TalaTati19- I guess everyone's finding it hilarious that Tyson's a cop. To be honest, I didn't know what kind of job to give him; I still don't know if I did the right thing! Everyone duck, Tyson's allowed to have a gun!

Important Notice:.. So for this chapter, I did a little research for the setting and I am editing only a small piece of information. Because of what I have in mind (mainly for this chapter), I have changed the aquarium Max works at to the Tokyo Sea Life Park. The Shinagawa Aquarium is still an impressive site, and I was amazed by it when I did the research, but further investigation led me to the massive and impressive Tokyo Sea Life Park. That's the only little change I have :]

-When feeding the sharks, be sure to submerge yourself entirely with the chum you are to feed them. Don't be afraid, they're extremely docile…except around food. Happy feeding!

Shout out to Brooklyn Peayl: thanks to all the 'educational' talks on your passion for sharks, I was able to embellish a little more on this chapter. Thank you!!!

Summary:.. [Rei's POV] It's been nearly five years since the last time we saw each other. The gang has made no effort to keep contact and I am also to blame. Now, out of mere chance, fate is binding us again. "How did we get here? I used to know you so well…" K/R, T/M

Note:.. The theme song of this story is the song 'Decode' by Paramore, found on the Twilight Soundtrack. It's the centerpiece of this puzzle. Also, the title of each chapter is two song names put together, both which summarize and are of great significance to the chapter. (Both song names are given at the end of the chapter.)

Genres:.. This story falls under the following categories- Drama/Romance

Disclaimer:.. TalaTati19 does not own Beyblade or any other commercial/marketing references that may appear throughout the story. WARNING: Yaoi fanfiction. Don't like it? Don't read it, don't complain, and don't be an ass about it. Just let it go and move on.

Scene Break:.. x-x-x-x


Decode (Aquarium Show)

--June 16th

Tonight I've discovered a few things. For one, Kenny and Emily are very much in love and their relationship is very…active. They got married only six months after I did and they already have three kids. Three kids! That's crazy! I've also discovered, well, been more clearly informed of via Kenny, of Tyson's immense hatred for homosexuals. He's such an idiot.

And speaking of Tyson and his idiot relationship issues (that he's still not aware of), I caught Hilary's cell phone with a very suspicious text. I handed it to her and pretended not to notice and I haven't told anyone yet, not even Max. Buddha knows what he'll do if I told him. I'm keeping this to myself for now.

Kai didn't seem like he was very into our party streak tonight. Then again he's never been one to party all that much. Tala, however, was crazy. I can see myself being best friends with a guy like him.

-Rei

x-x-x-x

"Alright, kids, class is over. Until next week be sure to practice!" I call out to them as the group of 8-12 year olds rush out of the martial arts gym, the next class already sitting on the sidelines waiting for their instructor. I pick up the few things that were left behind on the ground carelessly and put them away, heading out back to hit the showers when the back of my shirt was lightly tugged on. I turn around and one of my students is standing there with a small shy smile on her face, hiding an item behind her back.

"Hey Kimiko, what's up?" I ask sweetly and she reveals her pen and notebook, giving them to me. I let out a short laugh. "Again? I've already signed more than a dozen papers for you."

"I knoooooow." She bashfully replies, rocking a little from side to side. "But now that my friends actually believe that you're my martial arts instructor they want autographs too, Rei-san. Please, just a few more, Rei-san, pretty please?" She pleas, and I'm a sucker for little kids and their charm, so I take the notebook and sign my name a few more times.

"Tell your friends that I'm going to start charging for future signatures from now on." I joke, chuckling, and giving her back both notebook and pen. She bows respectfully, thanking me once again, and dashes off.

I make my shower a quick one, for I have to drive up to the Tokyo Sea Life Park to pick him up after work. He was generous enough to let me hang onto the car today, so I'll return the kind favor and drive him back home. As I washed down and lathered, my mind kept wandering back to the new secret I now hide.

