of hurt surfacing in the aqua depths of her eyes. "Dean, tell me what's going on."

He shook his head vigorously, trying to ignore the agonizing pain in his chest. He slammed down his walls, shutting out the hurt and the misery. This was something that had to be done, for her own sake. He was going down in flames, and he refused to drag her down with him. If ever he did anything good in his life, then this would be it. "Don't follow me," he told her.

The realization of what was happening dawned on the Australian, and she took a few more steps forward, her hands stretched out toward him and her mouth opening.

"I'm sorry," he said before she could speak, and then he whipped around and took off down the hallway.

"Dean! No!"

The pleading in her voice nearly made him crumble, but he made it into the elevator and slammed the button for the lobby. He looked up as the doors slid closed, just in time to see Emma running down the hallway toward him, a heartbroken look on her face.

Then the doors shut, and he was left staring at his own reflection in the steel.

Dean moved backward until his back struck the wall, and he slid slowly down until he was sitting on the floor, his entire body trembling. He lifted his hands to his face and dug his short fingernails into his skin, drawing blood as a ragged scream tore its way out of his throat. It was a primal sound, full of agony and rage. The cry of an animal with its leg caught in a trap and no way out but to chew it off.

When the elevator doors opened into the lobby, Dean was on his feet, blood trickling down his face from half-moon-shaped grooves in his cheeks and forehead. Some dark thing had escaped from its cage deep inside of him and now writhed in his chest, growing and growing. The hatred flared, and he allowed it to burn up the little piece of Emma that he carried with him, the piece that still carried some hope. Unfortunately hope was a fragile thing, and easily broken.

From now on the only thing he knew was vengeance.

Slowly he pulled his hood up, shielding his face from any curious onlookers, and walked out of the hotel. From there he crossed the street to a gun store, and when he emerged fifteen minutes later, he carried with him the instrument of his revenge.