Work Text:
The Sun Scorches the Soul
3/3/2026
It was Zaria’s NXT Women’s Championship Match, one she had earned a dozen times over in her own mind, and yet she had still had to force the world to look at her. Last week she sealed it the only way anyone ever seemed to notice; by running straight through Sol before Sol’s own match and handing Jacy the win. If it was cruel, fine. People had been cruel to Zaria first, smiling in her face while they stepped around her like she was optional. And Sol… Sol had been the worst of it without even trying, soaking up the cheers, the attention, the easy warmth, while Zaria stood beside her like an afterthought. Zaria was not sorry for what she did. She was sick of being overlooked in their friendship for far too long, sick of always being the one expected to understand, to wait, to be grateful for scraps.
However, it did break her heart to do it. Love for Sol flared hot and bright in Zaria’s chest; warm enough to soften her, sharp enough to make her furious about it. She kept her face set anyway, chin tipped up like she didn’t care, like this was all exactly as planned. Her jaw tightened until it ached, teeth grinding, and she rolled her shoulders back to lock the feeling down where no one could see it. Sol was the light that had slowly cracked through the dark Zaria kept wrapped around her heart, the sun that warmed its way into her very soul and smoothed her rough edges with a balm she hadn’t asked for.
Zaria had come to the WWE to dominate, and she could still taste that certainty on the back of her tongue; cocky, steady, earned. She hadn’t expected to fall for her tag partner in the process, hadn’t expected tenderness to feel like a weakness she wanted to fight. Fine. Let it burn. She could love Sol and still be the better one; she could want her and still run straight through anyone standing between her and gold. If the crowd wanted a villain, Zaria would give them one, smiling through the heat in her chest like it was just another kind of power.
Zaria had sealed their break-up after an F5 onto the announce table and with a roar of “Snatch that soul, Bitch!”, loud enough to make it feel like a victory; and then she’d grabbed Sol by the hair and hauled her up like she still had the right. The forehead kiss was searing, deliberate, the kind you leave on someone to remind them who put their hands on them first. The contact sent a mean thrill through Zaria’s ribs, equal parts triumph, and hunger; she hated how good it felt, hated how her pulse jumped anyway. She’d wanted to kiss Sol for months, and now she was doing it in the ugliest way possible: as punctuation, as punishment, as proof she could take what she wanted and walk away clean. She almost had, too; two weeks ago, when she saved Sol, when her grip lingered half a second too long and she’d felt that familiar pull snap tight, temptation dressed up like loyalty.
It was the last moments of Zaria’s match against Jacy Jayne, the pair were down after Jacy had rocked Zaria with a Rolling Encore, using the last of her stamina. Suddenly Sol entered from gorilla shouting after Zaria and wiping out Fatal Influence, before charging into the ring and downing the competitors with a Sol Snatcher.
Sol was furious and heartbroken. It hit all at once; heat flaring up her throat, eyes stinging, hands curling into fists at her sides as she stared down at Zaria like she didn’t recognise her. She couldn’t believe her former partner, the person she thought she knew best, could do this after carrying her on her shoulders last week like nothing had changed between them. Sol’s chest felt too tight for a full breath, like her ribs were trying to hold the hurt in place, and it only made the anger spike harder.
Two weeks ago, when Zaria saved her, Sol had honestly believed they were finding their way back. She’d crumpled into Zaria’s shoulder like she belonged there, fingers still trembling even as relief made her knees go loose. And she’d wanted, so badly it almost hurt, to tip up on her toes and kiss her, just a quick thank you that said more than words ever could. But Sol had swallowed it down. She knew better than anyone that actions meant more than promises to Zaria, and she wanted the moment to be real, not desperate. She’d told herself she’d do it last week, after she won the NXT Women’s Championship, proof she could have both. The gold, and the girl. Now the thought tasted bitter on her tongue, and the hope she’d been nursing went cold in her stomach as she watched Zaria laid out on the canvas of the ring.
Picking up the NXT Women’s Championship, Sol held it over her head like a verdict, letting the lights catch on the gold long enough for everyone to understand exactly who was standing and who was broken. Then she sauntered over to Zaria, slow, deliberate, mimicking last week with a spiteful precision. Her fist closed in Zaria’s braided crimson locks, and she yanked her upright, not gentle, not careful, forcing her to look at Sol. “Your soul is mine, Bitch!” she proclaimed, loud and satisfied, like it was a promise and a punishment in the same breath. The kiss on Zaria’s forehead came after; chaste, almost sweet if you ignored the grip in her hair, an insult dressed up as affection. Sol dropped her back to the canvas like she was finished with her, then gave her a few slow pats on the head for good measure, the kind you give a thing you own.
