Dark Skies

Serpentine Wisdom

Warning: Mentions of violence, death, torture and child abuse.

Summary: AU story, the world championships in Russia went differently than the way we know.

Disclaimer: I don't own Beyblade or any of its characters.

Cover the madness, cover the fear
no one will ever know you were here
a figure in the hallway light
returning like a ghost
something that was left behind-- something in a child's mind
a picture worth a thousand lies, a thousand words
a thousand eyes...

– Bury My Lovely, October Project

Chapter One: NE-1951

NE-1951 stood on his side of the dish with his launcher in his hands. It resembled the gun he usually used in the Abbey, there were only a few little differences in the design that made it easy to tell it was a fake. He looked up to stare into the blood red eyes of his opponent. They were just as blankly neutral as they had been when the owner of the eyes had walked into the Neoborg's locker room.

It had been a normal day as day went for the Neoborgs. They'd trained all morning and were just waiting for Balkov to let them go eat breakfast. S-2521 had been typing on a laptop that Balkov had lent him, he was looking for information about Team BBA. All their known strengths and weaknesses would have to be studied in miniscule detail but still be cast away in the heat of the battle. He was like that NE-1951had noticed; obsessive over details that he never had any use for. NE-1951 supposed it was because of the training, but he wouldn't know; he and S-2521 hadn't gone through the same training after all. No one did, it was shaped to fit the individual for those on their level– a little bit ironic since one of the things the Abbey and Biovolt despised the most was individuality.

S-2922 had been flipping a coin repeatedly, heads or tails; he wouldn't get to play in the final rounds anyway and was visibly bored out of his mind. But despite S-2922's relaxed pose NE-1951 could tell that he was just waiting for something to go wrong and allow him to actually do something. Exactly what, NE-1951 couldn't tell. S-2922 had never liked him and seldom spoke in his presence, not that it affected their teamwork. S-2922 was a professional in that matter; S-2922's loyalty was to his pack, just not always to the members of it.

And S-2151? He had simply been staring out the window, watching the snow falling gently to the ground, smiling. Which was enough to make 1951 feel wary. S-2151 never smiled unless he was carving someone to pieces and anyone who knew him –especially people who knew him– tried their best to stay out of his way when he graced them with a smile. Hell, even people who didn't know stayed away. Though amusingly enough, S-2151 didn't have a very intimidating smile at all it was actually quite beautiful, some would even say gentle, but it just seemed so wrong on his features. Sure, it was disturbing most of the time to listen to S-2151 talk and his unblinking eyes which seemed to see right through you –and seeing something else than what was actually there, seeing beyond someone's physical appearance– was enough to unnerve anyone. Even people who weren't exactly sane themselves, but he was surprisingly coherent and intelligent most of the time. Surprising since the Biovolt scientist usually pumped him so full with drugs that he shouldn't even be able to see straight. Biovolt claimed it was so they would be able to keep him in line, but to NE-1951, who saw perhaps a little too much for Biovolt's liking, S-2151 seemed to be much, much worse after his periods of drug-induced sleep. Maybe because he didn't really require sleep at all, who knew? 'Boris', as they had been instructed to call him in public, was the explosive kind of madman; he could be acting perfectly sane one minute, giving of no warning signs, and the next he could be exploding into action.

NE-1951 was different from them he knew that. They knew that, and it made them glance suspiciously at him keep their conversations up in voices to low for him to hear. They didn't trust him at all –not that trust was something they had much of– because unlike them he was a natural, born outside the Abbey's foreboding walls. And even though he had been barely two years old when taken away from his home and family, it still made a difference to them.

NE-1951 held no illusions of being special; he had been chosen for the bit-beast that his family possessed, nothing else. For Voltaire had once seen the might of Seaborg and had decided that it should, and would, belong to Biovolt. The only problem was when they had actually stolen Seaborg was that the ancient spirit refused to serve them and had even spoken to Balkov and said that only one of his previous master's blood would ever hold the power of Seaborg in his, or hers for that matter, hands. NE-1951 had been the youngest of his family and had therefore been the chosen one; he would be easier to form than the rest they had figured.

They had been right.

Sometimes at night he thought he could hear his mother's voice humming Russian lullabies softly in his ear or whisper soft words filled to the brim with a warm emotion that he did not recognize, he even thought he could feel her gentle touch for a few occasions. But it was nothing but his imagination. An imagination that had comforted him in his earlier years and given him the strength to stand up at dawn every morning simply to face another day of misery beyond misery.

But he never tried to escape, even though he probably could have made it with a little planning. Life on the outside, life without the Abbey or Biovolt, was unimaginable. It was confusing and very, very undesirable. He repressed a shudder of discomfort, the thought making him feel very much like a small child afraid of the dark. But he didn't have anyone to tell him that the monsters weren't real, he had never had. And even if he'd had someone say that, to comfort him with hugs and kisses instead of looking him up in an isolation cell for showing weakness, he wouldn't had believed them. He had seen the monsters, had seen what they could do.

Now he called them family.

It was strange to think that he was the youngest of the Neoborgs, when he looked like he was the oldest. Something he had the Abbey to thank for. Just because he was one of the few naturals that could survive being forced to fuse with his bit-beast, they had been very interested to see how his body would react if he went through a program of artificial improvement that was similar to that of the genetically engineered super soldiers. The soldiers he was supposed to become one of.

