Catalina Cortes Vs. Trent Steel (Part 3?)

In the beginning there was nothing. And then there was Twitch.



“Welcome back to Super Smash Cat, home of the fastest and most bad-ass-est half of the Kit-Kit Connection. You may remember us as the longest reigning tag team champions in Carnage Wrestling history, no big deal. For singles career purposes, I am the Pride of the Flamingo Academy, Rudo Royalty, the killer kitten with the hottest offense and the coldest comebacks… the one… the only…”





The screen flashed and the chat chanted along(via text, of course). With nearly two dozen viewers, Catalina Cortes decided it was time to begin the stream proper, but not before a history lesson. She adjusted her cat-ear headphones, cleared her throat(off mic) and weaved the tale of the terrible battles between the Lucha Princess and the Son of a Bitch. Virtual and otherwise.



“Once upon a stream, I proved my superiority over Trent Steel in OWF 2K17. My CAW trounced his official version and since then ya girl has gone on to defeat him not once, not twice, but thrice. But asterisk, you say! One was a countout victory, one was a tag team match where Zephyr Quinn took the pin as Trent’s partner, and the only time Catalina Cortes has successfully pinned Trent Steel was in a grueling gauntlet match where a bunch of other wrestlers did all the work. And to that, my counterpoint is this - shut up.”



The chat did not shut up and objections continued. There were debates amongst them, arguments, heated exchanges. Soon unadulterated, unmoderated chaos reigned. Her point unmade, Catalina pressed on.



“Because since then, I have gone on to virtually best him countless times. Crushed his Mii with barrage after barrage of red shells in Mario Kart 8 Deluxe. My Sim has bullied his Sim out of the Carnage neighborhood with her ruthless standup comedy skills. For the sake of giving him a fair shake, I even rolled a spindly ass Trent Steel in Bloodborne, but alas, he was no match for the eldritch abominations of Yharnam. How’s he gonna beat me if he can’t even get past the Cleric Beast? Get your head and your Saw Cleaver out of your ass, Trent.”



“But in the interest of fairness, I have paid an indeterminate sum of money to bring you my final and most accurate test. Thanks to the modding work of…” She read a name and sighed, resigning herself to reading it live. “PoopiestButthole, tonight’s stream will be something a little different. In the role of Jill Valentine will be me and in the role of Nemesis will be Trent Steel. Trentesis, if you will. Welcome to Resident Evil 3 Ultimate Turbo Game-of-the-Year Catalina Edition.”





Catalina Cortes sprang up in bed, fully dressed for some reason, in urban military fatigues. She examined her reflection, her hair and body proportions modified to fit the in-game avatar of Jill Valentine she was currently a skin for. “Holy shit, I look awesome.” Not normally a hat person, Cat admired the beret.



She took a moment to get her bearings with a few in place spins and adjustments to accommodate for keyboard shortcuts and mouse sensitivity. Raccoon City had more zombies and monsters per capita than Baltimore, but they shared a familiar dreariness. Cat looked at her apartment door and prepared to venture out, officially starting the game and her impending confrontation with Trent Steel, or whatever Trent Steel had become through machinations of PoopiestButthole.



A blast of heat and fire propelled Cat through the door, where she crashed into the hallway wall outside her apartment. She looked back to see her own wall was gone, her apartment a smoking and charred ruin. In the wreckage stood a towering outline, bedecked from head to two in gleaming leather. A snarl erupted from his pointed teeth, somehow worse than Trent Steel’s actual teeth. Fear overwhelmed her, but Catalina stood defiant.



“Bitch, you just blew up my laptop, my camera, my props, my sketchbook, my Switch, my PS4, my wrestling gear, my cosplays, my creepy costume mannequins, my Monokuma statue, my Pokemon hoodies, my Pokemon pajamas, my Pokemon plushies, my memorial to Mushu my dead chameleon, and…” She stopped herself, eyes drawn to a piece of blue plastic on the floor amid the wreckage. Her Cats(2019) blu-ray. Trentesis took a step, his foot hanging in the air for what felt like an eternity. “Don’t you fucking dare.”



