Disclaimer: Beyblade is a Japanese manga/anime series written and illustrated by Takao Aoki. LadyWulf does not own Beyblade, however she does own the OC's within this story. There is no financial gain made from this story, nor will any be sought. This is for entertainment purposes only. ***
Author Note:
Hiya everyone, LadyWulf here with my new story Phoenix Down. This is just a prologue of what's to come, but I wanted to see what readers thought of my story before I posted the actual thing. I'm also still in the midst of editing chapters, so once I get those completed I will begin posting the official Phoenix Down chapters.
I'm pretty nervous about posting this yet really excited at the same time. Please let me know what you guys think about the story and my writing, criticism is welcome, and anything else to help me improve as a writer. Reviews would be greatly appreciated, I really want to know what you guys think. Until the next chapter post, take care and have fun reading guys!
Cheers,
LadyWulf
Phoenix Down
Prologue
Looking out the window, thick snow painted the mountain landscape as more of the fluffy, white powder fell from the sky.
Kai Hiwatari continued to stare out the frost covered window, his mind lost in thought. Clutching a blue beyblade in his right hand, the young boy could feel a wave of warm aura wash over him.
It was Dranzer.
Holding the blade up, he stared intently at the bitchip centered in the middle of the beyblade. A slight smile graced his lips; he could feel Dranzers power flow through him, the phoenix was excited, happy to be back with her master.
Thinking back to that day when his bitbeast was taken away, ripped from his very being, Kai shuddered at the thought. The smile quickly faded from his face, replaced once more with the serious, stoic expression he always wore.
Never again would he put Dranzer in such danger. Never again would he be so foolish. He had come so close to losing the phoenix for good and the thought of such a thing ever happening again truly terrified him.
"Never again," Kai spoke aloud, continuing to stare out the window at the frozen wasteland that lay before him.
He had let his guard down. After so many years of shutting the world out, he allowed those steel walls guarding his very soul to lower. For once in a long, long time, he had thought for sure that things would be different, that he had finally found others he could trust.
It was that foolish decision though that almost cost him his life, and that of his bitbeasts.
"I've become weak," he thought looking down at the windowsill.
Suddenly another wave of energy washed over him, but this time it wasn't from Dranzer. Reaching into his pocket, Kai pulled out a black bitchip.
Black Dranzer.
The dark phoenix screeched calling to the young blader, and for a moment Kai smirked looking at the black fire bird. Who would have thought he would end up taming the dark beast, allowing it to become a part of him, just as Dranzer was.
Holding Dranzer in his right hand and Black Dranzer in his left, Kai gave one final look out the cloudy window clutching both objects tightly.
The two phoenixes belonged to him now. They were a part of his soul. His heart was filled with both light and darkness. You couldn't have one without the other, and Kai had finally accepted that fact. Putting both objects back into his pocket, Kai turned to leave the room.
Opening the door, he was greeted by a pleasant aroma. The hallway smelled of roast-beef and baked bread.
For once Kai felt a slight pain in his stomach.
He wasn't a big eater. Years spent at the abbey had left him with a very subtle appetite. Not much food was required to keep his body and mind functioning.
Food was something humans relied on to live, and therefore considered a weakness. Biovolt had taken extreme measures to make sure Kai and the rest of the children at the abbey knew that fact.
Their bodies were trained to function off the very minimum required to live, while still being able to perform in peak condition.
A shudder ran up Kai's spine as he thought back to the methods Biovolt favored when it came to conditioning its students to learn such self-control over their own bodies wants.
This was the reason for his meager appetite.
For a moment Kai wondered if his disdain for regular meals would always be like that. His thoughts were interrupted however by yet another small pain emitting from his stomach and the thick aroma of home-made food tickled his senses once more.
Spencer's cooking was beginning to spoil him. In fact, it was spoiling the whole lot of them.
Over the past couple months it seemed like they had all stumbled upon a new-found hobby.
Back during their years at the abbey, Callie loved to write. Now that she actually had the opportunity to do so, you could always find her lounging about somewhere scribbling away.
