A/n: Thank you readers for the sweet reviews! I'm glad to see that you guys really are enjoying this story so far. It makes me happy! I'm probably going to regret having two back-to-back updates in a week, but screw it. Like I said, your reviews have made me happy. And happy makes me excited. And excited makes me write.

And to reviewer kaillinne arami, the answer is yes. They will be here very soon.

Before anyone complains about someone (Kai) being out-of-character from here on out, allow me to justify myself by saying this: I have no choice but to make Kai talk more than he usually does. He's hosting Tyson at his house for the entirety of this story. There's also another element coming in next chapter that's going to make this clear. And besides…the entire point of this fiction is to discover the REAL Kai.

Disclaimer: Yaoi fanfiction. Don't own Beyblade.

Beta Reader:..None (offers, anyone?)

A Rumor in St. Petersburg
Three — A Mom, a Dad, and a butler too
[Tyson's POV]

"Tyson…" Yes, Beyoncé? "…Tyson…" Beyoncé, is that a strawberry shortcake cheesecake? For me? Girl, you shouldn't have! But really, can I have a slice of that? "…Tyson…" Beyoncé, you're starting to sound awfully masculine all of a sudden. I don't know why, but it's still kind of hot. Feed me my cheesecake now, you sexy MILF you!

"Tyson!"

I fall out of my dream with a pillow to the face, tumbling to the small floor space between my seat and the seat in front of me. Moaning in pain, I groggily glance up to find Kai with the weapon of the crime still in his hands. He sighs and rolls his eyes at me. "Did Beyoncé's cheesecake taste good, idiot?"

"What gives, Kai? Ever heard of gently waking someone up?" I complain, pulling myself up back into my seat. Rubbing sleep out of my eyes, I finally realize that the plane passengers are grabbing their carry-ons and filing out of the aircraft. Confused, I open my window and the strong rays of sunset blast me in the face with no mercy. Before slamming the window shut again, I saw the outline of the airport. "We landed already?"

Kai nods, tossing me my backpack, and retrieving his next. "Almost ten minutes ago. And I've been trying to wake you up for twenty minutes without resorting to violence."

I snort a chuckle to myself. "Well that's a first. Ouch!" I complain when he smacks me with the pillow again. I glare at him. "And for your information, I was about to eat a piece of Beyoncé's cheesecake until I was rudely awakened!"

Kai let out a sigh of irritation: his face said 'I regret bringing him along already'. "Y'know, for a guest you're really trying my patience, Kinomiya."

"Yeah, and you're a really rude host for assaulting me with a pillow."

The phoenix scoffed, "Spare me, idiot, I've slammed pillows in your face to wake you up before. Don't be such a pussy." Nodding a "let's go," Kai starts making his way down the plane aisle to the exit. I yell at him for leaving me behind again, slip my sneakers on, grab my things, and race out as fast as I can. Which—anyone who's traveled knows this—is slowly. People do not know how to walk in and out of planes, honestly! On another frustrated note, Kai is such a douchebag for leaving me behind all the time. He's also a douchebag for being a douchebag to me all the time. It makes me wish I stayed back home with Gramps.

…Who the hell am I kidding? There's no way I'd rather be home. I'd be dead of boredom by now!

I walk out (actually, stomp out) of the plane's walkway angrily, and walk into the mean ol' Russian himself. With an unceremonious huff, I drop all my crap on the floor making as much of a scene as I can. Kai glares at me, I glare back, and then he starts searching the crowd. Monkey see, monkey do, so I reflexively do the same, taking in the new airport I can add to my list of "visited." St. Petersburg's airport is really pretty!

"Who're we looking for?" I ask. For some reason, I expect to see Mr. Dickinson somewhere. Force of habit, I suppose. He's always at airports, train stations, and bus stops to pick us up.

"My dad." Kai answers. My brain slows to a mush.

"Your…dad?"

"Or my mom. They never said which one of them was going to show." The crimson-eyed teen explains. I'm still stuck on 'dad.'