Last night, on Hilary's cell phone, I had the misfortune of reading a text message that was not meant for me. And that's also raised a suspicion in my mind:

'Hey babe, what're you doing tonight?'

Granted, there was no name with it, so the gender of the person who sent it I don't know, but I'm almost positive it's a guy. And if so…would that mean that Hilary's cheating on Tyson? I wouldn't put it past her; Hilary isn't an innocent person, as everyone's well informed of, but would she really go so low?

Despite this terrible setback -to me, anyway-, yesterday night did have its positive points. An alcohol-induced happy Tala is a sight worth seeing.

Tala has loosened up an incredible (and when I say incredible, I mean incredible) amount from his beyblading days and is now a fun-loving, joking, great guy to hang around with. At least when he's under the influence that's how he is. After we exchanged cell phone numbers last night he texts me numerous times even though we were practically stuck with each other then entire time. It was certainly a fun and easy-going night.

I silently leave the gym so I don't disturb other lessons and walk down the nearly-silent halls of the BBA building. Which, by the way, is where I work. Mr. Dickenson was more than glad to give me a job here, and who was I to decline? As I'm checking out at the front doors the former world champion himself strolls in. Dressed in a full-fledged police-officer's attire and slowly being flocked by fans, the navy-blue haired man casually walks up to me as the kids are being held back. Typical Tyson to not even realize what's going on around him.

"So this is where the tiger works? I drop by here at least twice a week, how come I've never seen you?" He asks/greets me. I shrug.

"Maybe because I'm either teaching or not here?"

"And I still manage to miss you for a month? I must be more of a dunderhead that I realize." He laughs at himself and I stifle an even louder and meaner laugh. He elbows me hard as we both start walking out. "Hey, don't be a jerk. Is Max around?"

I shake my head. "No, I'm just on my way to go pick him up at work. Why?"

"I just wanted to talk to him, is all. I've missed having Max around." I feel a grin beginning to tug at my lips but I suppress it, listening further to what he has to say. "Don't take this personally Rei, because I don't mean any of it, but I'm actually jealous that you and Max are bunking together."

I pretend to be offended and he continues. "No, see, because I've seen the bond you and Max have developed and back in the day I used to be you. Max is an awesome best friend, one that I've missed having around, I'll be honest. So when I see that you guys have little inside jokes and secrets and all that cool stuff…well, I just wish I were you again."

Aww, if only Max could hear him now.

"Max is awesome, anyone that should date him is really lucky." I complement the blonde and Tyson nods in agreement.

"The girl he date's will have to share him with me, otherwise I'll be one jealous friend." Friend. This is what irritates me about Tyson, and Max had warned me. The reason Max has been keeping his sexuality a secret, especially around Tyson, is because Tyson hates homosexuals. Fate's irony is a cruel one.

I chuckle a little and nod, starting to get into the car and ready to wave my goodbye to him for now. "Hey, Rei, you think I can ride up to the Aquarium with you? I want to say hi to Max and he might give me a VIP behind the scenes tour. I haven't been there in ages." He grins hopefully. I can't turn down his request, especially when I know that Max will like to see him without a modeling brunette hanging off his arm (one that may possibly be cheating on him behind his back.).

I unlock the car doors, starting the engine. "Hop in, Ty."

x-x-x-x

I've been in this aquarium maybe five times before in the past month, and still every time I enter I'm awe-struck by the underwater majesty of it all. Of the five times I've visited, I've only been on a personal Max tour once, so the magic is still fresh and new to me.

As we walked through the exhibits Tyson and I caught up with more progress than the last two meetings we've had, which consisted of playing a game and partying. I have to admit, however, that I was a little glad I was able to avoid conversation. Now, here in the aquarium, we've been able to talk without interruptions.

I see now what Max told me about a different, better Tyson beneath the first image everyone gets of him. Under the cocky, oblivious, and headstrong obvious Tyson is a Tyson you can discuss conversation with, even hold a mature debate, and perhaps even share secrets with.

