Deanna Frost vs. Jenni Anderson

[SnowQueenSCW]

Project: Black Ice

”Mr. and Mrs. Craven”

Hotel Le Walt Paris
Paris, France
May 5th, 2022
6:30am


Deanna felt herself turn, rolling over in the large bed, slightly feeling the cool blankets on her bare skin, which also helped to warm her from the cool morning breeze that seemed to blow into the room and chill her cheeks and nose. As she completely turned over, the rays of the rising sun burst into her vision, creating a wall of light in front of her closed eyelids. Wincing a little at the bright intrusion, Deanna slowly, opened her eyes a little, seeing only that same bright light, immediately lifting her hand to shield her eyes by placing the hand against her forehead.

The sun was just rising above the horizon of Paris, France, the tops of the buildings (only a few of them) catching the first rays of morning. As her emerald eyes adjusted to the light, the redhead took in a slow breath, allowing herself to settle into the comfort of the large bed that was, easily, as big as the one she shared with her wife back in Manhattan, where the two of them could snuggle and still have loads of bedspace. 

Turning her gaze back towards the sun, her eyes further adjusting, she spied the Eiffel Tower in the near distance, so close she could count see the metallic details on various parts of it. The sight of it always caused her heart to swell a little – both it and her mind recalling the magical moment Selena had proposed to her at the top of that very tower.

If only we were here under better circumstances… she thought glumly as her vision settled down, the sight of movement stealing her focus towards the balcony that the open window led to.

There, sitting in one of the chairs, her bare feet resting on the large ottoman, was the aforementioned wife of hers. The sun seemed to illuminate her platinum-blonde hair, making it shine like white-gold. The same was true of her bare legs that rested on the large stool, her night gown having risen up a little to expose just a bit of the muscular limbs that hid underneath – limbs that held enough power to knock out countless superstars in SCW.

Deanna thought fondly on that, but also with a note of sadness. Despite Selena retaining the world championship at Holly-wood of the South, insisting going to the ring alone as Tommy Valentine was fighting alone, the Snow Queen had taken very little time to celebrate beyond the typical in-ring/post-match deal. Instead, she had spent only a little time showering and packing, preparations already made for them to travel via bus to the private airport where her plane was waiting and to take them here… to Paris.

The Snow Queen hadn’t noticed that Deanna had awakened, which allowed the young woman to study her wife – the older Frost glaring into the screen of the laptop that sat in her lap. It didn’t take much for Deanna to figure out what Selena was looking into so early, for it was the same reason Selena had taken her to Paris, France after the Pay-Per-View, where her children and Gerda were waiting.

It all revolved around Killjoy.

To say that Jean Black’s suggestion and Selena’s plan to confront and ‘make a deal’ with the madman had gone off the rails would have been an understatement, even Deanna could admit that. The plan had been somewhat sound, even if the very element of dealing with Killjoy was lunacy in and of itself. Selena had met with Killjoy at The Starmaker, Tommy Valentine’s club, at Killjoy’s request, to entreat the man to help remove Ryan Scythe from the running of becoming Nome’s mayor, effectively removing a distraction (and endangerment) to the Frost family’s lives. It was Selena’s belief that doing so would allow her more time to focus on Project: Black Ice, which was what Killjoy wanted her to do, and that that would be a compelling enough reason for Killjoy to step in and help them.

Things had not gone as planned.

Instead, Killjoy had now added a deadline. The Frost family now had until midnight on the night of the Nome mayoral election (technically being the next day since midnight- Deanna started but stopped herself to focus) to discover what the project was or someone else would die at the hands of Killjoy.

Not just someone… Deanna thought glumly. Me.

She almost had to give Killjoy credit. He had waited close to a year for Selena to ‘be ready’ in his own mind. But now, he had clearly run out of patience and had pulled off whatever ‘kid-gloves’ he had been wearing. He knew exactly what to do to get to Selena. Of course, the threat was going to work and, of course, it would have whatever desired effect the madman wanted. And despite Selena’s promises that she would do everything she could to solve the mystery and save Deanna from Killjoy, the redhead could not entirely stop the dread that filled her at the idea of being Killjoy’s next target. 