Looking at Zaria, Sol felt the anger in her soul twist into something worse: want. She hated it, hated the way it steadied her pulse instead of spiking it, hated the ugly relief that came with seeing Zaria beaten and quiet, finally small enough not to leave a new bruise with her words. Zaria was exhausted, eyes half-lidded, breathing heavy, and it should have made Sol back away. Instead, Sol leaned in like gravity had teeth, like she could pin this version of Zaria in place and pretend it meant something.
Her fingers flexed with the memory of Zaria’s braid in her grip a moment ago, the jolt of satisfaction, the instant shame right on its heels. Sol swallowed it like it was medicine. Because some twisted part of her still wanted to be wanted back, even after everything; still wanted to touch Zaria and make her flinch, to make her feel something that wasn’t control. Love had curdled into fixation, into the sick urge to keep Zaria close by force if she couldn’t be kept by choice, to leave a mark that said you don’t get to hurt me and still be free of me even as Sol told herself she was done.
Feeling Sol’s hand threaded in her hair and Sol’s lips pressed to her forehead, Zaria’s soul felt scorched; then iced over, like the burn was the only thing keeping her upright. The words “Your soul is mine, Bitch!” didn’t just echo; they sank in, ugly and certain, and Zaria hated herself for the vicious little jolt of satisfaction that came with it. It was ownership dressed up as affection, a claim made where everyone could see, and Zaria’s pulse jumped anyway, anger and craving tangled so tight she couldn’t separate them. She told herself she should be disgusted. She told herself she should rip free. But all she could think was that Sol had finally said it aloud: that no matter how they ruined each other, they’d stay tied together, not because it was healthy, but because neither of them knew how to let go without taking something with them.
Whether it would be their hearts or their souls didn’t matter anymore. Either way, they’d take it from each other with bare hands, loving and hating in the same breath, refusing to let the other leave unscarred. They would burn together, not clean like fire, but vicious and slow, scorching everything they were into something unrecognisable until all that was left was ash and the sick satisfaction of knowing neither of them got out untouched.
And yet, somewhere under the smoke and ash, something stubborn still lived. A choice. A single breath where both of them could loosen their grip at the same time, step back at the same time, and let the heat pass without turning it into a weapon. It wasn’t forgiveness. It wasn’t pretty. But it was a way out: to stop feeding the flame together, to stop mistaking possession for love, and to walk away, side by side or in opposite directions, with their souls still their own. It would look small from the outside; no grand apology, no dramatic reunion, just the discipline of not reaching for the nearest match when the hurt flared. Just Sol letting her hands fall open instead of grabbing, and Zaria letting the silence stand instead of sharpening it into a blade.
They would still burn for each other for a long time. But they didn’t have to keep setting each other alight. They could learn to want without taking, to feel without claiming, and if they managed that, the warmth between them wouldn’t have to be a warning. It could be a beginning. Not tonight, and not for the foreseeable future, but later: when the arena noise was a muffled thump through concrete walls, when the air backstage smelled like tape adhesive and sweat and cold metal, when the adrenaline finally drained and left them raw.
Later, when they could meet each other’s eyes and choose, on purpose, to be gentle. When “mine” could finally mean with you, instead of against you. And maybe one day it would mean we again, earned, not demanded. A hand offered without a hook in it, palm up and steady, the warmth of skin offered like a truce. Space respected. Breaths taken slow enough to hear. A quiet check-in in the harsh white light of a hallway, where Sol’s voice doesn’t cut and Zaria’s doesn’t sharpen; where the words land soft and stay true.
It would be trivial things at first: Zaria holding still when Sol reaches, letting the touch stop at her wrist instead of tangling into possession; Sol swallowing the impulse to grab harder, to prove something, and letting her fingers unclench. The kind of trust you rebuild brick by brick, like setting a splint and keeping it on even when the bone itches to move, until one day you realise you can put weight on it again without flinching. Until the fire between them is something they tend, cupped from the wind, fed carefully, watched with respect, instead of something they weaponized.
The End.