Steve Austin opened the final segment of the podcast following the commercial break. "Welcome back to the Stone Cold Podcast Live. Steve Austin and Ronda Rousey, back from our final commercial break. Ronda, just in case there's someone out there watching who was living under a rock seven months ago, I'm going to refresh a bit on what was going on before the day you parted ways with WWE."

"Sure." Ronda gestured for him to go ahead.

"Somehow, as things have a habit of doing in wrestling, the news leaked out that you were only signed to WWE for a year. A bit of a… no, a huge fuck up on WWE's part, in my opinion. Anyway, the news leaked out, and everyone knew that you were only signed for a year, which by this point actually meant a couple more months. All kinds of rumors started spreading like wildfire. There were people saying that they'd heard that WWE weren't going to offer you a new contract because you had issues with the McMahon family, with creative, all that shit. There were other people saying that they'd heard that WWE were panicking because you'd decided not to accept an offer that they'd already made, and that you were jumping ship to UFC. It got real crazy, and of the two rumors, everyone started believing the one about WWE not offering you a contract. Then that campaign started up on Twitter; Ronda leaves we riot. Hashtag RLWR. You totally kept your silence on it, until you went to that baseball game and someone put that picture on Instagram."

"Yeah," Ronda said quietly, clearly thinking back to what Steve was describing. "That was a rough thing. It wasn't nice."

"Tell us a bit about it, before I go on," Steve encouraged.

Ronda made a hand gesture that seemed to indicate that she was struggling for what to say and would have rather not been asked to talk about it. "Uh, well, I was at the game with Maggie and a couple other friends, and a fan came up to me, a teenage girl. I was sitting in the seat at the end of the row, by the steps. I thought she was going to ask me for a picture or something. I'm always happy to do that kind of thing for people, but this girl just asks me 'Ronda, are you going to leave?', meaning WWE. I was honest with her and said that I didn't know, and she burst into tears. It was awful, and I totally didn't see it coming. I didn't know what to say really, so I hugged her, but she just kept crying even worse and begging me not to go. Whoever it was, someone a couple rows in front of us, took a picture of that scene, me hugging a fan who was sobbing her heart out onto my chest, and put it on Instagram. They wrote underneath it 'Ronda Rousey just told this girl that she's leaving WWE', which of course was bullshit. I said no such thing."

"Right," Steve said, nodding as he remembered what Ronda was describing. "That picture and that caption, what's that thing people say? It broke the fucking internet."

"Yeah, it was fucking crazy," Ronda agreed, shaking her head as if the reaction was still hard to believe. "I didn't check Twitter or anything all night. I just calmed that girl down and carried on watching the game after she left. We got in the car to head home and Maggie went on Twitter on her phone and she was like 'You're the number one trend in the world, girl.' I had no idea why, but obviously I soon found out, and I had to tweet something."

As Ronda paused for a drink of water, Steve took over. "You tweeted that nothing had been decided, and that you were actually meeting with WWE the following week to discuss your future. You said what day it was going to be too."

"I did," Ronda confirmed, setting her empty glass back on the table. "It was a Wednesday. I'd been called to Stamford, to the office."

"When the day came, it was crazy," Steve said, grinning at the memory. "I can't remember anything like it. It seemed like everyone in the fucking world, certainly everyone in the wrestling community, was waiting on the announcement that you'd signed a new deal. People were talking about who you were going to wrestle next, who you were going to wrestle at Wrestlemania, all sorts of shit. By that point, opinion had totally changed. Everyone thought you were staying. So, tell us what happened."

Ronda took a deep breath and shifted in her chair to get comfortable. "Okay. Well, the first surprise I got was that when I walked in there, I found out that I wasn't meeting with Hunter, which was what I'd expected. I was meeting with Vince McMahon. I'd barely ever met the guy before, as Hunter was always the guy in charge at the events by the time I started wrestling. I went into the meeting thinking it was a little strange, but we had coffee brought in and all that bullshit. Then we got down to business. Much like you, Steve, I'm not one to fuck around with words, so I asked Vince what he was offering me. He replied that he had taken the decision that WWE would not be offering me a new contract because they had serious concerns about my attitude to authority, to creative and to my colleagues."

"Vince said that he had decided?" Steve cut in, wanting the point clarified as he leaned forward, listening intently along with everyone who was watching the podcast.

"He had decided," Ronda confirmed. "He was still chairman. I'm guessing, but I think he went over Hunter's head. As I said earlier, I think Hunter wanted me to sign a new contract."

"So what did you say to Vince?" Steve asked.

"I didn't know what to say for a minute. I was shocked. I mean, I admit I was hardly a model employee, but I wasn't anything like as bad as he tried to make out. I think that for whatever reason, Vince just didn't like me. I think he didn't like me or the fact that Hunter was now running the company. I was very much Hunter's signing rather than Vince's, and I was a success. I think making the decision not to offer me a contract was Vince trying to show that he still had some balls, or that his dick still worked, whatever. I think it was an ego thing is what I'm saying."

"So what did you say?" Steve repeated, gently urging Ronda on.