It was why Selena had taken such precautions in the week that followed before the pay-per-view, creating a new bank account under an alias, opting for private travel to avoid any issues and, upon arriving in Paris, adopting that alias into the hotel – the Hotel Le Walt Paris – and all of that was just the tip of the iceberg. They were not staying in the hotel under “Selena and Deanna Frost”, but rather under the names of Mr. and Mrs. Oscar Craven, doing their best to cover their tracks but taking detours and multiple ‘layaway’ stops before arriving in Paris. Even now, Deanna was sure, Selena’s plane was still making random stops in the world, effectively making it impossible to determine which one was where they had ‘dropped’ off too.

The same had been done for their children, who were staying in a room down the hall with Gerda, booked as ‘Mrs. Halloway’ and her three grandchildren. The aliases were all perfect and seemingly unrelated to the Cravens. Even those that saw them together would merely assume they had met in the hotel and become friends. In short, it was perfect - expensive but perfect.

Thank Odin for Selena’s bonuses as the World Champion… Deanna thought. Though they were not poor or even struggling financially, Selena had taken a page out of Malcolm Scythe’s book in creating the finances to the Craven and Halloway identities, using accounts and resources that were not so easily ‘associated’ with the Frost family. One of them had been all the bonuses she had accrued as a champion, kept in a quiet savings account as a sort of ‘emergency fund’, which this certainly constituted. 

Still, even with everything going smoothly with their ‘disappearance’, the redhead knew that it was only temporary. Eventually, Mr. and Mrs. Craven would need to leave Paris and fly back to the states to assume their roles as Selena and Deanna Frost. First of all, they needed to keep up appearances, rather than give the illusion that they had already fled and gone into hiding and second, Selena refused to abandon SCW – refused to give Killjoy that much satisfaction over a deadline. She still had a few more weeks to figure out the secrets Killjoy wanted her to find.

In that regard, Deanna felt the same. She understood the precaution, even appreciating it on several levels – she felt the most protected with Selena there with her, watching over her and vice versa. But she didn’t want to abandon SCW on a mere threat, even if it was from Killjoy. Her years in Frankfurt Prison III had, she was a little sad to admit, hardened her in a bad and good way. She wasn’t as naïve as she had once been – part of her missing that ‘youthful naivety’ - but neither was she so easily frightened by someone threatening her. Threatening her wife and children? Absolutely! She had begged Selena not to contact or attempt a deal with Killjoy. But Killjoy coming after her, specifically? That didn’t scare her nearly as much as him coming after Selena or their children.

Taking one last breath, Deanna pulled the thick blankets off her naked body, immediately shivering a little at the cool morning breeze touched the newly exposed parts of her skin, and pushed herself out of bed, grabbing the silk robe hanging on the hook nearby and throwing the clothing over herself. Quietly, she made her way the short distance to the balcony, her eyes on her wife the whole time. This was one of the few times in the day that she could see her wife as…well, her wife. For the children: David, Elsianna, and Amiliah and even Gerda – the only thing that changed was what people knew them as. The world had rarely seen any of them beyond a few posts by Selena on Twitter and maybe a spot or two on Breakdown or the SCW PPVs when they were younger, but all and all, no one really could point them out and say ‘Those are the children of Selena and Deanna Frost’.

The Frost wives were not so fortunate for anonymity. Selena had become one of the most popular and beloved superstars in SCW, a celebrity of sorts – ‘The Face of SCW’ having everything that came with such a name. And as she had become and remained the World Champion as the months went by, that popularity had only continued to grow. Her face was everywhere! Posters, commercials, toys, her merchandise was always in the top 3 selling of SCW every week. And while Deanna was not in that same ‘level’ of popularity, she was just as recognizable merely due to association but more so since she had become a wrestler. It was incredible under normal circumstances. But under the current ones? 

It meant that the two of them had to disappear whenever they emerged from their hotel room, with Oscar and Madelaine Craven taking their place. 

These mornings and behind the closed doors and blinds of this hotel room were the only times Selena and Deanna could emerge outside of SCW shows and be themselves, and Selena was spending most of that time researching through more and more of Malcolm’s files, trying to solve that damn mystery. 

Reaching her wife on the balcony, Deanna kneeled before the sitting Snow Queen before leaning forward, pressing her lips gently against Selena’s temple, causing the older woman to jump a little in surprise – so enraptured in her notes. As she turned her head, however, Deanna merely maneuvered her own head to match Selena’s perfectly, her lips now catching Selena’s in a full kiss. She even felt Selena’s arms go slack, the woman relaxing against the chair and a content hum – almost a purr - escaping her until Deanna pulled away.

