Hm..Don't know if anyone ever came up with this idea before, but I had fun writing this up. This will probably stay a one-shot.
Enjoy!
Kai looks around the bustling, unfamiliar city center. Everyone in sight – office workers, teenagers, children, the elderly, dogs – just walk by like nothing unusual was going on. On the road, several yellow cabs are parked nearby and there seems to be quite a bit of traffic.
He is stunned, shocked and unable to believe his eyes.
A moment ago, he had been beybattling with Brooklyn in probably his hardest match yet in a team effort to take down BEGA. He's still covered in cuts and bruises from the unfinished match, but in the blink of an eye, the world around him disappeared and the next thing he knew, he is standing here alone, without his beyblade, in an unfamiliar setting.
The place was not completely foreign to him. Just like the city he lived in, the architecture is quite modern and in fact, reminiscent of places he's been to in the past – namely, Max's hometown of New York City. But how the hell could he have gotten from Japan to New York in the blink of an eye?
That aside, is this really the same New York he visited before?
He could hear a group of teenagers nearby speaking but unlike before when he visited, he doesn't actually recognize the words that they are saying. Yet, despite not knowing the foreign words spoken by them, he understands what they mean…kind of.
'What the hell?'
He wonders if he's dreaming in some way, yet the sounds of traffic and busy streets, the smell of nearby hot dog stands, and view of tall buildings and large entertainment screens seem so real. Taking a few steps towards the side of the road, he reaches out to touch a light pole and notes the realistic, rough feel of metal to his fingers.
'Is this…for real?' he wonders, feeling lost, almost dizzy.
He looks around.
'Where am I?'
He decides to ask someone nearby – anyone would do, really. Surely these people walking around must know the name of the place he is in right now. He approaches an old man smoking by the side of the road waiting for a traffic light to change.
"Excuse me, where am I?" he asks. Although he asked in his native tongue of Japanese, The words that came out were as foreign as the words of the teenagers before.
The man looks at him thoroughly confused, almost with a look asking if the young man before him is alright in the head. He answers, "You're in New York City, boy. What's wrong, you alright?"
This just confuses Kai even more. How did he just magically speak a foreign language he never learned? And he understood the reply too! Wait…but what about the reply itself?
'New York City?' he repeats the man's response to him in his mind. Just how could he have gotten from Japan to New York City in a mere instant? And what happened to Suzaku? Or was it Dranzer…? And his team mates: Takao, Rei and Max? Wait…but wasn't it Tyson, Ray and Max? At least Daichi's name is still consistent in his memory…And Hiromi? Or was it Hilary? What about Boris and BEGA? And Tala? Wait...No! It's...Yuriy?
He tries to remember his teammates and friends more clearly. However, the more he tries, the more confused he is. Although he was sure he never had a relationship with any member of his team beyond friendship, he could remember times when he had done intimate things with each of them. Sometimes it was in his past, sometimes in the present, and even in the future.
But how could that be!?
He's not homosexual! At least he never thought he was...
Confused, he wanders around the streets a bit more. However, as he does, he realizes quite a lot of people he passes by seem to take special notice of him – and the reason isn't hard to figure out. While most people are dressed in normal business attire, or casual clothing, his sort of…stood out. Nevermind the fact that his outfit is noticeably worn from his match with Brooklyn, but it's also styled quite a touch different from the people on the streets here.
Suddenly, a girly female voice calls his name, "Oh my god, KAI!"
He stops walking and turns to the source. The speaker – a girl who looks almost like himself, even almost the same hairdo – is trying to make her way to him.
But who is she? How does she know his name? Actually, doesn't he know her? Should he know her? Her name…a dozen names come to mind yet he can't actually be sure if it's the right one or if he even actually knows her.
Now, she is in front of him.
"Hey, where are we? We were kissing just now and then suddenly I found myself here." she says to him.
This makes him even more confused. What could she be talking about? Did she confuse him with her boyfriend somehow? Yet, he vaguely remembers having an intimate relationship with her sometime after defeating Brooklyn.
Wait…
He didn't even beat Brooklyn yet! So how could what he remembers have actually happened? What the hell!?
Confused, he tells her, "Sorry, you must have confused me with someone else."
He then promptly turns to leave, leaving the girl looking rather disappointed and lost.
Yet, the girl gave him a very valuable piece of information. He is not alone in his situation, it seems. He does somewhat regret not having stuck around to ask for more information but shrugs it off to try to sort out his thoughts.
…
It has now been a few hours since he has somehow came to this unfamiliar version of New York City. While walking around, he had met a dozen girls like the first, some almost like a female doppelganger of him, while others more reasonable in appearance. They all shared the same story – while doing something, they suddenly got teleported to this place and somehow they all knew him intimately before or was his sister. Thoroughly confused and frankly, freaked out by their knowledge of him, and even more so, his own inconsistent knowledge of them, he left every single one of them and continued to wander on.
