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After failing at stomping the Premier Athletes for the second time, Joe, Hook and Shibata return to one of the main locker rooms, Shibata rereading the note left for them by Mark Sterling while Hook sits next to him, staring at his phone with a mulish look on his face. Joe watches the monitor for a few minutes before glancing over at the other two, quickly losing interest in the match going on. Pushing away from the wall he's leaning against, he lightly kicks Hook's foot. "Hey."
He looks up, blinking. "What?"
"I don't know," Joe says. "You tell me, why's it look like you're about to smash your phone with your bare hands?"
Hook grimaces and scrubs at his face. "It's nothing," he mumbles.
Shibata shifts next to him, beginning to type. "Well-" Before he could get any further, Hook casts a warning glare at him and Shibata shrugs, focusing back on his phone briefly. "Never mind."
Joe rolls his eyes. "Alright, look, we have this six man to focus on Saturday. I'm not going to risk losing because your head isn't in the game. So talk to me, Hook. We've gone through this. You're not going to learn shit if you keep trying to shoulder everything on your own."
Hook exhales and swipes his phone awake again, putting in his code. He then holds it out to Joe, who reluctantly takes it, not sure if he really wants to see whatever it is that has Hook looking this murderous. He reads the screen before rolling his eyes. "Really, kid? This is what's eating you?"
Hook shrugs. "You saw their match earlier."
"I did," Joe says. "Your guy didn't seem at all receptive to Sabre's bullshit." He hands the phone back over and frowns down at Hook. "Instead of sitting here, obsessing over the worst case scenario, why not go talk to him about it so you actually know where his head's at with all of this?"
Hook exhales like just thinking about doing so is painful to him, but Joe continues staring down at him, arms crossed over his chest as he waits. "Fine, bro," Hook snaps after a minute, getting to his feet. "I'll go talk to him."
Joe turns and watches as Hook pushes out of the locker room. Joe sighs while Shibata raises his eyebrows. "Unbelievable." He shakes his head.
-x
Hook scrubs at his nose as he walks through the halls, glancing into each open room he walks by. He hears Mark Briscoe long before he sees him and it guides him into the locker room Orange is settled in. To his credit, Kyle O'Reilly takes one look at Hook's face and nudges Mark, muttering something to him before they both leave the locker room.
Rhett Titus is packing after his match, but he's already halfway out the door, so Hook barely pays him any attention as he sits down next to Orange, who looks over at him curiously.
"Hook," he greets him.
"Orange," Hook says.
Orange frowns and sits up a little straighter, trying to read his face despite the shadows cast by his hoodie. "Is something wrong?"
Hook swipes his finger over his phone a few times, exhaling deeply before handing it over to him, once he's made sure that it's on the right screen.
Orange stares at the tweet loaded there, a perplexed twist to his lips. "Hook," he says slowly, absentmindedly scrolling through the rest of the exchange between he and Sabre from 2017, when ZSJ had said he was going to marry Orange and Orange had flirted back. He shakes his head, in amazement of how long ago that was, how different his life was at the time. "Where did you find this at?"
Hook shakes his head, tugging his hood back enough to dig through his hair, pulling it a little before he finally looks up at Orange. "Just found it," he says dully. "I get it, people say a lot of shit and most of it means nothing, but I saw you in the ring earlier with Sabre, and I just... I need to know if this is something. If... if you..."
"If I what?" Orange asks, blinking. "If I want to actually marry him?"
Hook shrugs. "Or, just, I don't know. If you had the chance, would you..." His words fail him and he rolls his eyes towards the ceiling, lost in how best to finish this thought.
Orange can guess, though, so he takes pity on him, cutting in before the awkward silence carries on for much longer. "I don't have the chance, Hook," Orange says, digging his teeth into his lower lip before sighing and handing Hook's phone back over, searching his face. "For a number of reasons, but the most important being that I'm not at all interested in him like that." Hook looks a little surprised by this, his eyes dropping back down to meet Orange's, and Orange taps the screen of the phone, smiling weakly at him. "These tweets are from 2017, Hook. Over seven years ago, I may have flirted a little at the time but we've all moved on. I've changed." He shrugs. "I love you, and that's not going to suddenly change just because of a couple of things said almost a decade ago."
Hook ducks his head, tracing shapes against the glass of his phone, his hair and hoodie hiding his expression, the flush on his face. "I'm sorry," he mumbles. "I guess Trent still had my number, and he sent me these awhile back, but they... they didn't really mean anything until I saw the two of you in the ring tonight." He frowns. "I don't know, all of that looked really intense, and I guess I just... started questioning things."
Orange closes his eyes at the first mention of Trent, reaching forward to rest his hand over Hook's, trying to still some of his anxious movements. "I promise you nothing Trent could ever say about us or any part of my life right now is true, ok? He stopped being privy to that shit a long time ago, even before he attacked me and Chuck. He's been distant and weird for a long time, I just didn't think too much about it until it was too late, because I figured he was just working through what was going on with Chuck in his own way." He hesitates. "I am glad you came to me to talk about all of this, though. I know it's not the easiest thing for either of us to do sometimes."
Hook exhales slowly. "Joe convinced me to," he admits, not able to meet Orange's eye after saying so. "Said I'd be too distracted for our match on Collision if I didn't at least try, and he wasn't going to leave me alone about it, so here I am."
"So he is good for something after all," Orange deadpans, Hook looking up at him in surprise for a moment before grinning. It warms part of Orange to see him looking a little less despondent as he leans in and kisses Hook.
Hook kisses back for a few moments before pulling back, searching Orange's face. "I'm sorry I let Trent get to me enough to doubt this."
Orange considers it, staring back at Hook. "You had the tweets for awhile and didn't worry about it until tonight?"
"Yeah, Trent sent the links to them about two months ago," Hook admits with a grimace. "But we both had a lot going on and, well, I didn't really care what he had to say or show me at the time."
"ZSJ is intense," Orange says. "But he's like that with everyone. You can watch any other match of his and this would probably seem like child's play."
Hook blinks at him. "That's possible?"
Orange huffs a laugh, brushing his fingers through his hair. "Yeah, uh. I may show you some day." Seeing the look on Hook's face, Orange chuckles. "Not any time soon, don't worry."
Hook leans into him. "Yeah, I guess. Maybe."
Orange laughs softly, slipping a hand under Hook's hoodie, resting against his lower back. "For now my best suggestion is to block Trent's number. I probably should've thought about it sooner, but I didn't really think he'd ever try to do anything to us. Or you."
Hook nods, thumbing through the settings on his phone to do so, and Orange waits patiently. "Done," he says, looking up with a dry smile.
"Alright." Orange kisses him. "Do you feel any better?"
"Yeah," Hook sighs, wrapping his arms around Orange's neck and running his fingers up through Orange's hair, lightly tugging at some of the longer strands, enjoying how they feel between his fingers. "I actually do. Thanks."
Orange hums and leans into Hook, enjoying the gentle ministrations against his scalp. "Doom time," he teases, laughing despite himself when Hook's fingers freeze.
"Oh come on," Hook huffs, looking thoroughly unimpressed.
Orange just chuckles and kisses him again.