“Morning.” Deanna smiled at temporarily ‘out of it’ woman.
“Hmmm? Morning. Did I wake you?” Selena asked as she opened her eyes.
“No, the sun did.” She gestured to the rising sun. “Looks like it’s going to be a beautiful day.”
“Least until 4pm.” Selena remarked, casting her eyes towards the sunrise. “Supposed to get some rain in the afternoon.”

“Oh… more time to stay in then.” She shrugged. “How long have you been up?”
“Uh…” Selena rubbed her eyes before shrugging guiltily at Deanna. 
“Selena…” Deanna sighed. “You’re not going to be any good to anyone if you don’t at least rest.”
“I did get some rest.” Selena offered lamely. “I think I got an hour in while snuggling with you.”
“Oooo.” Deanna rolled her eyes before choosing to let her wife off the hook, focusing on the woman’s laptop screen. “Find anything?”

To her dismay, Selena gave a sigh before shaking her head. “I don’t know. I started thinking about how to narrow the search down based on what little we knew.”

“What do you mean?” Deanna asked, positioning herself to sit in Selena’s lap, the platinum-blonde automatically wrapping her arms around her wife.

“Well, first of all, while there are numerous things that Killjoy could hate Malcolm for – there are only a few things that involve both him and I…” She held up her fingers. “And at the Starmaker, he had no care about Elsianna or David, so that removed their inheritance from both us and the Scythe family as a possible motive. That also means he’s not interested in an empty gold mine either… and… I just know this runs deeper than that for him.”

“Why?” Deanna asked.

“Because it just feels like more than some recent history. I mean, if all he wanted was money, he could have just come forward and held one of our children hostage. Or blackmailed us. Why the hell is he going this far for my ‘destruction’ if he just wanted to become rich? No, this is much deeper. This is obsession…”

“Hence the deadline…” Deanna said without thinking, immediately regretting it as she felt Selena’s body tense up under her. “I’m sorry.” She tried.

“It’s fine.” Selena shook her head. “Anyway, the only other tie-in between Malcolm and myself was the deal my father made with him when I was born.”

“The one where you were supposed to marry Gavin and unite their fortunes?”
“Essentially, though that was just a front for the DeCarlos and Scythes to gain power. The Frosts were all but bullied into it.”
“And you think that has something to do with Killjoy?”
“I don’t know.” Selena shrugged. “But I figured if Killjoy has an issue with me AND with Malcolm, then it has to do with that, so I started looking around businesses and whatever around the time of my birth and a few years before and after.”

“Did you find anything suspicious?”
“Surprisingly no.” Selena shook her head. “His businesses remained the same as he worked through his politics and his place in the government. The only thing that really changed was this…”

Reaching out, Selena clicked on a particular file that quickly loaded before the Frost women’s eyes. It was a series of bank statements and various forms of taxes and zoning requests and licenses. “Apparently, he helped to push through the building and opening of some kind of center for the homeless that doubled as an orphanage.”

“Malcolm?” Deanna asked, raising an eyebrow. “Caring about homeless adults and children?” 
“Probably for PR or something. To curry favor into becoming mayor.” Selena shook her head. “Don’t know if it did the trick because the whole business went under and closed in 1989 – basically three years later.”

“The year of your birth.” Deanna stated, which earned a surprise expression from Selena.
“Yeah…I guess so. I didn’t think about that.”
“Why not?” Deanna asked.
“Because it’s just some PR scam, right?” Selena asked. “I mean, it clearly didn’t work – it wasn’t even related to me or even to Nome entirely. See? It was closer to Pilgrim Springs, which already had an orphanage-“

“That doesn’t make sense.” Deanna shook her head. “Why would Malcolm make an orphanage and homeless shelter less than an hour from a previously established one? Not like you guys had a surplus of homeless children with your less than 4000 population.”
“You really need to let that go.” Selena shook her head, though her eyes seemed to light up with this conversation as they scanned the page. “Still…”

There was no denying the points Deanna had raised. The center was an anomaly in the list Malcolm’s activities. Various donations to hospitals and grants and such to doctors was one thing, but building an entire center for both homeless adults and children from scratch? And so close to another one? It didn’t make sense the more it was dug into. At first glance, who would argue? Home for the homeless adults and children! A fine endeavour, but the location and rationale given not only Pilgrim Springs but Anchorage as well – it just felt off.

