Nikkita Nowinski, aka "The Monster"

BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP! BEEP!

Nikkita groans. “Afternoon, already?” **** to return to sleep, Nikkita buries her face into the pillow, only for the alarm to continue blaring. Rolling onto her back, she gracelessly paws at her alarm, trying to shut off its incessant beeping.

After a couple of tries, she manages to press the right button. The damage, however, is already done. Eyes open yet still bleary, she glances around the room once more, finding everything exactly the same as it’s always been. The same way it's been since almost six months ago, right down to being nearly the exact same date as when it happened.

Reaching for her phone, Nikkita yanks it off of the fraying charger, and checks her face out in the reflection of the screen. Her once bright and beautiful eyes have long since lost any semblance of excitement, now just two light brown orbs that seem to reflect the same weariness as the rest of her gloomy expression.

Laying the phone screen down beside her, Nikkita sighs. Blinking slowly, she finally pulls the covers off from over her, unveiling a fair-skinned body that, despite an overall lack of physical activity in the past couple of months, seems perfectly sculpted for exactly that type of endeavor. Weight lifting, construction work, farm labor; Just something, anything, to make use of a gifted physique that has otherwise been simply wasting away on the 25 year old. Clad only in a shirt and a loose-fitting pair of shorts, the parts of her body that aren’t sculpted for fitness are almost painfully small - something Nikkita has been reminded of time and time again.

Getting up out of bed, Nikkita grabs her phone once more before shambling off towards the kitchen, eyes to the screen as she listlessly scrolls through her messages. However, as she continues to scroll, one message in particular catches her eye. Or rather, more a series of messages.

Staring at the screen for a few seconds, Nikkita goes to put her phone down, only to stop herself. Glancing back at the screen, her face falls, eyes darting to the bottom left corner of her vision. A few seconds later, she presses the video call button, bracing for the worst.

…

…..

…….

“Sis?” A voice comes through the phone speaker, before being matched to a face that can best be described as Nikkita’s, if new life had been breathed into it.

“Hey, Karmen.” Nikkita weakly responds.

“Hey, Nikki! How’s my favorite little sister doing? It feels like it’s been forever since the last time we talked!” Nikkita’s sister, Karmen, waves frantically.

Such rapid motion inadvertently causes Karmen’s own chest to wobble. Nikkita’s gaze briefly flickers downwards in envy, before she remembers that it’s her turn to respond in the current conversation.

“Heh, y-yeah…” Nikkita laughs in response, awkwardly trailing off as the aforementioned ‘last time’ fails to spark any memories in her mind. “Yeah, it uhm… It has been a while, hasn’t it?”

“Yeah, it… It has.” Now it’s Karmen’s turn to trail off.

…

“I’m sorry, Karmen-”

“For what?” Karmen cuts her off, a bit sharp with her reply.

As Nikkita goes quiet, Karmen lets out a sigh. “Look, it’s… It’s okay, alright? I get it, sis. Really.”

“Do you?” Nikkita asks, giving a sharp reply of her own, before taking a sharp inhale immediately after saying it. “Wait, sis, I’m sorry, I didn’t-”

“It’s alright! Calm down. Stop apologizing so much, Nikki.” Karmen patronizes her, her tone half-jokingly, before becoming more serious. “Seriously though, I get what you’re going through. I do. Maybe I wasn’t exactly in your shoes when I was at that place in my life, but it doesn’t take a genius to know what you’re dealing with.”

“...Thank you, sis.” Nikkita says, wiping some wetness from her eyes.

“I’m not finished, Nikkita. Don’t go thanking me quite yet.” Karmen teases. “After all, you did leave mom worried sick about you, you know?”

“I… I know, sis. I’m-” Nikkita cuts herself short. “...I mean, I’ll call her.”

“Promise?” Karmen asks, teasing her.

“Promise.” Nikkita chuckles.

“Good. I don’t think I have it in me to listen to her worrying about her daughter falling off the face of the Earth anymore.” Karmen chuckles, prompting Nikkita to do the same. It’s been a while since she really laughed like this.

“Alright, Karmen, I’ll be sure to give her a call sometime this week, okay?” Nikkita offers.

“Sounds good to me, sis. And Nikkita?”

“Yeah, sis?”

“Love you, you lumbering oaf.”

Both Karmen and Nikkita laugh. Nikkita so much so that she feels a wave of dizziness rush over her. Eventually, though, it settles down.

...

“Nikkita?”

The call goes dead. On the other end, Karmen looks down in anxiety, before her expression abruptly turns to confusion. Why had she been calling her sister in the first place? Nikkita should be enjoying her vacation! Not worrying about her mom and sister…

“...She is a ‘retired’ pro wrestler, and another former classmate and training partner of our Master, Miss Nikkita Nowinski!”

Nikkita Nowinski's theme song

Immediately, the presence of theme music draws the eyes of the contestants off of Linda for the time being. Instead, they look over to the sight of a woman who, quite frankly? Seems like she’s more fit to burst out into tears than make any sort of entrance. Her body is shaking, wracked with anxiety over her sudden and abrupt transportation here. She turns back to where she came from, questioning if maybe it would be better to just go back there. But unfortunately for her, she isn’t given a choice. Facing the same compulsion as all of the others, Nikkita’s eyes widen in terror as she’s made to storm down to the ring, her body taking long, striding steps to show off its size. To further emphasize this, Nikkita pulls herself up onto the ring apron, rather than using the steel stairs like everyone else before her, showing the strength she holds in her frame.

With her stepping between the top and middle ropes, Nikkita is instantly met with Serenity guiding her inwards, an arm wrapping itself around her shoulders as the host forcibly calms her, preventing those tears from escaping their confines.