"…I haven't been here since I was ten." Tyson says, still somewhat awestruck as we both take a gander at the Indian Ocean tank. The exhibit is filled with bright and colorful tropical fish of different shapes and sizes. "This place is incredible."

Near the glass of the tank that separates the land from the sea I foolishly try to touch an incredible and endangered species of sea horse, know as the Leafy Sea Dragon. "Yeah it is. I could spend the rest of my life staring at these tanks."

"Max is so lucky, he has the coolest job ever…" He complements with some envy. "Say, what exhibit does Max work here? Show me!" He whines much like the old Tyson I'm much more familiar with and I nod in the direction I start heading towards.

"He says he's such a vital aid here that he's always helping out in all areas, but he's assigned to feeding the tropical exhibits, the sharks, and frequent assistance with the penguins. That why I came here first. He's usually swimming around in there." I point into the Caribbean sea tank with filled with another array of colorful fish. The cop's jaw drops and he gazes back at me, dumbfounded.

"For real?!" I nod. He looks back, double checking that the current diver in there isn't Max, and is amazed with what I just told him. "I really wish I had Max's job."

I scoff and chuckle a little. "Come on, champ. You want to see Max, don't you?" As soon as I mention Max again he's hooked on (no pun intended). How can Tyson be so blind that he can't even see how much he really adores everyone's favorite American ex-beyblader?

We walk around to near entrance again and see the artic pool, or rather, the penguin pool. The visitors were all crowded around the railing flashing cameras and shouting in excitement. My guess? It's feeding time.

"Rei, Rei, come on, I want to see what's happening!" Tyson jumps up and down like a child, snatching my wrist and dragging me along to a small open spot on the railing.

Down in the enclosure the multitude of penguins are all swimming and socializing about, most catching sight of the two adults in blue and deep gray diving suits and waddling cutely towards them. The woman with warm red-rose hair took the tackled the baby penguins while the taller man with blonde hair and brimming blue eyes took care of the rest. He hooked the four hefty buckets of fish a safe height up off the ground and took the fifth with him. Tossing them out to the penguins.

"Rei, it's Max!" Tyson smiles one of the brightest smiles in his arsenal. He waves his arms like a madman and I cover my face in embarrassment. "Hey Maxie!"

"Tyson…" I groan, feeling the eyes of the public on us. "You are so embarrassing."

The American looks up at the crowd of people around the railings and sees us, smiling and waving back shortly. He continues his task with a smile on his face, occasionally making a few of the trained penguins to tricks to earn their fish and making a few lots at a time dive for their meal. In no time he was already through 3/5 of the fish buckets.

"Come on, I want to go see some other exhibits before we have to go." I drag the Japanese man away from the railing and down another hall. "We'll meet up with Max later. Now he already knows we're here."

"You think he can pull a few strings and let us feed the animals? I'd be totally stoked if he could do that!" He raves, his attention easily caught like a person with ADD by the dark rooms where cotton balls appearing to be floating in the tank. "Jellyfish!" I'm finally starting to remember how it was like to visit museums and other public attractions with Tyson back in the day: it's like walking into an amusement park with an eight year old.

"Wait up, Tyson!" I call after him, jogging to keep up with his pace. Now I understand why all the lights are out in this room. It's the only way you can see the variety of jellyfish they have on display. The room is nearly empty, with only a group of four teens near the exit, so it's a perfect hiding place for anyone that's hiding. I bet Mariah would never come looking for me here.

"Does it sound insensitive when I say that I feel like eating sushi once we're out of here?" My old-time pal asks out of the blue. I snort a quick chuckle.

"Coming from you Tyson, not that much." We're quite for another minute or so, staring at the tiny red jellyfish that are no bigger than my fingernail. "It must be terrible having to life your life confined to such a small living space with so many others." I comment, to get conversation running.

