Re-Birth

Chapter 3

Rain and Loneliness

Aichi couldn't sleep at all that day.

Lying on his bed, he could see the thick clouds starting to form, weakening the glow of the full moon which reminded him of the night when he had fought Kai.

Aichi wanted to look through his deck to calm him down, but it would also remind him of Kai, and whenever he thought of Kai, he would be reminded of the little child.

Why did he have to run away like that?

Aichi honestly didn't mean to frighten him; he just followed his instincts at that time to run away as far as he could. Maybe he still hasn't gotten rid of his fear of Kai because of the events of their final battle.

Kai had clearly betrayed him and wanted to kill him.

Aichi had repeatedly tried to convince himself that this was the only reason, but his mind couldn't help but wander to the other reason, which he wanted to bury deep inside and never think of.

He was scared of the new Kai and that was why he had run away.

He didn't know how to act around this Kai who seemed so pure and naive.

Aichi rolled to the other side of the bed and threw the blankets over his head. He didn't want to think about this anymore.

The little child shivered as a strong wind hit his back. He brought both hands closer to warm them up.

Kai stood in the same place where Aichi had left him hours ago at the rooftop, not moving. He had waited so long for Aichi to come back, but his daddy was no where in sight.

His cheeks reddened with the hot tears rolling down over his tightly pursed lips, replacing the previous dried tears in the cold.

He was alone and scared. He wanted to be comforted in his father's arms but his father didn't want him anymore.

The small child sniffed and wiped his tears with his tiny, freezing hands. "Daddy..."

A drop.

The child's eyes closed as his skin came into contact with a cold liquid. Hesitantly, he opened his teary eyes wide to see water drop from the sky. Kai watched in awe and bewilderment as the rain touched his skin, digging into it and causing it to burn of coldness.

He flinched slightly, but the glint of curiousness in his eyes still remained. Since he had no memories, it was his first time witnessing rain.

His hands reached out for the rain to touch his palms, feeling the heat of his hand drain away as rain rolled across his palms and dropped down from the end of his clumsily extended fingers.

"W-Wow..." the child breathed out, fascinated. To him, the rain looked something warm and sweet, almost like pieces of candy dropping from the sky.

At first, drops had landed softly, but as time passed, the rain escalated into something more violent. The rain pounded down, each drop a small stone, piercing cold and and drenching him completely within seconds. Kai backed away, sensing danger from the way the rain was hitting his small body and he wanted to run, but there was nowhere to hide. Wherever the sky stretched out, rain accompanied it.

The child's small body was trembling and he was alone. Exhausted, he sat down on the wet ground, dragging his feet closer to him.

Kai curled up into the position of a small ball, burying his face to shield himself from the cold. The little boy's determination and hope was unfaltering; he would wait for his father no matter how long it took because he didn't have anywhere else to go.

At the thought of his father's warm smile, tears ran down his cheeks, mixing with the rain and dripped down, leaving a small stain on his clothes. His shaky voice was left unheard under the howling of the wind.

"Daddy..."

With an umbrella in hand, Aichi walked under the rain, the wind tugging at his coat and hair. He couldn't sleep because worry and guilt swept through him; he wanted to make sure Kai was safe.

I'm sorry, Kai-kun.

I'm not your father.

Aichi bit his lower lip. He regretted the things he had told the child but he still was afraid of losing his friend. What if the Kai he knew would disappear forever after he had tried so hard to bring him back?

Before he realised, Aichi found himself standing in front of Kai's apartment.

How would a little child be able to enter an apartment alone? Kai didn't seem to even have memories of his past, so how would he be able to find his own home?

At these thoughts piercing his heart with guilt, Aichi's grip loosened around the umbrella he was holding. He let it drop to the ground, and it was carried away by the strong wind. His face was left exposed to the heavy rain, feeling the tears that were forming in his eyes start to mix with the rain as they left his cheeks.

Am I really this stupid?

Many thoughts started to build up in his mind, causing him to think of many different possibilities of what might have happened, thoughts which he quickly tried to avert. A conversation which he had with his mother not long ago occupied his mind. The words echoed clearly in his head, taunting him by reminding him of his mistakes and draining the little strength he had left.