Kai couldn't help but smirk at the thought, he was almost positive the bouncy, pink haired girl had gone through at least three notebooks, and that was just in the past month.
It was like that with all of them though.
Ian was constantly down in the basement tinkering away on some new contraption, whereas Bryan had taken to collecting antique knives.
Kai himself had always enjoyed reading. Now that he had time to lay back, relax, and immerse himself in a good book, he found that he was always running out of books, thus having to make constant trips to town to pick up something new to read.
As for Spencer, he seemed to be naturally talented when it came to the culinary arts. You could always find the Russian working away in the kitchen.
Breakfast, lunch, and dinner; three concepts that the group of teenagers had never been accustomed to was now a routine part of their day, with all of them sitting down together for each meal.
Back during their time at the abbey, the group had never received regular meals. Sometimes they would go days without a single crumb of food or even a drop of water. Other times they would be tested and given poisoned food.
Boris took great joy out of teasing the starved teenagers. Giving them hot, delicious looking meals, the twisted man would watch, patiently hoping his prisoners would gorge themselves on the food so later he could watch them suffer.
Knowing full well what would happen if they gave into their cravings and took so much as a bite of the food, the group forced themselves to resist such tempting offers. Over time they all became well equipped at recognizing whether food was poisoned or safe to eat.
Now however, food was no longer an issue, and Spencer was always experimenting with new recipes.
Walking out of his room, Kai made a mental note to speak with the blonde headed Russian about the matter of his cooking. They may have finally been free from the abbey but Kai would be damned if he allowed Spencer's cooking to make them all fat!
Making his way to the room at the very end of the hallway, Kai stopped and paused in front of the door listening for any sounds coming from the other side.
After hearing nothing but silence, Kai placed his hand upon the door knob and stepped into the room. Moving to shut the door behind him, he was careful not to make even the slightest noise.
The inside of the room was very dim, with its only light source coming from the window positioned across the room, directly in front of the doorway.
The blinds to the window were closed shut and the curtains had been pulled so that the cloth covered most of the window, leaving only a small crack, which gave the room a faint light.
The room itself, though dimly lit, appeared seemingly spotless. The desk sitting in the far right corner was free of clutter with an opened lab top resting atop it. Besides the lab top lay a worn notebook, and in front of it a cup filled with pens and pencils. Kai noticed the waste-basket sitting beside the desk was completely full of crumbled papers.
Turning his gaze to the other side of the room, the young Phoenix continued his survey. Not much else furnished the room aside from a small dresser and bookshelf. There were two other doors in the room that lay opposite of one another. One sat half-opened beside the desk, it was a closet, and a very organized one at that. The other door sitting next to the bookshelf on the left side of the room stood ajar revealing a washroom. In the far left corner sat a medium sized bed with a nightstand beside it.
The layout and furnishings of the room were very simple and Kai assumed that the other five bedrooms in the house looked very similar, his own included.
Noticing again how clean and organized the room was, he couldn't help but smirk. The room's appearance was a perfect mirror to his friend.
Still standing in front of the doorway, Kai quietly walked over to the desk and knelt down to further inspect the waste basket. Reaching for one of the crumbled balls of paper at the very top of the pile he froze upon hearing a quiet voice.
"You know, it's pretty rude to snoop through other peoples stuff."
Kai turned to face the direction of the voice and his eyes met icy blue ones.
Laying half propped up on the bed was the captain of the Blitzkrieg Boys.
"You should be asleep Tala." Kai spoke, looking his friend straight in the eye.
"And you should learn to knock." the red head sighed.
Rolling his eyes, Kai decided to forget about all the crumbled papers for the time being. Standing, he moved to take a seat in the desk chair and turned his attention back to the occupant of the bed.
Taking in the appearance of his friend, Kai couldn't help but wince. Tala's skin was much paler than normal and he looked far too thin, fragile almost. His left eye was patched over with white gauze and medical tape, but the right one was bloodshot with dark rings hanging underneath his eyelid. Kai could tell his friend had not been sleeping well.
Thick layers of bandages wrapped around the red heads chest, his arms and legs were covered in the white dressing as well. Kai noticed some areas of the bandages were stained with rust colored spots.
