Disclaimer: I don't own Beyblade in any way. The only character I own is Marina as she's my OC. I have permission to use Tari from my friend, Smiffyizdabest. Any other references I make are purely coincidental.

Chapter 7: Prediction or Nightmare?

It was yet another night going past for the teams without Marina, and now Tari's worrying was starting to affect her.

She was shaking in her sleep as thoughts ran through her mind, each worse than the one before.

There was a building and inside the building were a girl and a…creature. It looked like a horse, but…maybe not. The creature seemed under the girl's control…until…

The girl screamed and the creature controlled all its power into an attack which shook the walls.

The scene switched and the girl was on the floor staring up at a man with a whip in his hands. The girl was tear stricken and the man was saying something to her. She kept crying and the man raised the whip once more. He brought it down on the girl's back and…

Tari woke up gasping and panicking. Had it been a dream? She has had too many bad nightmares to not be certain if it was or not. She sat there on her bed, looking around the room. As her gaze arrived at the window, she saw it must still be very early morning. The sun was just barely coming out, making the Russian snow seem to shine.

"That wasn't me in that dream…maybe it was…" she thought to herself, but was interrupted by the door being opened, opened in quite a lot of force as well.

"Kai?"

"What happened, Tari? I knew something was wrong when Dranzer started glowing." he said as he entered the room properly.

Tari looked at her blade…indeed, Spiked Tiger had been glowing…the bit in the centre was making the whole blade seem to have a warm touch to it.

"I'm fine, Kai. Don't worry about me. We need to find Marina." answered Tari.

"Tari, I know you better than that." he said walking over to her and sitting on the bed.

Tari didn't look round at Kai…she knew her eyes were too easy to read and Kai would know for certain something was wrong.

"Tari…" he started slowly. "Did you have another nightmare?"

"It wasn't really…a nightmare." she answered.

"So, what was it?" he asked.

"Kai…" she started, but they heard a knock on the door.

"Who is it?" asked Kai in an angry tone.

The door opened. It was Hiro.

"I thought we better get some training in…not you, Tari." said Hiro.

Kai growled a little, but Hiro didn't notice.

"Tell me later, Tari." he said, and left the room past Hiro.

After Kai was out of ear/sight shot, Hiro turned to Tari.

"Are you okay, Tari?" he asked.

"What? Yeah…sorry. I'm fine." she said.

Hiro nodded and closed the door.

"What am I saying? I'm not okay." she said to herself and started to silently cry.

In the warehouse, Marina was still constantly training with Black Zeroth.

"No matter what happens…I'll be the strongest blader around. With this blade…I am invincible." she said to herself.

She released the blade again and it went crashing through six blocks of concrete.

"Not a scratch…as expected." said Marina catching the blade.

The training sessions had started back in the base. They were training two groups at a time; at the moment were Max vs. Tyson and Kai vs. Ray.

"Come on Tyson…I shouldn't be getting you and Dragoon this easily." laughed Max as his blade avoided Tyson again.

"That won't last much longer." said Tyson. "Galaxy Storm."

The attack that resembled a hurricane surrounded Max's blade.

"Tyson…Tyson…Tyson." said Hiro to himself, knowing what would happen now.

"Draciel, Gravity Control." said Max, and his blade started spinning around Tyson's and trapped it in a sort of water tower.

"Fight it, Dragoon." but to no avail. Tyson's blade went flying out the dish.

"Tyson, you have slacked off so much more than I thought. Listen to me. When it comes to a defensive blader like Max, you have to time when to attack. You can't just go charging in." said Hiro.

Tyson just frowned, even though he knew his brother was right.

In the other match, Kai clearly wasn't focusing, but he was doing better than Tyson.

"Something is on your mind, Kai. I've never had a match with you that wasn't challenging." said Ray as his blade avoided Kai's and attacked it on the side.

Kai was thinking about Tari, but how could he talk to her with a whole day of training going on?

Tari was in the base sitting in one of the rooms. Also in the room were Bryan and Tala.

"She looks very distracted." whispered Tala to Bryan.

"Say something then. Do I have to do everything?" said Bryan and he looked over at Tari.

She was fiddling with the star necklace she has and didn't even seem to notice Tala and Bryan looking at her.

"Hey, Stripes, you okay?" asked Bryan, and Tala nudged Bryan.

Tari didn't answer, which annoyed Bryan, but he didn't say anything.

Later, when Tala and Bryan had left the room, Tari was on her own when Brooklyn entered.

"My luck." said Brooklyn to himself, mostly because, for starters, of all the rooms to choose, he had entered the one Tari was in. Secondly, he didn't want to imagine the lecture and/or punishment Kai would give him if he knew that his rival had been alone with his sister.

He intended to leave the room, but noticed that Tari was so distracted; she hadn't seemed to have registered him opening the door.

"Tari, are you okay?" he asked coming over to her.

"Brooklyn? What are you doing here?" she asked suddenly.

"You're distracted. What's happened?" he asked.

"I can't tell you, Brooklyn." she said.

"Any reason why not?" he asked.

"It's not your business and I wouldn't tell you even if I thought I could." she said.

Brooklyn knew when to give up and left the room, partly hoping Tari wouldn't tell Kai that he had been near her.

It wasn't much later the training finally ended and Kai found Tari. He was worried how distracted she still looked.

"Tari, I want to know what is going on." he said in a bit of a demanding tone.

"Kai, I don't need your help. Please…leave me alone." she said and stood up from the chair.

She was about to leave the room when Kai stopped her.

"That won't cut it, Tari. I want to know." he said.

"You are so stubborn." said Tari and she gave him the well known 'Hiwatari glare'.

Kai smirked for a second. It amused him how alike the two of them were, but then he returned to his usual look.

"Tari, just tell me what happened." he said.

"No." she said in a strong voice.

Kai was getting annoyed now. He wanted to know what was going on and being the protective brother he was, he was going to find out, no matter what.

"Tari, come here." he said and grabbed her wrist.

"What are you doing?" she asked, also very annoyed now.

He stood her against the wall.

"Tell me what is going on." he said, clearly not taking no for an answer.

"Okay…I had a nightmare that Boris attacked Marina like 'Grandfather' used to attack me." she said.

"I see. Well, don't worry about it because we will find Marina and nothing will happen to her." he said.

Tari started to cry again and Kai hugged her.

"I'm sorry if I hurt you…I was just worried about you." he said.

"I know." she said.

"So, how about we get a smile back on your face." said Kai, and Tari smiled.

Notes

Sorry if anyone thinks I had Kai be too harsh on Tari, but I was trying to have Kai's harder and softer side being used at the same time.