"Hey Rei?"

"Yeah Tyson?" I look at him, finding an odd mask on his face that I've never seen before. One that's dead serious.

"How is life after the 'I do'?" He inquires, causing me to nearly choke on my breath. How to answer such a question, I wonder…?

I bite the inside of my cheek, focusing my eyes on the mini red marshmallows floating in the dark water. "Well, it's been…normal. There's nothing special about it; that so-called magic is like the 15 minutes of fame. It disappears in a heartbeat."

The policeman nods, also very interested in the jellyfish as he paces over to the next tank, where the stingers are the size of your hand and have an old yellow hue. "Hm…I guess I'm just somewhat curious. You and Mariah have always seemed happy with each other, and after last night's display it's obvious that Kenny and Emily are happy. I just want to be happy with Hilary."

I raise an eyebrow as I gaze at him from the corner of my eye, making sure he doesn't see this. I skip past him to the next tank, where there are only three jellyfish and they're baby blue. "Are you telling me that you're not happy with her?"

"No, that's not it! What I mean to say is…well, I suppose that your relationship with Mariah has always been my 'role model'."

Now I really feel like shit. All these years I've been living a lie and thinking that it's only hurting me. Now Tyson's telling me that he's modeling his own relationship after my fraud, which has been hurting Max. Why me?

"The two of you work out so well, and you were the only ones out of the team that really aided me when I ran out of thoughts. Kenny was never really concerned with love while we were still beyblading, Max's relationship with Mariam was long distance, so that didn't help, and nobody ever knew what the hell was going on in Kai's life, so I resorted to you two." As far as Kai's concern, nobody still has a clue what's up with his love life, which has been my biggest life problem. "But we've broken up and gotten back together so many times…and it hasn't really lived up to what I had hoped for. There's no…no…" He searches for a word to portray his emotions.

"Spark?" I offer and he nods. "Have you ever though, then, that maybe you and Hilary aren't meant to be?"

"But I love her." He says so softly that I never imagined he could get so sensitive.

"You said so yourself that your relationship is modeled after my own. Maybe that's the problem. Have you ever dated anyone other than Hilary?" I ask him, and he shakes his head in response as we both start to leave the jellyfish exhibit onto something different. "Then you probably still haven't found the one you're meant to be with; the special someone that lets you live that spark. That girl still may be out there…or guy."

His head immediately jerks up, a questioning frown set on his features, and I shrug defensively, raising both my hands in surrender. "Just throwing it out there. For all you know, you don't know." Remarkably, Tyson loosens up, and I'm glad that I've gotten through to him (I hope I have, at least I'll be fixing one mistake I never knew I committed).

Just before we step out into the light again, Tyson stops inside, laughing. "You know what's embarrassing?" I shake my head, a grin starting to break on my lips: I know something stupid's coming. "That Kenny and Emily…" He checks to make sure no one's around and air humps once, both his hands performing a downward gesture from his stomach (including hushed sound effects). "Three times!" He nearly exclaims.

I cover my mouth not to burst out laughing and shove him deeper into the dark, my torso quivering with stifled laughter. "Tyson, you idiot, don't do that here!" I laugh harder when he disobeys my request, air humping and 'dropping the baby' faster while making dorky sounds he imagines both the science geeks would make. I walk away quickly, trying to ditch the navy-blue haired man and the vulgar things he shouldn't be doing while in uniform, still laughing.

"You know it's the truth!"

"Shut up, Tyson!" I look up to the ceiling, controlling myself, and then gazing at the cop beside me disbelievingly. "You're unbelievable."

"You haven't seen anything yet; sometimes I use my gun and launch Dragoon from it. Now that's unbelievable…and completely awesome to boot." He smiles, proudly boasting the skills he shouldn't have.