"Your dad?"

Kai turns to me, sees my speechless amazement, and glares. "I'm going to punch you." I'm now grinning from ear-to-ear, sensing some discomfort in my captain's emotional shift. Kai has emotions, who would've guessed? I hop from one foot to the other excitedly and tug on the sleeve of his jacket.

"You never said anything about your parents before! This is so cool, what's he look like? Is he short? Tall? Does he wear glasses? Does he have crazy-colored hair like you? Is he fat?"

"Tyson, you have three seconds: shut up, stop jumping, and let go of my arm." The sudden seriousness in his voice makes me stop dead in my tracks, and I see anxiousness in his eyes. Is Kai actually nervous? "Listen…I kind of didn't tell my parents you were coming with me for the week, so they have no idea you're staying over." He explains to me. "It's been awhile since I've had friends over at home." Pfft, I'm surprised you're saying you've ever had friends over, Kai! Boy, this trip just gets more and more exciting!

I genuinely smile at my team captain. "Don't worry, Kai, I'll be on my best behavior!" I affirm with a sailor's salute. "You have my word as world beyblading champion!"

"…That's what I'm worried about." He shakes his head at me, and then his eyes sudden catch something of interest. "There he is. Come on." I whirl around excitedly on my feet, but spot no one in the crowd that really stands out. I pick up my bags and follow Kai at his heels, weaving through airport traffic, until we stop at the escalators down to the baggage claim.

A tall man, easily six feet in height, with midnight-blue hair and violet-crimson eyes like Kai's, steps forward and catches Kai in a one-arm hug, ruffling his hair with the other hand. He greets the phoenix warmly with a smile and chatters away in Russian. Kai nods and—braces yourselves—GRINS back up to the man, talking back to him just as quickly. The taller man sporting a thick winter jacket over his office clothes seems to be comparing Kai to himself. No doubt the "you've grown" conversation people who haven't seen each other in a while always say. Last time Hiro bothered showing up at home that's what he did with me.

I'm speechless. Kai looks a lot like his old man, and his old man looks GOOD for being an old man! You can tell that Kai gets a lot of his physical traits from his dad.

"Papa, this Tyson." Kai introduces, pulling me out of my wandering thoughts. The man looks at me with pleasant surprise.

"One of your teammates, I remember you." The man says with a smile. His English is coated with a light Russian accent, but it sounds pretty neat and I can understand him well enough. He holds out his hand in greeting and I shake it, smiling myself. "You're the talented one that's finally given Kai a run for his money. I'm Nikolai."

"Pleased to meet you, Mr. Hiwatari. Thank you very much for letting me visit for the week." I thank in advance. I catch Kai's skeptical glance at me, his signature eyebrow raised high in doubt. When Nikolai glances back at his son, I beam a bright, innocent smile at Kai. He can't glare at me, and I feel awesome for putting him on the spot. In hindsight, this is probably a bad idea. He might murder me in my sleep.

"On the contrary, Tyson. This has been quite the surprise. You might very well be the first normal friend Kai brings home for a change." He laughs in a good-humored fashion. I laugh along with him, because in my imagination I picture him talking about the Demolition Boys. I wouldn't be surprised if he actually was. Kai huffs and glares at Nikolai and, in turn, gets his hair messed up again by his dad, who ushers us onto the escalator down to the baggage claim. "I can't wait to see your mother's face when we get home. It's a pity we'll be away for the week; I'm sure she would love doting on your friend, Kai." Kai grumbles in Russian. Victory is mine! Father and son get lost in conversation again, conveniently in Russian, and I'm left out of the loop. I take this opportunity to pull out my phone and send a text message to the team.

New Text Message::
FWD Message: Chief Kenny; Hilary Tachibana; Max Tate; Ray Kon
"Just landed in St. Petersburg airport and guess who came to pick us up? Kai's DAD!"