He dared, his massive booted foot crushing the case and disc alike into shards of prisms and blue plastic. That was enough for Catalina to raise her pistol, firing a trio of shots into the fiery wreckage. Trentesis’ frame was nearly impossible to miss, but the bullets drove into his trenchcoat and the warped flesh beyond with little effect. “CATS!” he bellowed.



“Wait,” Cat said. “Is that directed at me, but you’re saying it wrong because you’re a dumb monster? Or are you mad about me owning Cats on DVD? Because at first I thought I just liked it ironically, but I’ve watched it a few more times since and now I don’t even know…” Uninterested in Cat’s hot Cats take, Trentesis charged through the remnants of her apartment, tearing through walls and floorboards to make way for his towering body. Cat dashed down the hallway, as fire consumed the entire building.



“CATS!” Trentesis called, his body seemingly the only thing that kept the ruined building from collapsing as he pursued her.



“It’s just,” Cat yelled back, “It’s got a surreally nightmarish quality that is pretty unique in modern cinema! If you wanna know more, follow me on Letterboxd!”



Her plug was interrupted by an explosion that sent her spiraling through a window, where she bounced off the brick wall of the building next door. The world spun, as Cat got back to her feet in the dingy alleyway. Her apartment crumbled in a pile of fire and smoke and rubble. She hoped no one was inside, before realizing that they would’ve just been NPC’s. Trentesis seemed to be buried as well, though the clock on his respawn timer was surely ticking.



Cat adjusted herself and noticed that the wreckage blocked one end of the alleyway. Spurred on by simplistic pathfinding, she advanced into Raccoon City. The zombies also appeared to be modified, with an eerie familiarity that unsettled Cat. Well acquainted with the physics of the Resident Evil 2 remake, she avoided them where she could and usually opted for leg shots to immobilize her undead foes. A single exception was made to blast what might have been a tumor from the mustachioed head of one particular walking corpse. Ignoring the shrieks and moans for a moment, Cat drank in the grandeur of Raccoon City, while in the real world she offered shoutouts to new subscribers. The demands of her audience met, Cat continued through the streets, until her eyes froze on an unexpectedly welcome sight.



The red and yellow lights of the In-N-Out called to her, a beacon of peace in a world consumed by the unending appetites of the undead. Cat’s own appetite spurred her own, her hunger-enhanced reflexes allowing her to make spectacular knee-caps and headshots to any zombie between her and her destination. Charging through the double-doors, she put two bullets in the undead cashier, puzzling over who would take her order as she reloaded her pistol. But when she looked at the counter next to the register, her heart sank.



“This is such bullshit,” Cat said, shoulders slumping at the sight of a pair of herbs, set mockingly in place of where a mouthwatering Double-Double should be. One red, one green, she took the two and miserably combined them in her inventory for double the healing power. She examined the kitchen, a game-breaking idea dancing into her brain. “Maybe I can make my own. I wonder how detailed this mod is.”



A red dot appeared on the wall beside Cat, pulling her eyes from the kitchen. It slid across the wall slowly, searching, until it stopped on her chest. Cat laughed to herself. “You know who really loves red laser pointers? Cats.”



“CATS!” Trentesis called from the streets of Raccoon City. Cat looked through the glass windows of the In-N-Out’s double doors to find the laser’s origin point. It turned out to be the targeting device on an impossibly large rocket launcher that was strapped to the arm of her pursuer, a weapon he was able to wield with inhuman ease. Again she noticed the dot on her chest and then noticed one rocket come loose from the launcher, spiraling toward her in a trail of smoke.



With no time to run, she raised her pistol, holding her breath as she took aim. Only a moment before the rocket would crash into the restaurant, Cat fired a shot catching it in midair. The rocket exploded and Cat felt a surge of relief. “Gotcha bitch!” she chortled, before the explosion swept through the In-N-Out, igniting the building and creating a larger explosion that blasted her out. She landed on the opposite side she had entered, with the restaurant’s rubble standing between her and her pursuer.



