Hunter and Chris sat in the locker room, alone, laughing as they changed from their wrestling gear into their street clothes.  Jericho, wearing only a towel around his waist, plopped down into Hunter's jean-clad lap.  "You were soooo sexy out there tonight."  he purred.

Hunter smiled down at him.  "You looked pretty good yourself.  That "Walls of Jericho" move you have....your facial expression is so interesting when you do it..."

Chris laughed.   "You want to do a little wall-breaking right now?"  When Hunter didn't respond, he went on to say "oh come on, no one's here, no one will see us, let's have some fun.  We've both been too tired to do anything lately..."

Hunter abruptly stood up, sending Chris crashing to the floor.  "What, you like talking it in the ass?"  he said, his tone dark and menacing.

Chris pushed himself backwards on the floor.  "No....no....this can't be happening...NO!!!!"

Hunter moved to pin him to the floor.  "There's no getting away now..."

*** Hunter's POV ***

"No!"  Chris screams, his body thrashing everywhere.  One arm flies out and hits me and that's when I move over to hold him down.  "Chris!  Chris, wake up...."

His eyes snap open and for a moment he is still terrified.  Slowly though, his eyes focus and he relaxes.  "Sorry, I...uhm.."

"Chris, what's going on?  This is the third time now that you've woken up in panic..."

Chris took a deep breath and let it out.  "Nothing's going on...I just haven't been feeling well the past couple days and I guess it's causing me to have strange dreams."

I held my hand on his forehead and sure enough, he did feel a little warm.  "If you're sick, maybe you shouldn't wrestle today.  Ask Vince if you can just do a run-in or something."

Chris shook his head.  "I'm ok to fight, really.  I think it's just a little bug or something.   Anyways, I can't just back out on my match this close to the show.  I know you wouldn't."

He has a point there.  So, I just sigh and get on with the day.  We give up on getting any sleep and go get breakfast.  Later on we show up at the arena, where I looked at the booking sheet.  "Oh.  Oh this is just great."

"What?"  Chris asked from behind me.  "What's going on?"

"We're facing each other tonight.  Damn, and you're not at 100%...."

"Don't worry about it."  Chris soothed.  "You've worked matches with the Rock and they looked good, compared to that making me look good while I'm sick should be a breeze."

"I guess you're right...."  With a kiss good-bye, I left to go over my scenes with Stephanie and Chris headed to the locker room.

*** Jericho's POV ***

This match is going to be so much fun tonight!  I can barely concentrate on what's in front of me, and now I have to be in a match with the one person who will KNOW something's off and won't let me hear the end of it.  I dropped down onto the bench, shivering slightly with the recollection of wood beneath me, and say a weak "hi" to Eddie and Sean.

Eddie keeps me distracted with his chatter about where he and Joanie wen for dinner last night, and what they had to eat, and how they found the most INTERESTING little store where they got this massage oil....soon he has both me and Sean, who's still moping around over Kane, laughing despite ourselves.  I left the locker room, intending to go talk to Joanie, when I heard Eddie whisper loudly "Hey Sean!"  I paused in the hallway to listen to their conversation.

Sean's voice.  "Yeah Eddie?"

"You notice anything weird about Chris?"

"Yeah, he's acting... I don't know....like something's going on that he's not telling us about.  Hunter mentioned it too last night, but he said Chris isn't talking."

Eddie paused, then said hesitantly "You think we should talk to him?"

"I don't know, he might kill us or something.  If he won't talk to Hunter, I don't think he's gonna talk to us."

"You don't know that..."  Eddie's voice faded as I walked away.  Shit!  Even Eddie and Sean could see through my act...I'm gonna have to get better at this before Hunter figures me out.

As I walked down the hallway, I bumped into Chris Benoit.  "Sorry..." I said, but he just gave me this stare.....this very very odd stare.....that made my stomach drop to about the bottom of my shoes.  I quickly shook off the feeling and went on walking.

*** Hunter's POV ***

I walked to the ring accompanied by Stephanie and the boos of the crowd.  Chris was already in the ring, waiting for me.  The match started off good, if not as spectacular as our earlier contests.  That is, until I went for the Pedigree.  He was scripted to reverse it, but he didn't, just went with the move.  Panicked, I started to taunt him, even turning my back on him...hoping he would realize his mistake and get up.  Unfortunately, he didn't, and I had no choice but to pin him, ending the match.

When we got to the backstage area, I turned around to face him.  "Chris, now you aren't gonna tell me you just screwed up the match and nothing's wrong.  What the hell is going on?"

He glared back at me.  "I told you.  Nothing is wrong, I was tired and I forget to reverse the move.  I'm really sorry.  If you want,. I'll go explain to Vince that it was my fault..."

He started to walk away, but I caught his arm and held him in place.  "No, you aren't going anywhere until you tell me what's wrong.  Chris, I don't know why you won't trust me enough to tell me what's going on...."

"Let go of me."  he said quietly.  I didn't release my hold.  "Dammit Hunter, let me go!!!"  he yelled, wrenching his arm away from me.  "Look, I don't know why you won't believe me, but nothing's going on and I'd really appreciate it if you stopped asking."

I shook my head in frustration.  "Fine.  I've about had enough of this anyways.  You want to talk, you know where the room is.  Right now I don't really have the patience to deal with this."

I walked away from them only to run into Stephanie.  "Where are you going Hunter?"  she asked.

"I'm going back to my hotel...look, this isn't a good time right now Steph..." I said with annoyance.

Stephanie crossed her arms over her chest.  "Why, because you had a fight with your loverboy over there?"

God, I swear, if she wasn't a woman I would severely hurt her.  "Look, you stay out of my business and I'll stay out of yours.  You're the last thing I want to deal with right now."

"Excuse me?"

Oh yeah, I forgot, no one's ever spoken back to Princess Stephanie.  "You heard me.  Now get out of my way so I can leave."

"Oh hell no..."  Stephanie got directly in front of me to totally block my path.  "You are going to listen to me whether you like it or not.  Why the hell are you with that guy anyway...it seems he doesn't want you....why don't you come back with me and we can forget all about this?"

I don't even believe this.  "I would never....and I mean NEVER leave Jericho and if I did.... I wouldn't get back with you, you...how does it go again...brutal, bottom-feeding, trash bag ho."
 
Steph's eyes widened in shock. "What???"

"You heard me bitch."  I growled, and stormed off.

"Hunter...HUNTER!!!  Don't you DARE walk out while I'm talking to you...."  I could hear Stephanie yelling after me, but I kept walking, even when her voice got quiet and menacing.  I really didn't care what she was saying...after all, what was she gonna do to me?

*** Jericho's POV ***

I walked into the locker room in a huff.  Almost everyone had left already, but I was too angry to notice the eerie silence that grew as each person left.  I had just slammed my locker shut when I saw Chris Benoit enter, and belatedly I realized we were the only two in the room.

My palms started sweating before he even did anything, and it just got worse when he walked up to me, smiling his trademark gap-toothed smile. "Hi Chris."  I moved to one side to get passed him, but his arm shot out, trapping me on that side.  "Where do you think you're going?  You and I have something to talk about...."
___________
Don't tell me I haven't been good to you
Don't tell me I have never been there for you
Just tell me why nothing is
Good enough...
- "Good Enough", Sarah McLachland