I attempt reaching for the revolver on his utility belt. "Maybe I should hold onto that instead." I grin, a bit maliciously, my finger's grazing the leather strap that's safely holding it in place. We get into a small, playful tug-of-war fight in the middle of the hall on our way up to the second level of the aquarium, pushing and shoving around the people. The only reason (that I can think of) that we haven't gotten yelled at is because I'm with an officer. The passersby probably think I'm some sort of souvenir thief.

We both end up on the ground , arms locked, in a tie of a wrestling match. A tour guide with a class of elementary school kids strolls by, all in haste, exclaiming in excitement of the sharks being fed by the divers. Tyson perks up when he hears this, giving me a friendly smile. "Call it even?"

I laugh again and nod, already ahead of him. "Sure; let's go see the sharks." The Japanese man is immediately up on his feet and helps me up as well, yanking me along with him by my arm (which he fails to realize is attached to me) to the enormous shark tanks. "Slow down, will you?!"

Surely enough, there were three divers in one of the tanks, armed with electric tasers, long iron rods, and the chum-bathed meal attached to the end of that rod. Of the two men that was in there Max was one of them. The woman was cautiously dumping out the feed a safe distance away from them from sealed buckets, attaching a few pieces to the slingshot mechanism of the rod that brought it back down to the very end. The second man had what appears to be the more lethal taser of the three, keeping close to the other two divers. Lastly, Max was the crazy adventure guy and was feeding these ocean beasts.

"That looks so cool but I'd honestly be scared if I were in there." That makes two of us, Tyson. I hate the fact that Max is pretty much defenseless around all these predators, on a playing field that is to their advantage. The agony and building tension of every passing second makes me nervous to no end; my heart is clenched so tight it's physically hurting.

After an eternity (it feels) of watching this torturous feat something goes awry with one of the sharks. From the informative plates on the ledge beneath my sweaty palms and from what Max taught me on my last visit, it's a Bull Shark. It's one of three sharks that scientists classify as most likely to attack humans because of it's aggressive and unpredictable behavior. The large stalky monster has been circling the divers (mainly Max, who's feeding them) ever since they started delivering the food in a manner that's been leaving me more uneasy than usual.

The animal chose the perfect instant to strike. The woman dropped one of the open buckets of chum by accident, and the man escorted her nearly halfway down the tank to retrieve it. The Bull Shark then took advantage of the American, an open target, and rammed into him. Thinking fast, Max took the steel rod and stuffed it in his mouth, flipping over the large predatory fish in the nick of time. My best friend, however, can only move so fast underwater whereas the shark is at a clear advantage.

The Bull Shark chews up the rod as he spits it out, whipping back and swimming at full speed towards Max. The blue-eyed diver only had enough time to pull back a few feet and pull out the taser; the shark rammed into him yet again and slammed him up against the faux rock wall. The taser quickly plummeted to the bottom of the tank along with something else I didn't want to see: his oxygen mask.

Bubbles rose from the spot the shark is blinding us to see, the spot where Max is, and soon those bubbles were tinted with a deep maroon liquid. Blood…

"Max!" I didn't even realize I was visibly panicking until I screamed, catching myself by surprise.

"Someone get him out of there, that's our friend!" Tyson also shouts, frantically searching around for a staff worker. I couldn't look away from the scene: the other two divers came back up and were shocking the Bull Shark continuously, other divers jumping in to help Max and keep the other sharks away from the scent of fresh blood.

"Come on, Rei!" Tyson, pulls me back from my shoulders along with another set of hands I'm not familiar with. "We have to get back there!"

x-x-x-x


Song: Aquarium Show from the Catwoman Score

I've included a journal entry of Rei's, which I'll be doing more often from now on. Rei's journal is extremely important…for reasons you'll see later on.

The entire layout of the aquarium is (obviously) not accurate, because I've never been there. Research can only get you so far, the rest is up for the author's creative mind to work it out.

Max was bit by a shark! First I kill his boyfriend, now I physically hurt him! I'm such a bitch ;-;

Reviews, anyone?