Upside Down

Chapter 1

Just another day.

Lavani Malcolm stepped inside the Freedom Hall arena in Louisville, Kentucky in a faded blue jean skirt with a black and blue open-shoulder top that had a V-shaped neckline and hugged her curves nicely. Her raven hair currently had blue streaks in it that matched the shirt and currently had it swept up on top of her head, tendrils framing her face. It was hot in Kentucky, there was no way she having her hair stick to her neck. Most arenas the WWF traveled to didn't have great air conditioning so she had to keep herself cool the best she could.

Flat out refusing to wear sandals though, Lavani instead opted for simple tennis shoes. She had them in every color and tonight she wore blue ones. Lavani worked for the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) with the McMahon-Helmsley Faction. She was their personal assistant/lackey of sorts, but they did treat her with respect for the most part. Lavani didn't take any grief, she'd worked for the company for the past two years since 1998.

It was now the year 2000 and her two year anniversary had just recently passed, having started shortly before WrestleMania in ninety eight. She loved her job for the most part and put the boys in their places when they stepped out of line, which her boss Vince McMahon appreciated. Tonight would be no different...or so she thought.

Shane McMahon was suddenly at her side, smiling down at her. This was the golden era, the McMahon-Helmsley Era, and they were referred to as either the McMahon-Helmsley Faction or sometimes M-H Regime. Him, Hunter, Stephanie, Tori, X-Pac, Billy Gunn, Road Dogg Jesse James, his father...and in a completely off-TV way, Lavani.

"Blue is your color." He greeted with his ever-present charming smile, adjusting his cufflinks and pretended he wasn't sweating down the back of his suit. This was one of those days when he wished he could just show up in jeans and a t-shirt.

Because Lavani wasn't an on-screen character and kept to the backstage area exclusively, she didn't have to dress up unlike the others she worked for. "For this week, yes."

She smiled up at Shane, carrying her purse -suitcase is what the rest of the Faction called it due to how big it was- along with her case that had all of the paperwork for the Faction in it. Airplane tickets, hotel reservations, car rentals...important documents. Lavani changed her color every week, going home for two days every week, which was on the weekends.

That gave her time to change her wardrobe out for a new color. She was weird, Lavani would be the first to admit it, but the streaks in her hair only changed every six months. Since working for the WWF, she had red, purple, orange -that was definitely a different experience- green and had recently changed them to blue about a week ago.

"You boys ready for tonight?"

Shane figured Lavani had some mild form of obsessive-compulsive disorder –OCD- that pertained directly to her attire. She was one of the weirdest women he had ever met in that aspect. In the WWF, weirdness in attire was actually considered normal.

"Of course." He scoffed, winking down at her before turning a corner and halting, opening the dressing room door for her and bowed. "Ladies first."

He was considered a playboy, or man-whore, depending who asked, by some. However, Lavani was one of the exceptions. He knew she was a gem professional wise and he wasn't about to mess that up with unprofessional, intimate relations.

"Kissing ass this early, Shane-O? My, my I wonder what you did." Lavani chortled, stepping inside the room and greeted everyone. "So what did he do this time?"

"You totally missed it." Billy stated, laughing. "This idiot decided to pull a prank on Show."

Lavani raised a slow eyebrow, sitting down while pulling out some documents she had to have Vince sign for approval. "Do I even wanna know?" She asked resignedly.

"Man it was GREAT!" Sean ignored Shane's glare. "Tell her what you did, Shane-O! You can't leave Lava outta the loop!"

Stephanie merely rolled her eyes. "I think she might prefer to be left out of the loop, X."

"Now what fun is that, Princess?"

Sometimes Lavani wondered how the hell she'd put up with all of these morons for the past two years. Shane cleared his throat, looking a bit uncomfortable, and not entirely due to the stifling heat even though their room had been outfitted with at least a million fans. He did have a bit of a...unprofessional, immature streak and attributed it to the people he was running around with.

"Well, you know the wardrobe department custom make all his trunks..." Shane began, making sure the door was closed because so far, Show didn't realize it was a joke. "I may have...been in that area the other night when they were washing some newly made trunks...and shrunk them-"

"On purpose." Jesse added, winking at the giggling Tori.

"So now, he may or may not think that he's growing...again..."

"The poor guy was practically in tears, Shane!"

"Just remember when he finds out that you did it, don't come crying to us for protection, Shane." Hunter reminded, snorting while wrapping his hands in tape, getting ready for possibly the biggest match of his career that night.

