Chapter Text
The mic probably didn’t catch it, or else Kevin Dunne would have been working his magic in the sound truck, but when Dean said he wasn’t a joke of a champion, Seth could hear the shake in his voice, the little waver that rarely made it into the ring. Dean wasn’t exactly lying when he said those things, and Seth could even hear a little venom when he said he wasn’t the sort of guy to lose a title, to get suspended, to leave, like it was hurting him to speak ill of Roman, but that he had to tell the truth, had to tell the world that he wasn’t what they thought.
Seth knows, all too well, that Dean’s got a bad habit of wrapping himself up in his own head when things are going wrong, to become quiet and insular, only snapping into violence and action when he needs to in the ring. He doesn’t want to see it again, doesn’t want to see Dean lose the title because he’s so deep in his own mind that he can’t think straight, and can’t hold himself together. Having held the title himself, Seth knows how easy it is for the welcome, long-awaited weight of the gold to feel heavy and dull, like a duty to be performed, rather than an honour to be earned. Dean’s manic grin in the ring tells him nothing, but that, in itself, is enough to tell him everything. Dean can fake almost anything, but when he’s stood face to face with Seth, he’s never been able to fake disinterest.
“What the hell was that?” he asks, the second they’re backstage and out of sight of the cameras. Dean looks at him, and for a moment, Seth can see why people say he looks old, can see the weight of years in his eyes like an old dog just ready to lie down. Then he shakes it off, the grin too wide and too pleased with itself to be real.
“Don’t know what you’re talking about, Sethie,” he chirps, and then shoulders Seth against the wall, out of his way, heading to his dressing-room where he can lock the door, and Seth can’t let that happen. He grabs Dean by the bicep, catalogues the wince – he’s overdoing it in the gym, pressure of being champ already getting to him – and pushes him back against the wall, hearing the air rush out of Dean’s lungs as his back smacks into the wall harder than Seth meant to push. Dean shoves back, getting in his face. “Hey, I don’t know if you heard, but wrestling’s fake. Back it up, buddy.”
Seth steps back a little, shakes his head like an angry horse, and comes back towards Dean, pinning him to the wall with his body and leaning in. This would have been so much easier if he’d never left their little group, if he’d been with them this whole time, if Dean had known he could let some of the weight fall onto Seth’s shoulders and he’d willingly take it. As it’s been, Dean has had Roman to help him when he’s struggling – but Roman isn’t here, and Seth is, so Dean will just have to deal.
“Don’t fuck with me, Ambrose. I want to know what the fuck you thought you were doing out there.” Seth’s voice is dark and firm, he doesn’t let a trace of concern leak into it, keeping it angry out of respect for Dean’s position in the company, and knowing anything like affection would probably get him a punch in the face.
“Thought you wanted me to fuck with you, Rollins,” Dean spits back, and rocks his hips upwards to punctuate his point. Seth growls and pins him a little more firmly to the wall. “Thought that was what you’d missed, all that lonely rehab time, all those pretty dick pics you kept sending, all those desperate texts?”
Seth’s had enough, and steps back a tiny amount, getting his hand on the back of Dean’s neck and gripping him, firmly. So he might have needed a bit of affection while he’d been out – he’s back now, and he’s not going to let a few embarrassing pictures change what he wants out of this company.
“You want to behave like a barely housebroken puppy, then I’ll treat you like one,” he snarls, and pushes Dean towards the dressing room door, already tired of this long hallway, walls bare brick painted black, every sound echoing. He knows what Dean needs, and he’s not above taking it right here, where everyone can see them, but he’s also aware that people expect certain things from the champion, and the aim of this is not to fuck up Dean’s championship run, not to make a bad situation worse.
Once he gets the door shut and locked behind them, Seth lets go of Dean’s neck, and Dean instantly turns, throwing a punch that Seth blocks lazily, using Dean’s own momentum to get him pinned with his face against the door, Seth twisting his hands up behind his back and holding him still.
“What the fuck, Seth?” Dean yells as his face hits the wood, and Seth might be sorry for that later, but not right now. “Easy on the goods, sweetheart, some of us still have media shit to do.”
Seth laughs at that, a bitter, sharp sound that’s possibly more honest than he’d like, before he takes a deep breath and lets himself calm down.
“Come on, Dean. What was that? You’re not on your a-game against me? When was the last time that happened, FCW?” Never, Seth thinks, we’ve never been as out of sync as we were tonight, when was the last time we ever lost ourselves in something as basic as a little trash talking? “We’re better than that, you’re better than that. You’re the champion, for fuck’s sake.”
The belt is still clasped loosely in one of Dean’s hands, and at the word ‘champion’, he lets it fall to the floor, where it makes a horrible noise. Seth makes a note to check it for damage next time he gets a chance, and steps back straight away, in case that was Dean’s signal to stop.
“I always bring my a-game,” Dean snarls back, moving with a quickness that might surprise another man, over by his bag almost before Seth has time to move. “You’ve just been gone too long, you’ve got ring rust.”
Seth watches Dean strip out of his clothes with anger, each movement precise and direct, no wasted energy, and wonders where his Dean went, the sweet, soft, eager to please Dean who didn’t need to be pushed into everything. Then he stops wondering and pulls his own ring gear off.
“Shower,” he says, frankly, rifling through Dean’s gym bag. “You didn’t stop carrying – nope, here we go.” He holds the lube lazily, tossing it back and forth between his hands, and Dean’s eyes follow it for a moment before he stiffens and looks back up to Seth’s eyes.
“Why would I do anything you say?” he asks, and Seth wants, so desperately, to smile at his boy, to reassure him like that, but Dean’s never responded well to tenderness when he’s like this. He needs to be treated like nothing, dragged down to the bare bones and held there – only then can he be built back up, layered onto the frame as someone who deserves to be loved, to be cherished and held tightly.
“Because you want tips from a real champ,” Seth hears himself say instead, and he pretty much deserves the ringing, open-handed blow Dean lays on his face. He fires back with a slap himself, and hear the crack of it echo in the locker room, red palm-print blooming on Dean’s skin as he draws in a ragged breath. “Now get in the fucking shower before I have to make you.”