OMG…I'm so happy! First and fore mostly, I got many nice reviews for the first chapter of this story (thank you all so much!) and secondly…I FOUND MY VIDEO TAPE ON WHICH I RECORDED ALMOST THE ENTIRE FIRST SERIES OF BEYBLADE. Hehe, call me sad, I really don't care. I just sat and watched the entire Russian tournament/Bio-volt part. I'd actually forgotten how scary and evil the Demolition Boys are in the TV show (except they're not really…they're just misunderstood. Really). And I hate how Boris says Tala's name. He says it like 'Tulla'. It kills it. 'Rise, Cyber-Tulla!' See, it doesn't work. Well I guess I can call watching it research for the writing of this story, since it centres on the main characters of that part… (Ah what the hell, I just wanted to watch it.) I am now filled with renewed enthusiasm for Tala. Yay, he's so cool!
Ok, enough of my yammerings. Answers to a few questions about this story:
1) No, the diary author is NOT an O/C. That would be no fun at all to write because then people would never guess who it was!
2) Most characters will make an appearance, short or otherwise, or at least be mentioned.
3) Someone said they didn't want to vote on a pairing because they weren't sure what I was comfortable writing. Well, I have nothing against shonen-ai. Would anyone here be offended by it? I have to say, though, it'd be nothing serious. I can't write full-on lemon or anything (no, I'm FAR too young. Haha). I don't know…I guess the pairings will just occur as I type. Most stuff happens like that.
With that said…on with chapter two.
I Found Your Diary
Chapter 2
During the course of the morning, Tala had absorbed absolutely no information from any of his classes. His body had been sitting in the class, but his mind had been inside that diary. Even in workshop, a class he ordinarily enjoyed and was reasonably good at, his concentration just hadn't been there and he had ended up putting the chisel he had been using right through his piece of wood. (Luckily there had been spares, one of which the teacher exasperatedly gave him.)
He hadn't had a chance to read any further, having been in classes with irritatingly watchful teachers ever since the end of physics. So now, at lunchtime, he was eager to discover more of the mysterious musings of the notebook's owner.
However, as he made his way to the cafeteria, a thought struck him.
…Hadn't he said that he would hand it in?
…
He really should. It was the 'right' thing to do.
But it just seemed like the diary's author was taunting him, saying 'Haha! You don't know who I am! And you never will!'
He reached the lost-and-found office. He looked at it for a moment, fidgeting indecisively…before continuing on his way. He'd hand it in later. He knew his mind would never be at ease until he knew who this person was. With this in mind, he entered the cafeteria.
After taking a tray and purchasing his lunch, which consisted of a chicken-mayo sandwich and a bottle of water, he grabbed himself a seat at his usual table with his small group of friends. This group was made up solely of Bryan (dubbed by classmates 'the scary one), Ian ('the short one') and Spencer ('the incredible hulk'). And, of course, himself. He wasn't sure how his classmates referred to him. Maybe it was better that way. (Although, Ian constantly insisted that the girls called him 'the good-looking one'.)
"You're late," Bryan remarked, not looking up from the book he had his nose stuck in. Tala glanced at it. Stephen King's 'The Shining'. Typical Bryan-reading.
"I got kept back in chemistry," he said with a shrug, "Teacher said I was being 'spacey'."
Silence fell upon the group, only broken by Ian dropping his fork.
"…What?" Tala asked, looking nervously at his three comrades.
"Ugh, what is it this time?" Bryan groaned, closing his book.
"It's not a girl, is it?" Ian said, somewhat worriedly.
Spencer, not the biggest talker, simply shook his head at him in apparent annoyance.
"What are you guys talking about?" Tala asked in annoyance.
"Ian, explain," Bryan ordered. For once the other didn't argue.
"It's common knowledge, Tala, that you have a serious one-track mind complex," the smallest member of the group said in his 'aged English scholar voice', "And we can always tell when you've had some new big idea or challenge because your brain becomes entirely focused on that and you forget the existence of everything else around you."
"Not true…" the red-head mumbled just loud enough for Bryan's radar-ears to pick up.
"It damn well is true," the stoic teen retorted, "If I may take you back to ninth grade when, after being posed a maths problem, you didn't speak to anyone for about a week, failed roughly three tests in various subjects and missed two important soccer games whilst puzzling over it."