"I swear, I think I'm losing IQ points being around you guys...with the exception of the women. Since you know, we actually THINK before we act." Lavani smirked when Stephanie and Tori started laughing, shrugging when she received glares from all the men in the room. "I'm right and you know it, so get those sour looks off your faces or I'll make sure you have to bunk together again."

"You wouldn't."

"Of course she wouldn't!"

"Try me." Lavani smiled sweetly, though it didn't reach her light brown eyes that reminded most the color of toffee.

Billy immediately threw his hands up, nodding. "Fine, fine we'll stop." He REFUSED to bunk with any of the guys again after what happened last time. "I refuse to have another dick pressed against my ass."

"HEY, it was a JOKE and it was a dildo!"

"Mr. McMahon, can you sign these for me please?"

Vince, who had been rather quiet throughout all this, nodded and accepted the forms she handed to him. For a very good reason, he didn't want to suffer permanent brain damage by associating in some of these conversations. Automatically he read over them, a habit he had adopted early on, before signing.

"If he finds out it was me, it was because someone TOLD him." Shane said, still continuing with Hunter.

"That dildo thing was just cold, Sean..." Jesse personally preferred staying in motels, he'd take bedbugs over anal rape via his friends any day.

"I honestly don't understand why we continue hanging around you clowns."

"No kidding..." Tori shook her head before smirking at Lavani. "It must because we're well compensated for it, eh?"

"Pretty much."

Lavani smirked right back at Tori, looking over the paperwork to make sure everything was signed before placing them back in her bag. She would find a fax machine and send them over to WWF headquarters once back at the hotel. Lavani tuned them out after the dildo remark, keeping to herself mostly. She was friendly, but wasn't afraid to speak her mind if necessary. Vince had offered to put her on-screen several times, but Lavani declined, enjoying being backstage and not in the madness part of the company.

"Okay I need java badly, anyone want anything?" She announced, standing up, the pay-per-view having already started a little over an hour ago.

"Just bring a pot back with some cups." Stephanie suggested, knowing it would be easier for Lavani to carry. "But I want a cappuccino, if they have a machine."

"Keep drinking that shit and it'll burn a hole in your stomach, Steph." Lavani winked before exiting the room, heading down the hallway toward the cafeteria.

"I'll go help her." Jesse volunteered, not about to stay for the second round of jokes that were starting, wondering why Vince didn't say anything. The old man couldn't be very impressed by a nightly 'dick joke' session. Poor old geezer. "So, do you have an opinion on the iron man match? Because Sean, Billy, Shane and I have a betting pool going." He grinned when she just gave him a look. "I'll give you some real good odds if you want to get in on it. So far, everyone is betting Rocky takes Trips to the cleaners." Mainly because...no one liked Hunter at the moment; he had gone into prick mode to most people outside their little clique.

"I could care less who wins that match, Jesse."

Though secretly, Lavani did hope that Hunter got his ass handed to him. But she knew better than to voice her opinions when it came to Hunter, loving her job far too much to lose it over him. He'd already had several people fired, though they didn't contribute that much to the business. He had Stephanie wrapped around his finger, which was dangerous in Lavani's opinion.

"And you do realize if he heard you talking like this, you'd probably be out of the Faction, right? So no thanks, I'll pass."

"Nah, he'd beat my ass, but then he'd have to beat Shane's, Billy's, and Sean's too, that's a lot of asses to whip." Jesse drawled thoughtfully. He was an easy-going, laid back kind of guy, which sometimes got him in trouble, along with the fact that when he said something. He usually didn't think in terms of 'who is this going to piss off?'. "Besides, I'm the D-O-Double G baby, I-"

"Need to shut the HELL up before I plant my B-double O-T up your annoying ass!"

It was always nice to run into Rocky.

Lavani had to bite her lip very hard not to start laughing and failed miserably, shaking her head at The Rock. "I knew there was a reason I liked you, Dwayne."

She smiled when he simply cocked an eyebrow down at her, ignoring it. Lavani called most of the guys by their birth names instead of their gimmicks. There were just a few choice people on the roster she knew better than to cross, Dwayne was definitely not one of them.

"Why don't you gentleman stay here and have a chat while I go get my java?" She suggested, slipping away and leaving Jesse to try to battle Dwayne verbally.

As much as Lavani liked Jesse, he could be annoying like the rest and right now she just needed a minute away from all the Faction.

"Wait there, mama, you can't leave me with him, he hates me!"

