Backstage Betrayal: A Wrestling Crime Mystery

 

The lights in SteelGrid Pro Wrestling Arena buzzed overhead, casting a cold glow on the vacant ring. Hours after the show ended, only a few stragglers remained backstage—technicians packing up, security doing rounds, and Lexi Storm, the company’s rising star, sitting in the empty locker room, hands trembling.

Her tag partner, Nova Raye, was missing.

Lexi glanced at her cracked phone screen for the tenth time. One last text blinked at the top:

Nova: "Don't trust anyone. Meet me in Tunnel 3. Midnight."

That was two hours ago.

Tunnel 3 wasn’t used anymore. It connected the ring to the old weight room—closed after the “accident” last year when a steel rack mysteriously collapsed on a rookie during training.

Lexi slipped on her black hoodie, pulled the hood tight, and made her way down the service stairs. The echoes of her footsteps bounced back like whispers. She shouldn’t be here. Not alone. But Nova was more than a partner—she was her only real friend in a world full of masked smiles and twisted egos.

She reached the tunnel gate. Locked.

But the padlock was broken—freshly snapped.

She pushed the gate open slowly. The hallway beyond was dark and narrow, lit only by emergency strips lining the floor. Her breath grew shallow as she walked. Something smelled off—metallic. Familiar.

Blood.

She stepped into the weight room.

There, lying motionless beneath the flickering light, was Nova.

Lexi rushed forward, but stopped dead. Nova’s eyes were open, staring blankly at the ceiling. A pool of blood soaked the mat beneath her skull. Her hands were clenched around a folded piece of paper.

Lexi grabbed it.

“One of us knew too much. Now one of us is dead.”

Suddenly, behind her—footsteps.

Lexi turned, but no one was there. She spun back—

Nova’s body was gone.

Gone.

She dropped the note. Backed away.

A low voice spoke from the shadows.

“You shouldn’t have come alone.”

Lexi ran. Up the stairs. Past catering. Through the halls. When she reached the security office, she burst in—breathless.

“I need help! Nova—she was in the tunnel, she’s gone, someone was there—”

The head of security, Branson, looked up from his desk.

“Nova Raye?” he said, blinking. “She left two hours ago. I personally walked her to her car.”

Lexi froze.

“No… she was there. She sent me a message.”

Branson raised an eyebrow. “No message sent from her phone since 8 PM.”

Lexi pulled out her phone.

Message: Deleted.

She checked her call log. Her inbox. Empty.

Branson stood. “Go home, Lexi. Get some rest. You’ve had a long night.”

She walked out, heart thudding.

Outside, in the parking lot, a car engine rumbled to life. Nova’s car. But behind the wheel wasn’t Nova.

It was someone wearing a mask.

Lexi recognized it.

The old mask Nova wore before their tag team gimmick. The “Dark Nova” gimmick she’d dropped… right after the steel rack “accident” last year.

Lexi stepped forward—but the car sped off into the night.

She was alone.

But not finished.

Because someone inside SteelGrid Arena had just sent a message.

And Lexi Storm was going to uncover the truth—one match, one lie, and one masked enemy at a time.