“CATS!” he roared from out of sight. Even with her ears ringing and the fire crackling and the zombies moaning, she could hear Trentesis’ thundering footsteps growing ever closer. Cat stumbled to her feet, having gained a noticeable limp following the damage from the explosion, her health downgraded from a green fine to a yellow danger. Alleyways and potential side paths cut off by unmovable police barricades and arbitrarily crashed vehicles, she advanced down the street toward the Raccoon Police Department, hoping it might provide a more fortifiable haven along with mysterious puzzles that seemed like they might be an impediment to the day-to-day goings on of a police force. For the sake of surviving the horror, Cat conserved her ammunition where she could. Dropping zombies with shots to the leg or knocking them back with a quick headshot, before rushing past them. She made her way through the front gate of the police department, which was surprisingly unlocked, then through the front door of the police department itself, also unlocked. That seemed nonsensical, but it got her to a cutscene.



Inside the Raccoon Police Department, Cat was greeted by another misproportioned reskin, this time of Christopher Marlowe in what appeared to be a steampunk constable uniform, not time appropriate for his era, Cat’s era, or the era of Resident Evil 3. “I’m Christopher Marlowe,” he said, lacking any kind of theatrical training. Clearly PoopiestButthole was not a voice actor. “Have you seen my pantaloons?”



Cat was relieved and annoyed, but the digital approximation of her former partner was not enough to make her oblivious to a common trope. “Hey, dude. Pretty sure you’re about to get fridged.”



The real Marlowe would ask what fridging meant and Cat would explain while shoving a TV Tropes article in his face. Given the current situation, that wouldn’t be possible. Her inventory did not include a phone and digital Marlowe seemed to have limited capabilities. “The stars move still, time runs, the clock will strike,” said Digital Marlowe.



“Yeah, yeah, yeah, I get it,” said Cat. “You can only speak in Marlowe quotes and we don’t have much time.”



Digital Marlowe nodded. “You must be proud, bold, pleasant, resolute. And now and then stab, when occasion serves.”



“Stab, shoot,” Cat shrugged. “Whatever the occasion serves. I think I’ve got proud, bold and resolute down. Still working on pleasant.”



Footsteps thundered outside. Trentesis had found them. “CATS!” he roared into the night. The double doors of the Raccoon City Police Department creaked as tore at them.



Digital Marlowe sighed. “It is a comfort to the wretched to have companions in misery”



“Yeah,” Cat said. “I wish there was a hug button. But hey, at least this is some kind of closure.”



He put a digital hand that Cat could not feel on her shoulder. “Love always makes those eloquent that have it.”



“Uh, yeah,” Cat said uneloquently, as the doors bent to the clubbing blows of Trentesis. Her eloquence abandoned her. She took a final look into the uncanny valley of Digital Marlowe’s eyes. “I’m gonna avenge the shit out of you.”



Her feet were frozen in place as the cutscene continued. The door exploded, sending splinters in every direction. Trentesis had to duck to get through the doorway, but soon enough he was inside, staring down at both of them. A slave to his programming, Digital Marlowe threw an impotent punch at the monster. The blow landed on the creature’s trenchcoat with a wet thud. The two exchanged looks, then Trentesis’ gnarled fingers seized Marlowe by the wrist. With gastly speed and inhuman strength, it tossed Marlowe into the air. He floated there for a moment, but the beast aimed its rocket launcher, the targeting dot tracking on Marlowe’s center. Another rocket fired and met Marlowe midair. The explosion left blood and bone and viscera showering down upon Cat and her adversary. Marlowe’s intestines wrapped around Trentesis’ shoulders like a ghoulish feather boa. His right hand landed on Cat’s shoulder. The palm was open, offering her one final pat of encouragement. The cutscene over, Cat took the opportunity to grab the hand by the middle finger and fling it to the floor. “Ugh,” she said, dripping with gore. “Little unnecessary, dude.”



Seemingly stunned by the gore as well, Trentesis shook the shock off, but made no adjustment to his intestine boa. His inhuman eyes glared at Cat. “CATS!”



“You want cats, bitch?” she said. “I’ll give you cats. Just one, though. Me.” Cat groaned at her failed, meandering one liner. With the boss battle ready to commence, she took a step, her limp returning to impede her mobility. She called for a time out. “Hold on, I’m not ready, lemme use this herb.”



Before Cat could open her inventory, Trentesis leveled his rocket launcher at her and fired. The rocket closed the distance between them in an instant, ending her in-game life in an explosion of body parts. Once again it rained blood inside the Raccoon City Police Department. Trentesis blinked as Cat’s rib cage landed on his head. “CATS,” he murmured, to no one in particular as the screen proclaimed a game over.