"He's still bleeding," the phoenix blader thought to himself, his teeth clenching in anger. Callie would most likely be up soon to change the bandages again.
Kai watched closely as the red head attempted to sit up in the bed. Flinching at the protest of his injuries, Kai could tell Tala was trying his best to conceal the discomfort. He could see right through his friend's facade however and knew the red-head had to be in a great deal of pain.
Standing up, Kai made his way over to the bed, leaning down he wrapped one arm around his friends back and hooked his other arm around his waist. Slowly, he pulled Tala up into a sitting position, ignoring the other boys protest.
"Kai don't even think about it," Tala gritted out as he attempted to push the other boy's arms away.
"Kai you jerk I don't need your help." Struggling for a few moments, Tala tried in vain to fight back against his friend, but after a moment he felt winded and decided to give up, his body far too fatigued to continue.
"Don't over-do it Tala, you heard what Callie said, you need to rest."
Seeing that Tala had finally stopped struggling, Kai pulled one of the thick blankets up around his friend's chest and then looked the red-head over making sure he was comfortable.
Tala's head was turned away however, his eyes staring intently at the crumbled bed sheets that lay around him. Kai noticed a light flush spread across Tala's face. Pausing for a moment, he wondered if his friends fever was acting up again, or if he was just blushing out of embarrassment. He hoped it was the latter.
Satisfied with himself, Kai moved back to sit down in the desk chair. He heard the red-head mumble a faint "thank you," and Kai gave a curt nod in response.
Kai knew Tala hated being so helpless and that the red –head was beyond frustrated with how debilitating his injuries were.
He wanted to say something reassuring to his friend, to tell Tala to just relax and let them take care of him. He knew his words would fall on deaf ears, Tala was far too stubborn.
They were all like that though, refusing to show any sort of weakness, keeping their emotions locked away, and always wearing that steely facade.
Emotions were for the weak, nothing more than a crutch for man-kind. Yet another lesson Biovolt had drilled into their minds.
Callie was probably the only exception out of the six of them.
Kai never understood why, but somehow the pink haired girl managed to hold onto some of her inner self, even after all those years at the abbey. He knew that it was mainly due to the young girl's personality but still, there was always that small spark that lay aflame inside the Russian girl, refusing to be snuffed out by Boris and his tortuous ways.
In a way Callie was a light to all of them. The darkness may have consumed their lives, but as long as she was there, a dim light would still remain.
Kai knew that Callie cared dearly for all of them, especially Tala.
The two siblings had a strong bond, one that was forged from years of abuse and suffering. When it all came down to it, Callie could always break through those icy barriers, the ones that steeled themselves around her brothers very soul.
A faint knock on the door brought Kai out of his thoughts. A second later the door opened to reveal a very concerned looking Callie.
"Is everything alright?" she asked, her quiet voice breaking through the silence.
Kai looked over to Tala who only looked up at his sister and nodded.
"Everything's fine Cal, Kai was just keeping me company."
The pink haired girl frowned, "You haven't been able to sleep at all have you?"
"I slept for a little while," Tala lied.
He didn't want to upset his sister, or make her any more worried than she already was.
Kai snorted and rolled his eyes at Tala's obvious fib.
Callie let out a small sigh, and then disappeared into the washroom. A moment later she returned with a medical kit in hand. Laying the box at the end of the bed, Callie looked up at her brother smiling softly, "You know the drill big brother. I need to change the bandages so nothing gets infected."
Tala mumbled grumpily and once again attempted to sit up in the bed. Struggling just as he had before, Callie leaned across the bed to help support her brother.
Kai started to get up from the chair to help but Tala gave him an icy glare.
"Stay your ass in the chair Hiwatari!" Tala continued to stare down the phoenix blader.
Deciding to leave things up to Callie, Kai sat back down, shrugged his shoulders and smirked, "Whatever you say captain."
"Don't think you're off the hook Kai, I want to look at your injuries after I'm done with Tala."
Kai sighed loudly, the smirk leaving his face.
Reviews are greatly appreciated, please let me know what you guys think!