But when he had looked upon the team he was destined to be with for the rest of his life, in that locker room not so long ago, and just when Balkov entered with S-2841 he had realized for the millionth time that he could never be as them. The look in their eyes, it was ancient, he could practically feel the weight of eternity weighing down on him in their stares. But that wasn't the only thing, the way they thought and behaved seemed so alien – and it wasn't simply because they were born and breed Abbey soldiers either. He knew, somehow, that they had never been fused with their bit-beasts like he had but there was still something about them that… wasn't human, not even artificial ones.

And no matter how many times he was tampered with, NE-1951 could never hope to replicate or match any of them, as a soldier or as a killer – not as anything if truth were to be told. They had been created with artificial bodies and brains that could deal with constant upgrading, he hadn't. And that revelation, though it was hardly something new, always hit him like a ton of bricks – made him realize just how worthless he was compared to them. He was the runt of the litter, the omega of the pack.

Though to be honest most of the time he felt relieved that he couldn't handle as much as them. He had seen quite a bit of what they had been put through and he didn't envy them even for just a second. S-2151 was the way he was for a reason, after all. They all were. But it didn't ease the emptiness he felt, a hole in his soul growing larger and larger every day; a dull ache in the back of his mind.

With a sigh he pushed away those thoughts, a soldier didn't feel sadness, he was obedience and nerves of steel. Balkov wouldn't appreciate NE-1951 slacking off, even if it were just in his mind. He had seen it happen to too many of the children of the Abbey to let himself go down the same path. It always started small a few doubts here and there, a few comments that shouldn't have been made…

The punishment wasn't too severe in the beginning but if the subject continued to show what was, by Biovolt, considered as undesirable behavior it was upgraded. In the end they either became what Biovolt wanted them to be, or they came back quiet and zombie-like. They reminded NE-1951 of mice, small scurrying rodents terrified of everything that moved. Usually they didn't last long, there was always a predator lurking amongst the Abbey soldiers ready to put an end to their suffering – pick off the weak. Being dragged away, limp and unconscious was not something NE-1951 looked forward to.

Anyone who had been to the Abbey could understand that, but not everyone could understand the terror he felt of it. The soldiers that had been created in the labs, the group he belonged to for example, didn't seem to be able to fear much, not even torture or death. After all, how could someone who had never had anything to lose feel fear? Trying to explain to them why death and pain was something to be feared was pointless, they had it programmed into their genes. And if some of them did feel fear they were never going to admit it, but he doubted that was the case. Even S-2841, who had been away for almost eleven years, couldn't seem to understand it, though at least he had seemed to realize the need NE-1951 felt to avoid such matters.

Though NE-1951 still had the same instinct of thinking about S-2841 as a part of their team it had been hard to get familiar with him again, especially since Balkov had seemed to want to keep him away from the rest of them. Maybe Balkov hadn't been sure if it was for the best to let them all meet for longer periods of time. They had after all been following his trail for all those years, hounding him for the traitor he was, until he left the country that is and met up with Mr. Hiwatari again.

Every single one of them had known who S-2841 was even before Balkov had re-introduced him; grey hair and red eyes weren't especially common after all. S-2151's head had turned at an –for him– unnaturally slow speed towards the door even before it was opened while S-2922 had almostdropped his coin in a sudden and violent twitch and S-2521 had stopped typing to look up without ever being asked. They had suddenly been tense and there had been a feeling of growing excitement fluttering in the air.

But their expectations had gone down the drain along with the unrecognizing gaze they had received from S-2841. Though S-2151 had later calmly stated that he wasn't very surprised, he had met 'Kai', as S-2841 choose to call himself nowadays, at the Abbey just a day earlier. But not even he had known just how much about them that 'Kai' had forgotten until Balkov had explained that he believed that 'Kai's' memory had somehow been directly linked to Black Dranzer and was only recently starting to recall it all because of his contact with the bit-beast.

They hadn't wanted to believe it, but of course they did. They could all sense something was wrong with him, but they couldn't figure out just what it was and they didn't have time to either. 'Kai' turned traitor on them again and returned to his team of weaklings too soon for that. Traitors, NE-1951 thought grimly as he stared at 'Kai', did not deserve mercy. Whatever it took, whatever he had to do, he would crush the traitor here. The damnable traitor that had the drive and guts to free himself from Biovolt that NE-1951 found himself lacking.

It never occurred to him that like Hell was more than burning lava and demons, Biovolt was more then cold walls, more then physical torment. Just because you left the physical restraints behind, did not mean you had escaped it. Freedom was a state of mind that not many who had spent their youth in the Abbey could understand – least of all someone who had lost his memories.

To be continued…

If you're wondering why I keep referring to the Neoborgs as number combinations the answer is really simple. Names give you a sense of self and Biovolt doesn't want their soldiers to be individuals or have definitive sense of self.

Age when the Championships took place:

Kai (S-2841): 18

Takao (Tyson): 16

Rei: 17

Yuriy (S-2521, Tala): 18

Boris (S-2151, Bryan): 18

Max: 16

Kyoujyu (Kenny): 15

Sergei (NE-1951, Spencer): 17

Ivan (S-2922, Ian): 18

Vladimir Balkov: 52

Voltaire Hiwatari: 76

The Majestics: 16 (Olivier), 17 (Gianni/Enrique and Andrew/Johnny) and 18 (Ralf/Robert)

The White Tigers: 15 (Kiki/Kevin), 17 (Mao/Mariah), 18 (Lai/Lee) and 19 (Gao/Gary)

The All-Starz: 16 (Emily), 18 (Eddy and Michael) and 19 (Steve)

The Dark Bladers: Unknown

Judy: 37

Max's father: 40