“Welcome, Nikkita! Welcome… To Harem Hotel!” Serenity greets as she continues guiding Nikkita to her chair, before pulling her in for a more personal, closer introduction. “Now, just between you and me, the script writers wanted me to do this whole grandiose thing where I welcome you to ‘heaven’, before correcting myself to say the name of the show, just because your name matched up with a reference to some song that they wanted me to try and shoehorn into the intro. But, I think we both agree that this is a bit more natural, yeah?” Serenity quips, either completely forgetting about - or perhaps purposefully ignoring - the fact that the cameras are on her at this exact moment in time.

“Harem… Hotel?” Nikkita asks, her words slurring together. It's obviously she's still mentally battling through the sense of calmness that’s completely overridden her sense of fear.

“Oh, right!” Serenity lets go of Nikkita, letting her emotional state level itself out. “Sorry, I’m still learning the ropes with this whole ‘hosting’ thing. Had it on almost full blast thanks to miss manager over here. But hey, at least I’ve got some more experience with transformations now!”

Serenity glances over at Linda, who looks up, accidentally meeting her gaze. Linda jolts back in her seat, causing the host’s expression to falter, before she turns back to facing Nikkita.

“Anyways, as I was saying, this is Harem Hotel! To keep things moving along, I’ll keep this one short. You and seven other women are here to fight for Christian’s affection. Win, and you become part of his harem, and also join in on his new wrestling promotion. Lose, and, well…” Serenity stops for a moment, before waving it off entirely. “Well, you don’t want to know. But hey, free contract in a major wrestling promotion!”

“Pardon me, Serenity, didn’t you introduce her as a retired professional wrestler?” Penelope asks, the others looking in agreement.

“Yeah, I definitely heard you say retired.” Gail adds in.

“Retired?” Kehlani asks, turning to face Nikkita. “Nikkita, you never told me you retired.” She says, before averting her eyes. “N-Not that we really kept in touch with each other, or anything. I just… I remember reading about how your career was picking up traction. T-That’s all…”

Serenity scoffs. “Retired? Please, everyone knows that retirements in wrestling are only temporary. Unless somebody dies or is left bound to a wheelchair, there’s always a chance for one more match!”

“That…” Penelope goes to respond, but stops short. “...Might be true for some people. But what about the ones who aren’t medically cleared? I mean, Nikkita here might have suffered some real bad neck injury, or got some spinal diagnosis that none of us knew about. It wouldn’t be fair to **** her to get back in the ring if she's injured.”

“Huh?” Serenity asks, genuinely seeming confused by Penelope’s response. “Oh! Oh, no no no, don’t worry, Nikkita didn’t retire because of suffering some injury.”

Penelope’s brow furrows, perplexed by the host’s response. “Wait, so then…”

As Penelope’s mind wanders, Nikkita fidgets uncomfortably in her seat, refusing to make eye contact with anyone around her.

“So you’re saying she retired for a different reason entirely?” Gail asks, equal parts confused and wary of the host's true motives.

Serenity nods her head. “Yep! You see, it wasn’t ol’ Nikkita here who was the one who got injured.”

Once more, Nikkita begins to fidget, this time more noticeably to the others around her.

“H-Hey, if you don’t want to talk-” Kehlani tries to offer, only to be cut short.

“In fact," Serenity interrupts, ignoring Nikkita’s own struggles. "The reason she retired was because of her own clumsiness!” Serenity exclaims. "See, all it took was one botched move during one of her matches, and then BAM!” For emphasis, Serenity pounds a fist into her palm, Nikkita’s eyes widening from the memories flashing back to her mind. "Straight to the hospital."

“Wait, you’re telling me that all she did was injure someone?” Penelope asks, looking far less worried than before. “What did she do, paralyze them?”

“Nope. Just a minor concussion from dropping them at an awkward angle.” Serenity explains.

“...Oh.” Penelope clicks her tongue. “That’s it? She just quit? Over a single concussion?”

“I-It was more than that!” Nikkita yells out, startling Penelope. “You weren’t there, okay? You didn’t see what happened afterwards! How glossy their eyes were, how difficult it was for them to remember what had happened-”

“Honey, I’ve been concussed before.” Penelope responds, folding her arms. “I know what the symptoms are. You don’t have to list them out for me.”

Unfortunately, Penelope’s indifference only seems to exacerbate Nikkita’s woes, as she joins Linda in curling up in her chair, once more on the verge of tears.

“Okay, okay! Let’s all settle down, here. There’ll be plenty of time for drama and crying later on in the show.” Serenity pipes up, stepping towards Nikkita and placing another calming touch onto her shoulder. “For now though, there’s still two more contestants to introduce!”

With Nikkita’s mind numbed once more, Serenity lets go of the supposed ‘Monster’, and faces the hardcam once more.

“Because while the monster might be big and bad, and the anointed might be the company’s golden child, what every wrestling company needs is a real wrestler’s type of wrestler. A person who can twist and torque their opponents into all sorts of debilitating holds. Someone who can stretch out muscles of the body that their opponents didn’t even know that they had! Be they part of wrestling royalty, an amateur sensation turned hopeful pro, or just someone whose unwavering dedication is unmatched by those around them, these technical cripplers know how to turn a match from a spot show to a proper battle. And given the person we’ve chosen to represent this role? I get the feeling a certain someone will be all too happy to see her grind her way to the very top of the card here in Harem Hotel Wrestling.”

Without giving any sort of explanation, Serenity turns to the entrance ramp, giving a much more low-key motion than the others.

“Introducing the seventh competitor here on Harem Hotel, and playing the role of ‘The Technician’...”