Back in her studio apartment, still Twitch streaming, Catalina Cortes glared at the screen, processing her failure. “Okay, but that’s not gonna happen in the match.”



Some members of the chat agreed. So laughed out loud. Others went so far as to laugh their asses off. Cat did not.





The banner across Cat’s living room in her recording studio/studio apartment proclaimed.





The set dressing was updated. Slightly. Cat stood before the camera in her orange and black ring gear, the green screen behind her dominated by a slideshow of DeviantArtistic interpretations of her greatest victories of 2020. A small end table was dominated by an 8x10 photo of Marlowe in a wooden frame, pumpkin spice scented candles on each side in a makeshift shrine to the poet and his basic ass white girl sensibilities. Cat addressed the camera clinically, hoping to bait a hypothetical subject into revealing some sort of insecurity for the sake of previous views, like a tiny Mexican Dr. Phil.



“I’m sure you’re telling yourself that fourth time’s the charm, Trent. First time we tangled, it was in a gauntlet match. Me and Marlowe got a luckier draw and you even did us a solid with a bag of weapons and cheapshotting our competition. The second time, I got overzealous and cracked you with a Massacre at Melrose from the ring apron and wasn’t able to hoist your ass back into the ring before beating the count myself. Kinda cheap. Then it was me and Marlowe against you and Zephyr, falls count anywhere. Zephyr got pinned while you were locked in a treasure chest. Fair to call those extenuating circumstances. Asterisks. Shrug emoji.”



Cat shrugged, not unlike the emoji.



“And now we move beyond all that into glorious 2021, where everything will be different, except for all of the stuff that isn’t. You’re still the grizzledest old guy in Carnage who always seems like he’s a step away from winning the big belt one more time. And I’m… still winning I guess?”



She shrugged again, less like the emoji and more like a person.



“2020 went pretty swimmingly for me there, except for one big singles loss to Silvio Leon and one big tag loss to Rock Lobster. When I beat Jonathan Willis two weeks ago, I felt like my confidence was back. But I don’t want to jinx myself, because my professional psyche is still undergoing a bit of a rejiggering and beating two of the company’s best at back-to-back shows is gonna be, as we say in the business, hard as shit.”



“And after the slew of injuries and departures and gas leak deaths that annihilated the Carnage roster over the last couple of months, you and I tying up is like a physical manifestation of the company’s soul. Like a clash of ideals. The neverending battle of old versus new, the tried and true against the latest and greatest. The more things change, the more they stay the same, unless they don’t. You could lay claim to a spot on the Carnage Wrestling Mount Rushmore if you wanted to, fill out the form, sign the papers, go through all the proper channels. Me, I dont’ have that kinda cred yet. I still gotta climb the mountain myself, chisel in hand, and at the very top chisel…”





The name flashed, this time in a Flintstonian font for the sake of rock-chiseling approximation.



“Since we’re all competitors-slash-performers and since we all have those aching egos that need to be satisfied. Trent Steel needs to prove he’s still as good as anyone here and if they forget that, he’ll kill them. I need to prove that as much as I like the Catalina Cortes who dominated the tag ranks with Christopher Marlowe, there still exists a Catalina Cortes after Christopher Marlowe. She likes JRPG’s, long walks down the cereal aisle, and huge gold belts that never seem to fit her right. And coincidentally, the guy holding the biggest, goldenest belt is the guy who used his wizard powers to transfigurate her win streak into a goose egg last year. I haven’t been bathing in holy water every night just so you can keep me from getting to Silvio, Trent. I’m on a one-woman quest for stupid righteous vengeance, and if you wanna keep me from my endgame then I’ll chop you down like any other miniboss. I already know your weakness. A knee to the fucking face. And my knees are hungry for faces.”



Cat smacked her right knee, to stop it from lunging at the camera in search of faces to consume.



“Even without Carnage’s resident thespian, I still got plenty of drama. And you’re getting all of it. New beats old. Fire beats Steel. Catalina beats Trent. You wanna win, you better bring a rocket launcher.”



Making a finger gun, Cat pointed at the camera. Squeezing one eye closed, she took aim and fired.



“Yes, I know that was a pistol.”