I didn't think I'd get anything up this soon after my colossal update, but this one just came to me last night. I finished the whole thing in one sitting and that never happens. I'm too antsy. This one was different though; the words just flowed. There are some monster paragraphs so bear with me.

Disclaimer: I don't own Beyblade.

Enjoy!

Not Even In The Rain

Kai Hiwatari's steps were leaden as he dragged himself down the cobblestone path. One foot in front of the other he walked and lived. One thing at a time was how he took things, constantly looking behind himself at what was. But looking back can be dangerous. It can ruin a man by causing him to relive his worst memories, choking on them until he's as useless as the ashes of a fire, holding on to life, but barely. In these last, dying embers of a man, he remembers when he was a young flame, burning bright, and he regrets the foolish things he wasted himself on. For now he's nothing but a lonely pile of remnants, soon to be discarded.

The sky was inky purple, unable to be penetrated by tiny, pinprick stars and the ghostly face of the moon. Kai preferred it that way on the nights he visited them. He would rather have his soul shrouded by night's cloak than have the light penetrate him, revealing to them the weakness inside his tough exterior. They had to believe he was strong. He wouldn't let them see sorrow in him, for they deserved better than that. They deserved more than he could give them even.

Kai moved in a specter's manner, wondering, as always, if he was imagining the mist of the night, or if the souls of the lost roamed. There were times, on nights where the fog was so thick you felt suffocated, that he imagined them walking with him. They were always just how he remembered them: he, tall and handsome, her, beautiful and fair, and Nikolai, supportive and very much like his father in Kai's mind's eye. They had been too young to die and he was too young to lose them.

"But why'd he have to leave?" a much younger Kai asked, tugging at Marilyn's apron with a small fist.

"I don't know, Sweetheart." The nursemaid pried his fingers from her clothing to take hold of his hand as a loud fist pounded on the front door.

"Take the boy upstairs," Smithwright, the butler, ordered Marilyn. "It's Lord Voltaire."

"But Master Hiwatari isn't back yet." The grip on Kai's hand tightened.

The small child hadn't a clue what was going on. He never saw his grandfather except on holidays because his work kept him busy. Why was he here now? And why was everyone acting so frightened?

"What's going on?" It wasn't until he was older that Kai would fully realize what type of situation he was in.

"We're just going upstairs while Bill answers the door." She scooped Kai up as another booming slam shook the door. Marilyn's tiny feet made good use of themselves when she ran up the steps and hid herself and Kai in the nursery.

Kai hadn't noticed before, but, when he looked at her now, fear was etched into her face. He sensed, like children can, that something was very wrong. She had placed him on the floor and went to stand by the door, wringing her hands together. Kai dared not say a word as he began to shake uncontrollably. He didn't know why, but he was suddenly overcome by a feeling of dread that couldn't be explained. With a little difficulty, Kai got up and went to hide behind his nursemaid's legs, clinging to them tightly. She ruffled his hair assuringly.

In a moment's time heavy footsteps could be heard pummeling into the floor as they climbed the stairs. Shortly after Marilyn ushered Kai backwards, the door flew open, ricocheting off the wall. Voltaire sauntered in with several policemen trailing behind him.

"Where's Mr. Smithwright?" Marilyn's voice quivered as she spoke.

"He's mourning," Voltaire answered unsympathetically, "the death of my son, his wife, and their oldest son."

Marilyn's huge, blue eyes widened immensely and tears sprouted from rarely used ducts. "No." Susumu, Natasha, and Nikolai...dead? It couldn't be. "No."

"Yes." Voltaire's voice had an icy clip to it that made her shiver.

"Did your employers have a will, Miss..."

"Kuznetsov." Marilyn choked.

"Yes, well, do you know of a will?" the policeman inquired gruffly, unaccustomed to comforting the more emotional females. This one seemed to have a bit of backbone; he hoped it would hold up until he was gone.

"I suppose they had one. It would only make sense given the amount of money they had. But I really have no idea."

"There is no will." Voltaire's statement sounded more like an order. He stared down at his grandson who sniffled, his face flushed with the fever he'd acquired recently. "Their death came suddenly. They were still young and thought they had no need of such a thing."

Part of Marilyn wanted to kill that man, with her own two hands, right this minute. He was positively insufferable and he radiated evil. How dare he suggest that Mr. and Mrs. Hiwatari had been so foolish! You could be sure he had a hand in this business. If there hadn't been a glimmer of a chance that she'd be allowed to stay and be nursemaid to Kai, she surely wouldn't have held her tongue – or her hands.

"The child will most likely be left to you, Mr. Hiwatari," the policeman informed, speaking of Kai as if he were a piece of property, what Voltaire had always seen him as. "We can't be sure until the legal work is done, but it's the likeliest of solutions."

"Yes." Voltaire reveled in his victory as he stared menacingly down into Kai's eyes. The child stiffened under the glare. For the first time, those emotionless eyes sliced through Kai, searing his soul and making him feel extreme hatred, fear, and ferocity.

That horrific night had been the absolute worst night of Kai's life. It was worse than any night he had spent at the Abbey, locked in a dank, frigid, musty cell, his body beaten and battered as a rug after a vigorous spring cleaning. Kai knew more than most the agony and pain living could bring every time he lay in a broken, bloody heap with that sandpaper-like stone floor wearing away at his body and, slowly but surely, his soul.

It was as if he'd fallen off a cliff, but there was nothing he could do because he hadn't even known he was falling until he was halfway down.

As if sensing the stir of emotion deep within Kai's being, the heavens began to pour down their bountiful supply of fresh water. The lightning flashed in the sky and he remembered the rotating police car lights blinding him as Voltaire walked him out of the house and away from the twisted face of Marilyn and everything he'd ever known. With each clap of thunder he was taken back to the Abbey where his head was slammed repeatedly off the wall as someone shouted, "They abandoned you! They hate you! Show them that you can hate, too! Nothing but hate!" As the boy in his memory collapsed to the ground, the pounding of a fist against a solid oak door rang in his ears.

Kai shook with emotion, not because he was cold from being soaked to the skin by rain falling in torrents. But he wouldn't cry. There was a prick in his heart that told him the rain would hide his tears; his family would want him to cry so their distant arms of comfort could have a use.

However, back when the whole thing had happened, he'd cried enough for a thousand people, but it had never done him an ounce of good. As a matter of fact, he'd been punished for it by the same brutal hands that had once struck his own father as a boy. It was those hands his father had tried, and failed, to keep him safe from. He wouldn't let them know how much the loss of their lives has cost him. His love for them, not his pride, couldn't allow it. Not even in the rain.

Kai ran a hand over the granite gravestone while murmuring a small prayer. He hoped he would be a good enough person in his life to spend eternity with them; they meant everything to him. He could almost see them running to greet him in a land of all white; his mother and father, perfect as always, and his brother much more grown up than he'd been when Kai had last seen him.

"Welcome home!" They'd greet him with crescent moon smiles as he buried himself in their embrace. The childish words he's once spoken would once again flow from his lips.

"I love you," Kai whispered, taking shaky breaths in an effort to calm himself.

He allowed but one tear to fall as he dropped two roses by the single gravestone his three bygone family members shared: black for the sorrow he felt, and white for the life they'd live together once more.

One glance upwards and he walked back up the narrow, cobblestone path.

A/N: Just in case anyone was wondering, things that are unexplained, particularly in the flashback, are things that I'm planning on incorporating into a story that my sister and I will write together. I'm not sure how soon that will be, but if you're interested, it will be uploaded onto our collaboration account. There's a link on my profile.

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