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| Owner | Sara Claremont |
| Employees | Ghost Shadows Triad Associates, Joshua Springsteen (security) |
| Hours of Operation | Monday - Friday (6pm - 11pm) Fights: Friday, Saturday, Sunday (6pm-11pm) |
| Current Status | Open for Business |
| People Come Here For… | Underground Fighting, Illegal Activities |
It smells of sweat in the basement of Coco's Boxing Gym all the time; sweat undercut by blood. Beneath the floor of Long Island City's oldest boxing gym lies a newer secret, a dirty and grimy basement of exposed pipes and chain-link fence that has become an underground fighting sensation. Since the collapse of the Pancratium on Staten Island, the appetite for destruction held by so many of New York City's criminal element is sated here in painful beauty.
This basement is five rooms with low ceilings, serving as a unisex locker room, makeshift medical bay consisting of a single uncomfortable gurney on wheels and a few first aid kits and a back office. The primary feature of Coco's basement is the "center stage" as it's called, a spacious raised area with a thirty foot by thirty foot floor to ceiling chain link cage surrounded by a ten foot buffer zone of screaming, sweaty spectators where the action happens.
Three nights out of the week unlicensed underground bloodsport takes place down in that cage, with non-evolved fighters from around the city pitting themselves against the desperate, the depraved and the sportsmen. Betting is organized and enforced by Triad connections and enforcers from the Ghost Shadows Triad are entirely common on all open nights.
One night out of those three, however, serves as the "main event" where Evolved fighters are pitted against one another in no holds barred competition.
Trivia
- Monday through Friday the Center Stage is open for business, having been converted into an underground club. Drug deals, arrangements for arms smuggling and all manner of other illegal activities happen here under one condition: Anyone doing business arranges it through the Triad and pays a stipend for service fees.
- The Center Stage has been outfitted with a makeshift kitchen, sound system, tables and a very small bar for patrons. Admittance on nights without fights costs $10 per person.
- The Center Stage is open three days a week for fighting, Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Saturday nights are "main event" nights when Evolved on Evolved fighting is allowed. On no other night is an Evolved allowed to fight in the center stage, and the arena's owner Sara screens fighters with her ability to keep the fights clean (or as clean as they can get). However on Saturdays a Non-Evolved is allowed to challenge an Evolved fighter— typically it never goes over well.
- The Ghost Shadows Triad effectively own Coco's Boxing Gym and its "front" owner Sara Claremont is in the Triad's pocket for reasons she won't specify. A cut of the nightly profits go straight to the Ghost Shadows leadership.
- All visitors to the Center Stage on fight nights are charged $50 a head to get in and participating in the fights is free of charge and winners of a fight walk away with a small cut of the spoils every night. Saturday nights are $75 dollars a head and typically the entire basement is packed to standing room only (roughly 450 spectators).
- Particularly strong competitors at the club might earn the attention of the Ghost Shadows Triad, especially repeat victors… for better or worse.
- Fights at the Center Stage are not to the death but to KO or tap-out. Sometimes accidents do happen though, but fighters who kill someone in the Center Stage forfeit all winnings for the night and may find themselves on the unfriendly end of the Ghost Shadows, since now the Triad has to hide a body and pay off more cops. Be careful.
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