"But I did work it out in the end," Tala pointed out in his defence.
"Yes, you did," Bryan continued, "You phoned me up and told me, remember? You phoned me at three thirty in the morning to tell me that you finally found the solution, which you then related to me along with all ten pages of working. I know I'm an early riser, but even I was asleep then."
"I said I was sorry."
"Nonetheless. Anyway, hurry up and tell us what it is now. The world is not an entirely safe place while your head is in the clouds," Bryan concluded, picking up his book again (but Bryan did possess the peculiar ability to concentrate on more than one thing at a time, so Tala knew he was listening).
"It's nothing, really," Tala said, opening his bottle of water, "I just…ah, never mind."
"Oh God, it is a girl, isn't it?" Ian said, putting his head in his hands. Tala rolled his eyes.
"No," he replied. Ian looked up, looking more concerned than before.
"Is it a guy?" he asked, eyebrows raised. Tala spluttered on the water he was drinking.
"Ian, NO," he said firmly, "Just…no."
"Than what it is!" all three – even Spencer – demanded.
"Alright, alright!" he said in defeat, "It's nothing big. I just found something, that's all. A diary."
"So why are you going 'spacey' over that?" Ian asked, resuming eating now that the initial panic was over.
"Because I need to work out who it belongs to."
"Couldn't you just give it to lost-and-found?"
"Yeah I thought of that but…it's just annoying me. I mean, the person wouldn't even write who they were. They're doing it on purpose because-"
"Wait, hold up," Bryan said, raising a hand ('The Shining' once again having to wait), "You read this diary?"
"Well, not all of it. Just the first entry."
"Tala, that's-"
"I know, I'm scum. I couldn't help it. I mean, I was in physics."
"You're forgiven," Ian declared (who, incidentally, was going to have to suffer the tediousness of Mr Malden next lesson).
"Yeah. Anyway, whoever wrote it…it's like they're actually challenging anyone who reads it to find out who they are. And you know that-"
"You never back down from a challenge," his three 'friends' finished for him.
"Right," he said with a sigh.
"So, what, this person actually wrote 'if you read this you have to work out who I am'?" Ian asked sceptically.
"Not exactly…they actually wrote something more along the lines of 'if you read this I will kill you in a very painful manner'."
"It's your funeral, Tala," Bryan said flatly.
"I know."
"How are you supposed to know who it is?" Spencer asked suddenly, "If they haven't written it?"
"He has a point."
"I'm not sure…" Tala mused (his sandwich all but forgotten), "It's like…there are clues, y'know? Like, they wrote that they're a 'lone wolf'…"
"The two of you should get married," Bryan remarked, earning himself a glare.
"'Lone wolf'?" Ian said, raising an eyebrow, "What does that mean? They have no friends?"
"…Yeah, I guess," he agreed, deciding there was no more sensitive way to phrase it. After all, the mystery author had written that same thing themselves.
"So they're…" Ian said mischievously, "A drifter?"
The other three gave a collective sigh at the term. It was the name assigned to anyone who didn't belong to any particular 'group' of people. They had all been 'drifters' themselves, until they had all met and banded together in middle school. Right now, as they subconsciously started looking around the lunch hall, all the different groups were apparent. And then, interspersed among them, some at tables by themselves, some just wandering, were the drifters. Outcasts. Lone wolves. Whatever you wanted to call them.
"Kind of sad, don't you think?" Tala said, remembering the days when he had been one of those people. Of course, he hadn't wandered the cafeteria. He had stayed outside.
"Hn," was Bryan's response. He had always stayed outside too. That was where he and Tala had – quite literally – bumped into each other. After yelling at him and getting yelled at in return, they had quickly become firm friends.
"So all we have to do is interrogate every drifter in the school, find out who this diary belongs to, and you'll be back to normal?" Ian said.
"I'm normal right now," Tala insisted, annoyance increasing.
"No you aren't, your eyes are already getting that 'far-away look'." Bryan said, "Come on, let's go round up some lone wolves."
"No!" Tala said as his rather violent friend got to his feet, "No, that's not how it's meant to work. I'm supposed to read the thing, and from that work out who it is."
"But that'll take too long. And, remember, you're not actually supposed to read it."