The drive up to Kai's house has been very scenic. It's been ten minutes shy of an hour, but with the views of nighttime St. Petersburg, the comfort of Nikolai's SUV, and Kai being forced to talk a little more than I've ever seen in the two years I've known him, the time and distance hasn't really bothered me. Kai ineffectively told me that his house is in the middle of nowhere, which Nikolai kindly clarified that it's in a suburb heading up the mountains. He also reprimanded Kai for not being so nice to me. I can tell Kai's patience is wearing thin, especially since I keep pushing said patience to its very short limit.

This week is going to be so much fun.

Nikolai and Kai are back to talking to each other in Russian again, father speaking more than son, and the farther up the road we drive the more I'm beginning to believe what Kai said. We're surrounded by woods, I can see more or less the entire suburb from where we are (and the city in the distance), and I can count twenty Mississippi's between every house we drive by for the past ten minutes. Then, at long last, the words I was dying to hear.

"We're home, boys."

The SUV slows down in front of a huge house: a modern, mountain lodge-style sort of vibe to it. The kind of house you'd rent out for a family ski vacation in the mountains for winter. We pull into the driveway, waiting for the doors of the garage barn to open up, and I take it all in.

Holy hell! Kai lives here? This place is HUGE!

"Don't drool in my dad's car, Tyson, that's disgusting."

"Oh, ha, ha, Kai." I stick out my tongue at him. "I think your sudden sense of sarcastic humor is what's disgus—is that a Porsche?"

The car pulls to a complete stop in the garage and the doors behind us roll down to a close. I get out of the car and stare in awe at the creamy-gold Porsche stored beside a scarlet red Sedan. I circle to the back of the SUV to grab my suitcase only to find that Nikolai already picked it up for me. I follow Mr. Hiwatari and Kai into the house and hear barking. Lots of barking, from more than one animal. They have dogs?

This…place…is…amazing. And it's so damn BIG!

"Your friend is easily impressed, Kai."

"He lives under a rock."

"Hey! I do not!"

"Right, of course. He lives in a pigsty of dirty laundry and comic books. A rock would be an improvement."

"…I hate you, Kai."

We exit the spacious and clean barn-garage into what seems to be a coat room. It's got a wall of cabinets and closets on one side with an open shoe rack and a few skis stacked up in the corner. Nikolai and Kai took off their shoes and coats, putting them away, and I just took off my shoes. The house is heated, but it's still pretty cold to me. Kai pretended to go pick up my shoes while his father was looking, but once the older Hiwatari left through a different door he kicked them into the closet.

"Real nice, Kai, thanks."

"I'm not touching those things, they reek."

Catching him alone for a brief moment, I point to where his dad disappeared to. "Dude, your dad is wicked chill! You should take some pointers from him!" Unimpressed by my comment the crimson-eyed teen steps on my foot. "Oww!"

"Has anyone ever told you that you're starting to talk more and more like your Grandpa? I'd be careful."

I ignore my captain's sourness and walk away the pain, following him into a hallway. "You were right, Kai, you really do live in the middle of nowhere! But your house is really nice, it's so big!" A meow brought my attention to a small table by the main doorway. "Cat!"

Kai gave me a deadpanned, 'I-can't-believe-you're-my-age' look. "His name's Napoleon."

I give him a puzzled glance, watching him pet the Calico cat affectionately. The cat purred contently under his hand. "Napoleon, why?"

"It's an inside joke." A joke? I laugh.

"You can joke? This I got to know."

"He's a male Calico cat. Napoleon was a short guy with a bloodline that didn't last a generation after his death." None of this processes as funny in my head. Kai scoffs and rolls his eyes at me. "You're too stupid to get it, let's go." (1)

"Or maybe it's just a stupid joke." I retaliate. He leads me into the open floor plan of a formal living room and kitchen. Once again, I'm struck speechless. The formal living room on my left has bright red couches surrounding a fur carpet and a copper-decorated fireplace. There's a glass wall that—get this—is a fish tank separating the formal living room from a set of stairs that lead downstairs. The most impressive thing about the entire living room, even more than the fish tank, is the floor to ceiling window-walls that give the perfect view to the mountains and city in the distance. "Ho-ly craaaap…."

