This is my first fic, so please review so I can improve!

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Love isn't something I understand

"Why can't you ever lighten up!" The indigo-haired Granger roared at his captain, best friend and secret crush, Kai Hiwatari. But the dual haired enigma blatantly ignored all of Tyson's accusations and rather flirtatious advances. Takao was all but tweaked at Kai's behaviour: Why did he have to be so indifferent!

"The answer, Tyson, is beyond me," Kai responded in a deadly quite tone, his head dipped so that his long bangs shaded his face. "I don't know how to be anything more than a cold, heartless weapon, remember?" Something in his voice astounded Tyson; it was full of an unrecognized emotion that he had never heard before coming from Kai.

The older teen sounded… abused. Like the way a small, innocent child would after he'd been beaten. In an immediate response to his captain's change of behaviour, Tyson found himself placing a hand on the latter's shoulder in a gesture of comfort and reassurance, but it was bluntly refused when Kai shrugged it off.

"Leave – me – alone," Kai found himself saying in a monotonous voice that at the same time resonated with danger. "Kai," Tyson persisted, moving forward yet again and placing a firm grip on Kai's shoulder. It was amazingly boney beneath his fingers; Kai lacked the masculine physique of the other Blitzkrieg Boys, favouring a more slender frame instead. "You need to let us in if we can ever help –" Tyson was rudely interrupted in mid-sentence when Kai jerked himself away from him.

"I DON'T NEED HELP!" Now it was Kai who shouted at Tyson, trembling with something other than rage. "Especially not yours! Can't you see! I'm the insensitive, arrogant prick everyone thinks I am! So leave me alone!" Suddenly, Kai spun on his heels and dashed madly out the front door, his scarf trailing out behind him like a white flame.

/ Midnight :

Tyson was scouring the now deserted night-time streets of Bakuten for any signs of the agitated Russian, after a constant haranguing on the part of the other G-Revolution members for hurting the feelings of the said Russian. He didn't even know Kai HAD any feelings. That was the biggest mistake he made. In believing that his captain was as emotionless as he claimed to be, Tyson had unwittingly peaked the emotional roller coaster that Kai's life had become to an all time high.

Tyson hadn't expected Kai to react no negatively to his offers of help; he hardly even knew what he did wrong! Apart from his outburst at Kai more than eight hours ago, there was little else that he had done to set the dual haired enigma off. It dawned on his that Kai had recently been rather edgy, and it took a ridiculously miniscule amount of Anything just to irritate him.

More than once over the past three weeks, Kai had surreptitiously snuck off out of the blue and not returned for hours at a time, even not till the next day. He rarely spoke to anyone, preferring to isolate himself in some shadowy part of the dojo and completely ignore the rest of the gang. Tyson wondered silently why Kai had changed so much since the end of last year's tournament.

Many people didn't see Kai the way he did; they believed him to an evil, heartless, merciless prick like the rest of the Blitzkrieg Boys; that he cared for no one but himself, doing just about anything to get what he wanted. But that was far from the truth. Kai was rarely seen by anyone, because he felt no need to be seen when he was not needed. He possessed an extraordinary ability to disappear and reappear whenever someone desperately needed his help, and his self-command earned him a profound respect and admiration. In any case, not a single one of the Russian bladders had an ounce of evil in them.

Then there was Kai's genuine way with words. With just a brief sentence or even just a passing comment, Kai could make you feel as if you were on top of the world, or he could bring you back down to earth so hard you could feel yourself crashing on solid ground. He could make you reexamine yourself more than you would ever have done in your entire life, or make you feel so proud that nothing and no one could make you feel any smaller.

He and he alone took the time to single out a particular trait of a particular person, and make them see it in a way only he could, because he took the time to look for it. It gave him the uncanny ability to make other bladders understand something about themselves that they'd never understood before. Anyone could tell you this; Miguel, Raul… With barely any exchange of words Kai had changed their lives for the better.

But ironically, everything seemed to be going wrong for the Russian. First was his grandfather's escape from the Russian Federal Prison, then the $5000 contract on his head placed by the maniacal Boris. It got worse when Kai's recently discovered family, consisting of his mother and twin sister, was brutally murdered by someone speculated to be Voltaire.

His world was crumbling and falling to pieces; pieces that couldn't be put back together, but yet Kai still refused to burden anyone else with his problems. And because of that, the madness and the stress was eating away at him, diminishing his once powerful desire to survive pull through at all costs. Tyson knew that if he could find his captain soon, Kai would loose all will to keep on fighting, and the life that Tyson so deeply cherished would be no more than a very painful memory.

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Me: Yay! My first fic!

Kai: It was stupid. I'm not suicidal. Tala is.

Me: But Tala isn't the main character, so be quiet before I do kill you.

Kai: grumble

Tyson: Leave her alone. I want to see how it ends.

Me: Thanks! Read and Review Please -!