"Give me a break, huh? I'll figure it out," Tala said, silently sighing with relief as Bryan resumed his seat, "And if I find out you've been interrogating anyone…"
"Relax, Red," the other teen said; using the old nickname in reference to Tala's blood-red hair, "It's all yours. Just remember we have a soccer game on Saturday. Inter-school's cup, semi-final. Do NOT forget, no matter how absorbing your little diary becomes."
"The way you talk, you'd think you were team captain," Tala (who was, in reality, team captain) said in amusement.
"Hn."
Bryan had gone back to the ghostly apparitions and supernatural occurrences of 'The Shining'. Tala finally started to unwrap his polythene-smothered sandwich. Sadly, it was at that moment that the bell signalling the end of lunchtime rang. He stared for a moment at the untouched sandwich.
"Oh well," he said with a shrug, tossing it in the bin as he passed. One pound eighty well spent. (A/N – I wasn't going to risk using any currency other than my own because I'd probably end up making a sandwich cost the same as a Porsche.)
"Hey, Tala, one question," Ian said as they headed toward their lockers.
"What?"
"When you find out who this person is, what are you going to do about it?"
"I'm not sure…" he said thoughtfully, "But whoever they are, I think they should really be a part of our 'group'. Because, seriously, from what I've read so far, they pretty much sound like…one of us."
"You mean clinically unstable with slight violent tendencies and would never fit in with normal people?"
"Yeah," he said with a faintly melancholy look, "Just like that."
It seemed like Fate had taken a particular interest in Tala Ivanov today. Because surely it had been more than mere coincidence that he had been the one, out of one thousand five hundred other students, to pick up that diary. And it couldn't have been an accident either that he was the type of person who would devote his time to reading it and uncovering its author's identity, rather than someone who would do the 'right thing' and simply hand it in. No, he had been meant to find it. Fate had had a hand in this.
And now, Fate was going to give things another little nudge.
Because when Tala entered his locker combination to retrieve his books, the thing wouldn't open. He tried again and again, but no. The locker that had worked perfectly since it had been assigned to him was now jammed shut. He sighed exasperatedly. Oh well. It was only Computing he was missing.
Soon the corridor was empty, all the other students having found their lockers in good working order and already left for their next classes. He grumbled an obscenity to himself and gave the locker a frustrated kick. Unfortunately, this caused it to burst open and half of its contents spilled out onto the floor at his feet.
"I do not believe this…" he mumbled, stooping to pick everything up. He stuffed it all haphazardly back into the locker, extracting the books he would need for the afternoon. Once he had everything he required crammed into his bag, he turned around.
But the funny thing was, the very second, the very instant he turned around, another figure came power-walking around the corner, almost colliding with him. Right at that exact second.
Wow, Fate sure was on a role today.
The two stood face to face for a moment, blinking in surprise. Then the other lowered his gaze, muttered some apology and stepped to the side. Tala looked at him with a frown. He didn't think he'd ever seen him before. After all, he was sure he would have remembered him if he had. He was reasonably tall – almost the same height as himself – but oddly thin looking, as if he didn't eat much. He wore a black T-shirt, and the bones in his elbows and wrists could be seen easily. But despite that, he looked as though he was strong. He sported a messy shock of blue-grey hair, light at the front, darkening to indigo towards the back. Odd, Tala thought. Not that he could talk, of course. His eyes were currently shadowed by his hair, so he couldn't discern anything about them.
But by far the most striking feature of the newcomer were the twin blue shark fins, tracing up each side of his face.
End of chapter two. Hm, three guesses who this new person is (anyone who gets it wrong is getting a fish-slap).
So how was that? I was originally going to make Kai part of the DemoBoys 'group' but…meh, I changed my mind.
I don't know if Tala seems like the type to be 'spacey' but I always thought he seemed like someone who, once they have a goal in mind, all their efforts become focused towards it and all else is pushed aside. I guess I was just playing around with that personality trait.
Aw, there was no diary entry in this chapter…worry not, there will definitely be one in chapter three (did anyone even notice?)
For their reviews, thanks go out to:
Kimkizna (the first reviewer!), RoseOfSharon28, Saphira's Ember, Darksouled Saiyanphoenix, Rise From Thy Ashes, Ms. Controversy, Moon Comix, Silverspoon and Liliana.
Well, please tell me what you think of chapter 2.
Until my next update…
Fiver