"This is the gathering room." Kai explains.

"You guys are loaded…!" I gasp again, plastering my face against the fish tank. Colorful fish swim back and forth and through corals and rocks. "This is so cool!"

"That's my dad's Hawaiian tropical reef habitat. It's his hobby."

"Can your parents adopt me?"

"No." He cuts me off sternly, prying me away from the fish tank to face the other way. "Out that door is the deck, and this is the kitchen and dining room area."

The kitchen and dining room was just as high-end in appearance as the living room. The appliances were all stainless steel, cabinets a brown so dark they looked black, and the counter tops were white granite. The dining room table is long and has twelve seats to it. And get this, they're office chairs! It looks cool, though. The dining room table's decorated with candles and flowers in bright spring colors.

My eyes stop at the kitchen island, where a group of four adults are sitting and chatting around half-eaten or finished plates of dinner and drinking wine. One of them is Nikolai; the other guy looks nearly identical to him. One of the women has shimmering slate-blue hair that's long and pulled into a ponytail; the other has strawberry blonde hair in a pixie-bob haircut. They did that awkward thing I hate: when everyone stops talking at the same time and turns to stare at the new guy.

And then the blue haired woman let out a squeal of joy.

"Kaike!" She shouted, all but running at us, Kai pulls me towards the kitchen before he's glomped by the woman in a bear hug. The woman talks at a million miles an hour in Russian, smiling happily at the teen and kissing both his cheeks. Kai hugs her back and answers calmly and—OH MY GOD! Is that a BLUSH? A SMILE? This is a dream. Avery cynical dream. I demand my subconscious to wake up this instant! If only the team could be here to see this!

The petite woman finally lets go of Kai and turns to me with a gasp paired with her smile. "Sweetheart, who's this?" She asks, now in a language I can understand, and with an accent thicker than Nikolai's. I give her my hand.

"Hi, M'am—er, ahm Miss. My name's Tyson, I'm one of Kai's teammates on the Bladebreakers." I introduce myself. Her smile, if possible, grows even wider. She gives Kai another quick one-armed hug and shakes my hand.

"Kai, you didn't tell me you were going to bring a friend!" She beams. "It's a pleasure to meet you, Tyson. I'm Kai's mother, Yuliyanna. Yuliya is fine, if you'd prefer."

"You're Kai's MOM?" I ask. "But you're…young! And hot!" Kai's subtle blush grows a little more intense from embarrassment. He looks up to the ceiling with that face that said 'please smite me now'.

"Tyson, I'm going to murder you…" Kai growled under his breath through clenched teeth. Yuliya melodically laughed.

"You're too nice, Tyson. Nadiya, did you hear what he said? I'm young and hot!" Taking me by the shoulders as well, she pulls me and Kai over to the island table to the other two guests. They warmly welcome Kai home in Russian (I assume) while Yuliya talks to me. "Tyson, this is my brother and sister-in-law, Andrei and Nadiya." Oh, I see, Kai's uncle and aunt. They each greet me as well and offer Kai and me dinner. I'm about to accept (it smells and looks amazing) but Kai decides to give me a tour of the rest of the house and show me to my room. His relatives agree, and then tell him something in Russian to which he replies with a nod and an "ok."

"Kai, your relatives are…well, they're normal!" I tell him, following him back through the living room and down the stairs behind the aquarium wall. We walk into another living room—well, more like a family room. There's a bar on the first wall you see to the left, and the green and gray couches of the living room encompass a shag carpet and what may very well be the ultimate movie and gaming TV setup ever. "Not that I ever thought that they weren't normal. I just…well, you're kind of anti-social and your Grandfather's kind of a psycho…I guess I didn't know what to expect, but I definitely didn't expect this." His silence makes me feel awkward. "I'm going to shut up now."