“I don’t want to get our hopes up.” Selena sighed, pushing herself out of her chair and placing Deanna back on her feet before re-entering into their room. Carefully, the Snow Queen shrugged out of her nightgown, revealing her pale, scarred skin, a history of brutal matches against some of the most dangerous people in SCW history. “But at least it’s something to consider.”

“It’s better than nothing.” Deanna tried, stepping into the room behind Selena. “And your logic makes sense. It’s something.” She repeated Selena’s words.

“But I wish we had more than ‘something’.” Selena sighed as she moved around the room, reaching into a box that sat on a nearby table, pulling out a large roll of gauze. “I wish we had an answer. Something that was – like a silver bullet… We can’t afford to waste time on wild goose chases if they lead to-”

Deanna watched as Selena began unrolling the thick gauze. She knew what Selena was doing, which made her movements all the more rushed. Without thinking, the redhead quickly pulled off her nightgown and marched over to Selena, wrapping her arms around her wife’s form, her warm skin pressed against Selena’s. There was a temporary surprise in the taller Frost’s body – Selena growing silent - before she gently wrapped her own arms around Deanna, savouring the warm skin-to-skin contact. 

“We’ll find it.” Deanna whispered. “We’ll figure it out.” She looked up, emerald eyes meeting Selena’s. “I just am afraid of what he thinks it will do to you when we do.”

“He underestimates me.” Selena sighed. “He always has. I’m more afraid of what losing you will do to me.”
“Selena…”
“Deanna –“ Selena interjected. “I know what you will say but… you know what I did with Queenie.”

Biting her lower lip, Deanna inhaled slowly, nodding her head. She remembered that day, how Selena had confessed in their ‘conjugal room’ on their specified day of the month, the platinum-blonde crying in Deanna’s arms as she told the redhead of how she had brutally punished the inmate, pulling out all of Queenie’s teeth with a set of pliers because the woman had assaulted Deanna. How she had threatened Queenie’s son in order to keep her compliant. 

“The last part was a bluff.” Selena admitted. “But I was so close…so close to following through if she hadn’t agreed. Losing you…” she sighed. “I’m more scared of that than whatever Killjoy wants me to ‘find’.”

“I won’t let you fall that far.” Deanna vowed, squeezing her wife more snugly in her arms, resting her head over Selena’s heart. “Same as me fighting for your vision of integrity. I’ll keep fighting for us.”

“I know.” Selena sighed, kissing Deanna’s forehead before releasing her. Encumbered, the world champion began wrapping the gauze around her chest, flattening her torso. As the two got dressed, Deanna in a summer dress and Selena in black pants and a dress shirt, it was Selena that appeared less and less like herself and more and more like an effeminate male.

Reaching over to the same table where the box was, Selena carefully took both wigs, a brown one and a black one, handing the black one to Deanna before sliding and pinning the brown one over her platinum-blonde hair.

A few minutes later, the transformation was complete and Oscar and Madelaine Craven were dressed to meet their friend Mrs. Halloway and her grandchildren.

“How’s that?” ‘Oscar’ asked, her voice dropped low to try and sound more masculine.
“Weird.” Deanna sighed, still not used to her wife’s full-fledged disguise. “I’ve never been attracted to a man before.”
“Don’t make it a habit.” The brunette teased. “Can you grab my laptop from the balcony? If we get caught in the rain, I don’t want to get it wet while we’re out.”

Giving a nod, Deanna moved to the balcony while ‘Oscar’ finished any last bits of his ‘transformation’. But as the raven-haired woman took the laptop, her thumb slipped on the scroll space, causing the screen to randomly drop down.

“Ooops.” Deanna remarked before carefully maneuvering herself back into the room to place the laptop safely on the table, her eyes taking only a second to spy the screen as she reached up to close the laptop top.

What she saw, however, froze her movements.

“Selena!” Deanna called out, immediately getting the Snow Queen’s attention, the disguised woman rushing into the room from the bathroom to stand by her wife.
“What is it?” She asked in alarm, her disguised voice temporarily forgotten. “Did you drop it and-“

She froze as she saw Deanna pointing a finger at the screen, specifically, the name that appeared under the mountain of other names – those responsible for the homeless/orphanage center they were researching. Before the Frost women’s eyes read one name they had not forgotten in nearly a year.


‘Head of caretaking – Personnel and Residents: Rebecca Scythe’