Entering a large park amidst some tall apartment buildings, he spots an empty bench and sits down. Although lost in this strange city, he is at least able to have some small reprieve here in this quiet park.
However, he soon spots a girl with golden blonde hair and heterochromatic eyes clad in white and pink attire. This girl, like the ones who approached him so far, is also familiar to him in a way inconsistent with his other memories. Just like the others, he knows her name, but unlike the rest, he also knows she's probably more helpless than he is in this confusing situation.
He gets up to approach her. Sensing his approach, she too seemed to recognize him. However, seemingly distressed by him, she tries to run away.
Kai catches her by her wrist, "Wait!"
She turns to him.
Kai asks her just to ascertain, "Do you…remember me?"
She seems to have understood him but just remains docile in his grip for a bit. She eventually nods, but adds, "I don't know you though…"
Kai stares at her shy expression.
What…?
This one doesn't know him?
The girl gently wriggles her wrist free from him and steps back. Seeing as he has nothing else to say to her, she runs away from him.
Kai stands still after she leaves. He remains confused. In fact, he is even more so than before.
…
After leaving the park, Kai wandered to the edge of the city where the Hudson River can be seen. After the strange one in the park, he's met a dozen more, with mostly the same back story as the rest. The sun is now starting to set and he could feel his stomach growling too. By now he's started to wonder if maybe this is some kind of parallel universe. But that's just a science fiction trope, isn't it? I mean, how in the world, could he have been transported to an alternate world anyway? And why him?
He walks a little along the edge of the water.
Eventually he spots a pair of girls leaning on the metal rail that bars passersby from falling into the river. Like the previous girls he's met, these two girls are also familiar to him. He even knows both their names and has memories of going to university with the two of them. Yet, he hasn't ever been to university so just like the rest, he shouldn't actually know them at all.
However, one of them notices him. A girl with long, pale, strawberry blonde hair...
She turns to him, causing the girl with short, platinum blonde hair next to her to turn to him as well. Although the platinum blonde would have spoken to him, the taller girl beside her bars her from doing so.
The strawberry blonde speaks to him, "Do you know us?"
Kai isn't sure how he should answer. He does and he doesn't. He does, yet he shouldn't.
"Kinda," he responds.
The strawberry blonde eyes him for a while and then asks, "How old are you right now?"
Kai responds with the information she requested, "Sixteen."
The platinum blonde appears surprised by that but the other girl is unfazed.
"I see," she responds. "So we really aren't in the world we belong to…"
"Huh?" the other girl looks up at her, confused.
Kai also took note of what she just said. Is he somehow in a different world?
The brief conversation is interrupted however by a fangirl-ish scream.
Turning to the direction from which it came, Kai sees yet another girl run up to him. For once, this girl isn't familiar to him. However, just like the rest, she seems to know him.
"Oh my god! It's Kai Hiwatari!" she exclaims, admiring him from every angle. She goes on, "Like, I thought almost no one remembers the original Beyblade series anymore…"
The original Beyblade series? What?
"What are you talking about?" Kai asks, out of pure curiosity. Maybe he can get some new information that might straighten out his understanding of this confusing mess.
"You're cosplaying as Kai, aren't you?" The girl then adds, "From the original Beyblade?"
"Original Beyblade?" Kai repeats, still confused.
"Yeah the show!" the girl clarifies.
Show? Kai looks at her confused. Does she mean a TV show?
Sensing something off based on his reaction to her, the unfamiliar girl stops admiring him and step away. However, Kai approaches her and asks, "Can you show me…this…'Original Beyblade'?"
The girl is confused too now, but responds, "Yeah… I guess…"
The two blonde girls from before approach too, now curious to hear more information.
The unfamiliar girl takes out her phone and types something into the mobile device. She then flips the device around and shows them an article about an anime called "Beyblade".
"There's like, two sequels too," the girl adds.
She then pulls up another page featuring information about "Beyblade: V-force" and another one titled "Beyblade: G-Revolution". On all three articles is a picture of Kai with his team.
Shocked, Kai grabs the device from the girl and looks through those articles one more time.
Is this for real?
He's an anime character?
He's not even a real person in this world?
What's going on?
He struggles to take in the new information that the anime fan just showed him. Yet, he senses she probably has no reason to lie to him...
He then searches up the names of the two blonde girls he was just speaking with. Upon briefly browsing the search results, his thorough confusion over how he knows so many girls that he has never met before and should not know becomes clear.
'So...all the girls I met were just fanfiction characters and I'm not even real in this world.'
Feel free to leave me your thoughts in the reviews/comments.