Kai walks into a hidden door just after the stairs on our left. He opens it quietly, peers inside, and silently leaves his belongings inside the door before shutting it. He gives me a forced smirk. "Good."

"What's that room?"

"My room."

"Oh. Can I see?"

"No."

I huff at rejection, but follow the phoenix back. Kai's room…I've always wondered what Kai's room might be like. Actually, I've always wondered what all my teammate's rooms might be like. I've seen Kenny's and it looks like something straight out of a robotics and computer engineering convention…except filled with Beyblade parts. I've seen Max's place at his dad's too, but I've always wanted to see what his room in New York at him moms might be like. Hilary's room looks like a chick-flick sorority bedroom that Vocaloids threw up all over. Ray said his room back in White Tiger Hills isn't anything spectacular. He said it's a straw bed with an old mattress on top of it, a short table for writing, and a mat in the middle of the floor for yoga and meditating with lots of throw pillows. Hehehehe, I hope Salima doesn't want any action this week.

"Do I even want to ask why you're giggling?"

"Gee, Kai, you sure do talk a lot when you're back home, don't you?"

"Ignoring that…" The dual-blue haired teen sneered at me. "This is the family room. The bar's off limits." He points, going to the back door and opening the door for an enormous white dog and a litter of look-alike puppies that walked in. I knelt down on the ground to pet them all. They're so cute! "You can pet the dogs later, Tyson, c'mon."

"Are all those dogs yours?" I ask, petting the mother of the litter before hopping off after Kai.

"The litter's not ours for long, just Tyandra, the mom. My mom's giving them away once they hit six months." The phoenix explains. "This barn door here's storage, and the door next to it's the laundry room. Down this hall is where you'll be sleeping, in the ski dorm." Following Kai down the hall, he opens the door to a huge bathroom. Kai only let's me gape for a split second before dragging me to the last door down the hall.

"Kai!"

"Hn?"

"There are eight beds!"

"I know."

"Eight beds!"

"I know."

"Ho-ly SHI—!" Kai smacks in the back of the head before I can finish swearing and drops my stuff on the floor. "Oww! Jerk!"

After a delicious dinner made by Kai's mom, shower, and walking Kai's hoard of dogs, I found myself still awake at eleven at night. So, since I'm not really tired and I'm all alone, I'm going to give a status report to the gang.

I creep out of the ski dorm, checking to make sure that Vladimir—the butler—isn't around, and go into the family room. I don't worry about Kai or his parents, because they're all upstairs having catch-up time. Vladimir, by the way, is also a pretty cool guy, and he seems to have a bond that stretches back years ago with Kai. He's this old guy, easily in his late fifties or early sixties, that dresses as sharply and neatly as a butler can. If you can imagine Batman's butler Alfred, he's kind of like him. He's kind of like James Bond too. Ok, imagine James Bond and Alfred's lovechild, only Russian. That's Vladimir. He's the shit.

Hopping onto the computer, I turn it on and log into Oovoo to see if anyone's there as well as Facebook. To my surprise, everyone's on Facebook, so I send them all a message to log into Oovoo. "Ugh, Tyson, couldn't you have picked a better time to log in? It's four in the morning." Ray complains, shaking his messy bed-head out of his face.

"You're telling me. I was asleep." Hilary moans with a yawn, pulling her blankets over her head like a hood.

"Kenny and I are on lunch break." Max pipes up; he and Kenny wide awake with a sun-filled background behind them.

"You guys complain too much. What are you two doing up so early anyway?" I ask. Napoleon the cat (whose name I still can't fathom why it's funny) leaps down from a shelf next to the computer desk and lazily walks up to me. For some reason, he decides to sit his butt down right in front of the webcam. I meekly push the Maine Coon cat to the side, scared that he might bite or scratch me. Thankfully, he just sat there with a detached look in his big green eyes. It's the same expression Kai wears most of the time…I wonder if that's where he got it from. The cat, of course.

