Chapter 1 – The Dragon's Arrival

"What was that?" Gingka asked aloud.

His mind felt clearer, strangely. He could breathe freely without feeling like he was going to choke with every breath. It was like he had dived into clear, icy water, shocking him out of the faded, blurred, static-filled world he had been living in for the past few weeks.

His bey was in the middle of the floor, spinning.

Gingka blinked and rubbed his eyes before pinching himself, trying to convince himself that this wasn't a dream. But no, there was the blue bey, and when he reached out to his partner, there was Pegasus waiting for him.

Except that Pegasus was not alone. There was another presence in the bey, a great and forceful power that ripped Gingka's breath away like a gale.

It was the dragon, as blue as the sky and as strong as winter. Its power was nothing like the other dragon that Gingka knew of – it wasn't fire and darkness and rage. Rather, it was like a gust of wind, bright and fair and full of promise on a sunny morning. The dragon had expanded to fill every tiny crevice of the blade without pushing out Pegasus, yet even though there was no room left it didn't feel as if the two beasts were cramped. In fact, Pegasus seemed happier with this arrangement than he had been on his own.

"Who are you?" Gingka asked the dragon, trying to reach out to it in the same way that he would reach for Pegasus. But there was no response beyond a faint trill of notes at the very edge of his mind, which wasn't anywhere near a sensible answer that Gingka could understand. The bey wobbled and toppled to the floor, spinning to a halt right in front of him. He reached out to touch it.

"Who are you?" he asked again, brushing a finger against the edge of the bey. The creature within made no sound – maybe it couldn't now that it was safely contained in the blade. "Pegasus? What's happening?"

His constellation leaned against his mind, radiating an idea of peace-safety-guardianship that Gingka took to mean that the dragon meant no harm. But underneath the image of safety was another, darker one from the dragon itself – one of wariness and watchfulness. Gingka had never felt anything like it, not even when he had been running along the corridors of Spiral Core on guard for traps and ambushes. Almost all of the dragon's focus was on something else, something far away, and the closer that Gingka tried to look, the further he got dragged into it.

Gingka sighed. He wasn't the expert on these things – Madoka was. But waking her up at midnight seemed a very poor payment for all her hard work fixing Pegasus, so he would just have to wait until tomorrow.

Pegasus leaned against his mind again, bringing a familiarity that Gingka hadn't felt since the events of Spiral Core. It was that more than anything that was stopping Gingka from panicking and waking everyone else in the house to work out what was happening, because if Pegasus was relaxed and happy with that dragon sharing with him, then surely it wasn't a bad thing? Pegasus had never yet allowed any harm come to Gingka or those that he cared about, and somehow he doubted that such a thing would start happening now.

But what was the dragon? It wasn't a constellation – there was only one dragon-based constellation and Ryuga had that one. But it was quite at home in Gingka's shining blue blade, so it must have some connection to beyblades...

Mind full of questions, Gingka picked up his blade, wrapped his fingers around it tightly and clambered back into his bed. He could feel the power of the two beasts humming through the metal and couldn't help but wonder what on earth he had managed to get himself into this time. After all, it wasn't every day that a dragon came soaring through your window and into your blade. He could only hope that Madoka would be able to get to the bottom of all this – and that after all this excitement, he would be able to get to sleep at all.

Hey guys! Thanks for all the interest shown in this story - it means a lot to me and it's a huge encouragement! However, I'm coming to the end of my second year of uni, and so I'm afraid I'm off on hiatus again until after 13th May. Sorry about that, but I'd like to get a really good grade for this year, so I'm putting all my effort into essays for the next two weeks. After that, though, I'm back to writing, and hopefully this time I won't end up with writer's block again...

Feel free to review/PM me - I'll still respond to those, but I won't be doing any story-writing for the next fortnight.

Thanks in advance for your patience!

JuniperGentle