"Mom."

"Hm? What's wrong, Aichi?"

"How would someone... a child feel when their parents abandon them?"

Shizuka put down the dishes and walked over to her son. She didn't question the reason for the sudden change in topic. Instead, she faced her son and looked directly at him in the eyes."How would you feel, Aichi?"

"M-Me?"

"Yes."

Aichi turned away from the apartment and ran in the empty streets, the rain soaking him completely in a few minutes.

He was too focused on finding Kai to be able to blink the rain away from his eyes. In his vision, the street lights were distant and blurred and the muffled roar of vehicles could be faintly heard in the distance. His head felt like it was spinning, and his body moved of its own accord.

He stopped in front of a couple who were about to get inside their car, catching his breath, before asking if they had seen a child. The couple shook their heads, a little surprised by Aichi's outburst. Before they had time to say anything else, Aichi had disappeared and turned around another corner in the street.

He had spend his life chasing after Kai.

Kai had been strong; a role model to him. Aichi had wanted to become like him, so he trained to become a stronger opponent to him, gaining courage and friends along the way. However, their paths never seemed to intersect.

Just when Aichi had stopped chasing after him, he found himself in the same place as where he had started.

He stopped to catch his breath, falling on his knees hopelessly in the middle of the rain. People watched as they passed by, but Aichi didn't care.

He had searched the whole area but there were no traces of the little child.

Even though he was still breathing, he felt a constriction in his chest, like his lungs were contracting and all oxygen was squashed out of them.

"I would probably feel betrayed, hated and cold..." Aichi answered his mother's question. His eyes softened as he was mentioning each word.

Tears welled up in his eyes and he hit the ground in frustration with his bare fists. It was his responsibility if something was to happen to Kai, and most importantly, he would never be able to forgive himself again for hurting such a vulnerable child.

Shizuka smiled sadly at her son's answer. "Yes, that's probably what a child would feel like."

"I feel horrible..." Aichi whispered, realisation showing on his face, which was soon replaced with regret and pain.

What happened to the child? Was he lost? Was he alright?

He had to find Kai.

His expression changing into a determined gaze, Aichi raised his head slowly, wiping his tears away.

There was one more place which he didn't check.

The rooftop.

The stairs seemed to extend a thousand more meters the more he climbed up. His muscles pleaded to rest, but he couldn't stop.

He realised that he had done something terrible and wanted to fix it.

He wanted to make sure he didn't hurt the person he used to care about the most.

He reached the rooftop, almost stumbling, his eyes scanning the area in panic, immediately searching to find Kai.

There, at the corner of the roof, he spotted a mix of brown and white. The child was barefooted with an overly large white shirt completely drenched in rain. Beside him lay a jacket, a pair of black trousers and a pair of boots that would never be worn again.

Aichi found it harder to speak with the guilt piercing his chest. He was trembling in the cold and could only hope that Kai's little body wasn't frozen in this weather.

"It's bad for you to stand in this weather..." That was all he was able to say from the many things he wanted to apologise for.

The curled up child in front of him neither moved or made a sound.

Panic seeped through his blood, freezing him momentarily. Quickly breaking through his daze, Aichi ran up to him. "Kai-kun?"

As Aichi approached him, he could see how the child's chest was rising and falling in a rhythmic and subtle movement and the end of his hair was dripping with rain, slowly landing on his cheek and rolling down, replacing the last tears that was shed before he fell asleep. His face displayed child-like innocence and naivety, contrasting the darkness of the sky.

Relief flooded his veins when he realised that Kai was only sleeping, causing the frozen blood to move around his body once more.

Aichi brushed away the brown bangs on the child's head and wrapped his own coat around him to warm him up. He noticed Kai's deck on the ground next to him and picked it up, shoving it in his pocket.

"Were you..." Aichi paused, finding himself unable to continue. He knew that Kai was sleeping, and couldn't hear him. Nonetheless, he forced himself to speak, before he lost the courage to do so. "Were you waiting for me to come?"