Ray let out a short laugh. "I planted a prank in Lee's room with Kevin an hour ago, I've been trying to fall asleep since, but Facebook's too distracting."

"Haha, nice."

"My phone goes off with a ringtone every time I get a Facebook notification, so you work me up." Hilary tells me.

"So how goes Russia, Tyson? Any news?" Kenny asks.

"Yeah! What's Kai's dad like?" Max asks right after the Chief. Ray and Hilary immediately look more alert.

"Guys," I whisper, lowering the speaker volumes. "Kai's parents are the coolest, nicest parents I think I've ever seen!"

"No way!" They chorus, each in their own way. "What do they look like?"

"They're both pretty young. Kai looks a lot like his dad, except nowhere near as tall yet. And his mom is a freakin' MILF! Seriously, they're like Barbie and Ken!" I look around for a picture of the Hiwatari couple, but the only one nearby is mounted on the wall. "There's a picture of them up on the wall; I'll take a picture of it in the morning and send it to you guys."

"That's so weird. And you said they're nice?" Ray asked, also whispering.

I nod vociferously. "Really nice. If Kai weren't raised by his asshole grandfather he'd probably be…hell, he'd probably be all smiles and energetic like me or Max! There's this family butler Vladimir and he's chill too."

"That's pretty hard to believe." Kenny laughs.

"Honestly! And his house, holy shit, I can't even begin to describe it! It's like, huge and classy and awesome! Get this: the room I'm staying in has four bunk beds and the bathroom to match it has two showers and three toilets. The upstairs living room has a wall that's a fish tank! It's literally the entire wall! It's like they literally bought an exhibit at an aquarium and put it there as a wall!" My teammates all exclaim, impressed with my story, and I check over my shoulder to make sure Kai's not coming back downstairs.

"Tyson, you have to show us the house; I want to see it!" Max and Ray tell me.

I nod, "As soon as I can you guys. And he has pets, too! This stupid cat that won't get away from the keyboard and this big white dog that had a litter of puppies! I think his mom said it was called a Sam…a Sama…Sama-Yeti? Something about the 'smiling Sammy' breed."

"A Samoyed." Hilary clarified and I nodded. "I want to see them!"

"They're all asleep in the laundry room. If I grab one of them they'll all wake up barking, and I'll get caught. I'll send pictures of them too."

"Tyson, did you ever figure out why you're there?" Kenny asks. My mind drifts for a second on the question until the answer comes to me.

"Yeah, I did! His parents mentioned it at dinner while they were playing cards with his aunt and uncle. Which reminds me, I met two more of Kai's relatives today too. They had dinner with his parents just before we got here." Max tries to interject with questions about Kai's other relatives, but I ignore them and continue. I think I heard footsteps heading for the stairs. "He's babysitting."

"BABYSITTING?!"

The footsteps I heard from earlier start coming down the stairs. "Guys, I gotta go, someone's coming and I'm supposedly asleep already. Talk to you guys later. Goodnight!" Scrambling to shut the computer off quickly, I run back to my room, slam the door behind me, dive into my bed, and duck under the covers. Nobody comes in to check on me, and eventually I drift to sleep.

1.) If you understand Napoleon the Calico cat's joke already, I applaud you! If not, sit tight. This inside joke I intend to extend for a couple of more chapters in this story. I want to leave Tyson very confused haha!

A/n: I'm sorry if the house explanation seemed excessive. I literally took a house the channel HGTV gave away as a prize in 2011 because I loved the layout of it so much. I kind of wanted it for myself, but that's a story you don't care about. I also didn't want to do the cliché give-Kai-a-mansion schpeel, so there you have it. I wanted to do the house justice, hence all the explaining. If you want to see what it looks like, shoot me your email in a private message and I'll send you the pictures. It really is a beautiful house. All I added was the fish tank. I love fishies.

Next chapter…the child.