"Everyone hates you." Dwayne said flatly, having absolutely no love for anyone in the McMahon-Helmsley Faction.

They had taken their little 'idea for a storyline' and blew it out of proportion, mainly thanks to Hunter. Everyone knew he was a power hungry, egotistical jackass, who was definitely taking every advantage he could right now. Dwayne knew without a doubt if Hunter wasn't screwing the boss's daughter, he wouldn't be getting the push he was at the moment.

"My fans don't hate me..." Jesse argued.

Dwayne snorted at that.

"You don't have fans." Mick Foley said as he passed by, carrying his own cup of coffee. "Al Snow has more fans then you."

"Call me mama again and watch what happens, Dogg." Lavani shot back over her shoulder, along with a glare, wondering if the man had a death wish.

She had all control over where he slept at night. If the man was smart, he wouldn't call her mama, like she asked him to several times. Lavani made it to the cafeteria alone thankfully and headed straight for the coffee, noticing they didn't have a cappuccino machine.

'Poor Steph.' She thought sarcastically, deciding to just get herself from java since nobody else spoke up.

She would simply tell Stephanie there wasn't a pot available to bring back to the room. Stirring the creamer and sugar in her coffee, Lavani decided to take a few more minutes to enjoy the silence that surrounded her. Silence was golden and it didn't exist in the Faction.

"LavaBean!" Silence was not to be hers, not tonight; it was a pay-per-view and everyone was geared up. "You are looking, like, totally hot!"

"Totally, E, does this woman not reek of awesomeness?"

"Not as awesome as us, but almost!" Edge chirped, smiling evilly when Lavani slowly turned around, knowing it drove her up a wall when they did this to her. "Hi Lavani, how are you tonight?" He asked in his normal tone of voice, leaning against his best friend and tag team partner. "Ah...one of those nights?"

"How do you know she's having one of those nights?"

"Her eyes are narrowed."

Edge and Christian, though Lavani knew them better as Adam and Jason -Jay for short-, two men who had befriended her when she first started in the company. They drove her crazy a lot of the time, but for the most part she tolerated them. Not to mention, she'd worked closely with them during a darker period in the WWF when they were part of the Ministry of Darkness angle briefly. How those days seemed so long ago. Lavani mostly worked with the McMahons, but during that time, things were very hectic and sometimes she was assigned different tasks every night.

"Yes it's one of those nights where I really don't want to hear about reeking of awesomeness or about dicks." If she heard one more dick joke from the Faction, Lavani was pretty sure she'd blow her head off. "So if you want to talk to me, do it as your normal selves, please and thank you."

"Gotcha LavaBean." Adam saluted her, then frowned. "Wait a second, rewind, I could have sworn you just said-"

"Dick jokes? We do not make dick jokes, that is one of the lowest levels of humor."

"Right next to the pun."

Jay took position on one side of her while Adam took post on the other side, both men wrapping arms around her. "They being their normal 'fun' selves?" He asked sympathetically, 'they' being the people she sadly had to work with.

"When aren't they?" Lavani retorted and took a sip of her java, sighing with relief. "Caffeine is my best friend."

"Hey! I thought we were your best friend?"

"Yeah, nobody can compare to E & C, LavaBean!"

"Did you seriously just try to rhyme?" Lavani couldn't help laughing when Jay shrugged. "Well as much as I've enjoyed your company, I have to get back before they send a search party out after me."

"Okay but before you go, how bout we get together tonight after work?"

"We haven't went out in awhile and we miss you." Adam leaned his head against her shoulder, batting blue eyes at her. "Please?"

"I'll think about it. Ciao for now boys." She winked, walking away from them and headed back to the Faction's locker room reluctantly. In the distance, Lavani could hear a rumble, wondering if a storm was brewing in Kentucky. 'Oh wow, I was gone that long?' She wondered in thought when Hunter and Stephanie stormed past her, along with Vince, everyone having their game faces on. That meant it was the sixty minute Iron Man match against Dwayne. 'Go Rocky.' She cheered in her head, stopping when she heard that rumbling again and frowned.

That rumbling was the man arriving, fully prepared to reclaim his yard. He had watched this joke of a faction slowly take over and heard from various sources about the extreme inflate in egos and backstage politics. He had decided it was time to announce that he was back and one hundred percent in each and every way. No one in the ring heard a thing besides the fans screaming, the beating of their own hearts and the blood rushing through their heads.

None of them were expecting what was coming.