The child's emerald eyes opened, confusion and fear filling them as he observed his surroundings. He closed them quickly to keep the rain from burning his eyes.

"I'm sorry... it's my fault for being such a coward. I just couldn't stand the thought of losing a close friend to me, and I believed that he would return, because Kai that's why I left you alone... but you are not him. I'm sorry." He hugged the child's shivering body closer to him, tears burning his skin.

The child listened to the muffled voice of his father speaking and he immediately felt safe, even though he didn't understand what he was saying. He had been terrified of the darkness and of being alone in the rain. He leaned closer to his father as Aichi picked him up and hugged him, stuttering apologies non-stop. Kai was really happy knowing that his father didn't abandon him or hate him, but it hurt to see Aichi crying.

Both stood in the middle of the rain, feeling how it poured down over their heads. The rain would weep and it would eventually heal.

For a moment, they had been the rain.

Aichi lent Kai his old blue shirt and a pair of trousers which his mother used to keep since he was little. He left Kai alone in his room once he decided to take a shower.

Curious, the little child looked around the room, hoping to find something that would interest him.

Noticing Aichi's desk, he struggled before he climbed up on the chair, and his eyes caught the most colorful object closest to him. It was Kai's deck.

Kai picked up a card and turned it around carefully, feeling like he was used to doing this. Even though he was now warm again, he felt very cold inside. It was a feeling new to him- a feeling worse than what he had felt when he thought his father had abandoned him, although he didn't understand it.

He put the card back on top of the rest of the deck slowly, and climbed back down from the chair, moving away as far as possible from the weird object in front of him.

Suddenly, lightning flashed in brief sparkling bursts, illuminating the surrounding clouds with an ominous glow, gaining the toddler's attention.

Aichi was watching the child shrink behind the desk as he entered the room and chuckled. "You're scared of thunder, Kai-kun?"

He was surprised at first; was Kai scared of thunder? However, he started to gradually accept the fact that this Kai was different from the other Kai and, who knows, maybe the Kai he knew was also scared of thunder?

The child peeked from between the hands covering his face in an attempt to hide from the horrifying sound.

"Daddy!" The child exclaimed, running to hide behind his legs. "T-Tunder!"

Aichi had found it quite odd how Kai wasn't scared of the lightning, but just the sound.

"Oh, you mean 'thunder', right?" Aichi corrected and the child nodded, lowering his head. "I don't like it either... " Aichi said, trying to convince Kai to somehow get rid of his fears of the thunder, but it didn't seem to work. Aichi patted his head and smiled at him in an attempt to ease the child's fear. "But it's not very scary, I promise."

Kai nodded quietly and the grip on Aichi's sleeve loosened slightly.

Aichi sighed in relief, believing that they would be able to sleep now. He was so tired and wondered if he had woken up his mother or sister.

Probably...

A light from the window gained both of their attention, followed by the roaring sound of thunder filling the silence. The toddler immediately yelped, and hid underneath the bed.

Aichi bent down to the ground to face Kai's widened eyes. "Come here, Kai-kun, don't be scared."

Kai shook his head and closed his ears with his tiny hands, the bed directly above his head. He didn't want to come out and hear the scary sound of thunder all over the place.

This, Aichi realised, was going to be the longest night so far unless he could somehow make Kai get rid of his unexpected fear of thunder,

Or somehow make the thunder stop.

Italics like this is used when thinking or flashbacks.

Thanks for answering my question and for the reviews, guys! I enjoyed reading them and seeing what reactions you had to the last chapter. I agree with all of you who said that Aichi was kinda cruel, but think about it, how would you react if something like this happened? Anyway, I hope this one was less depressing (or was it more depressing? O_O)

And did you notice that whenever a paragraph/scene is about child Kai, I always use more simple language? I like doing that!

So, what do you think of this chapter? I made it too long, didn't I? Well, it's 'cause I love you all! ;P

Disclaimer: It's cruel how many times I have to be reminded of reality... but I don't own CFV!