"Not much, really. I wasn't going to plead with the old bastard. I will say this though, for anyone who doubts what my intentions were, I went into that building intending to sign whatever I was offered. I wanted to stay. I told Vince that I wanted to stay, but he said that it wasn't an option, that the decision had been made. I thought about asking to see Hunter, but I knew that I'd be wasting my time. Then the thought hit me that I wouldn't feel right working for WWE knowing how Vince felt about me, and knowing that my contract was going to expire and I'd be let go like I was of no significance. I've got more pride than that, and I told Vince as much. We talked about it for a few minutes, and we worked out a deal for WWE to pay me a certain amount, and I would be released from my contract that day."

Ronda paused for a moment, and Steve was about to ask another question, but she continued, "I finished my coffee, Vince offered his hand, and I shook it. Then do you know what he said to me? He said 'You can learn from this, Ronda.' I remember thinking how patronising that was."

Ronda turned to look at the camera. "Well, I learned from it, Vince. How about you?"

Steve tried to get Ronda back on track. "Was it right when you left the office that you made the Instagram post?"

"Pretty much," Ronda nodded. "I sat in my car for a few minutes, and I was like 'What the fuck just happened?' I'd gone in there to sign a new contract, and I came out unemployed. It was fucking insane. Then I realised that the fans were waiting to hear what had happened. That moment was bad. I had such a special connection with the fans, and now I knew that I wouldn't be wrestling in front of them again. It was over, as far as I was concerned. I thought that Ronda Rousey would soon be forgotten about. It really hurt, and I sat and cried for a minute. That's when the quote popped into my head. God knows why, but it did. I decided it was perfect, so I found an image of it and put it on Instagram."

"Can you remind us of the quote?" Steve asked, unsure of the exact wording off the top of his head, wishing that he had written it down on something before the show.

Ronda obliged him. "Don't cry because it's over, smile because it happened."

"That's the one," Steve said. "Then underneath, in the caption, you revealed what happened in the meeting."

"Yeah. I wrote that Vince McMahon had personally taken the decision that I wouldn't be offered a new contract, and that after some discussion, we had agreed that I would be released with immediate effect. Then I finished with how I felt; devastated." Ronda looked down at the table and shook her head, as if the memory was still painful for her.

Steve took over. "When that post went live, I don't think there's been a reaction like it on social media before. Certainly not one that I can think of. Everyone went crazy, at least that's how it seemed. All sorts of stuff started trending. 'Thank you Ronda,' 'Bring back Ronda.' They were the positive ones, but there were others aimed at WWE. 'Cancel WWE Network' was the first one, then 'Boycott Raw,' 'Boycott Survivor Series,' and then 'McMahon out!' That was the killer one. Well, that one and the one about cancelling the network, because people were actually doing it.

Ronda held up her right wrist, the one with the wristband on it. "Yeah. What Vince McMahon underestimated, and in a way I underestimated, was this. We win and lose together. Me and the people. Vince McMahon didn't just shit on Ronda Rousey that day, he shit on millions of people, and those people didn't fucking stand for being shit on. They all wanted me to be given a new contract, yet Vince chose not to do it."

"They sure didn't stand for it," Steve agreed. "WWE's network subscriptions dropped like a fucking stone. The next week's Raw viewing figures were in the toilet, and nearly a week after you'd left, 'McMahon out!' was still trending from time to time. It was like a chain reaction or some shit, feeding on itself. WWE's stock prices started tanking because of the public backlash, and they had to do something. They couldn't give the fans one of the things that they wanted, which was you, because you obviously wouldn't have accepted an offer in those circumstances, but they could give them the other. They could give them Vince McMahon being asked to step down as Chairman, and that's what they had to do."

"That's about right," Ronda agreed, with no real emotion. "I'm not here to crow about it. Vince fucked up big time, and it cost him. WWE ended up being fine, of course, as it should be. People started subscribing to the network again, and their views went back up. Survivor Series didn't get boycotted, and that's all good. It wouldn't be fair on the guys who go out there night after night, busting their asses, to have their pay or jobs cut just because I got released. I appreciate the support that everyone continues to show, I really do, but please, don't chant my name throughout the Divas matches. It's not fair on the girls in the ring. Well, you can chant it at Sarita Lopez if you want, if you're still awake," she added, only half as a joke.

Steve could see the producer panicking that the show had already gone on longer than it should have. "We're running low on time, Ronda, but there's one more question that needs to be answered. Will we ever see you in WWE again?"

"I don't know," Ronda answered with a shrug. "You'd have to ask Hunter about that. He runs the place, not me. I never wanted to leave to start with."

"So you're definitely not ruling it out?" Steve asked, knowing that he had just hit his headline.

"Absolutely not. Never say never. Hunter's got my number and my agent's number is not hard to find."

Steve smiled broadly. "Ronda, I want to thank you for coming on. It's been fucking awesome chatting with you."

"No, thank you, Steve," Ronda smiled back. "I've really enjoyed it."

With that, Steve and Ronda shook hands and Steve turned to the camera to thank the viewers for watching and to plug the next week's podcast.

END

The next story in this series is titled The New Order. You can find a link to it in the bio section of my profile page, along with a list of the other stories in the series.