Windstar: This is one of my favorite chapters I think. It's delving more into the mechanical world of Beyblading and it's starting to rationalize a lot of the purposes the characters have for doing things. I hope you like this.
Disclaimer: See Chapter One
Thanks to all the great reviewers!
Chapter Nine:
"Victory is life, defeat to our enemies!" Pull the ripcord, put it back in. Spin the invisible blade. Imagine it slicing and cutting down the opponent flawlessly. "Victory is life, defeat to our enemies!" Repeat process. That was the way of the Abbey.
The unified chorus of the students at Balkov Abbey echoed through the halls. It rang through all their ears and it jumped into the hearts of anyone who was listening. Hours upon hours of harsh training would never be wasted as the boys of Balkov Abbey trained harder then any other professional beyblading hopefuls. There was only one goal, and that was the dark chorus that the boys of the Abbey yelled out each time the guards ordered them to.
The older students were welcomed into a dark and untrusting world, constantly being raised to believe that they are the best and that none other could surpass them. They skirted around Boris and they flourished under the dark teachings that would ingrain themselves into their minds.
Victory is life, defeat to our enemies!
The older you got, the more impatient Boris was with failure. It was no longer a matter of teaching someone to get better; it was a matter of weeding out the weaklings. Now that they were no longer four year olds just holding a blade for the first time, the real horrors began. Death was all too real of an option, and it was something that everyone was in constant danger of.
The floor in the training room was now rigged. Every time someone lost they fell through the trap door and they disappeared forever. No one saw them again. The first time it happened, the whole room fell silent. No one could believe what they'd seen. The guards shouted angrily at the onlookers, shoving them back to their games.
With the knowledge that every loss would cost them their lives, the matches suddenly became more rigorous. They were fought with so much fury and anger that they were really starting to become the cold hearted monsters that Boris was attempting to make them be.
The floor would open up and swallow the losers whole. Every training day would be one that half the group would be killed at. Those days took place once every two months, because they couldn't kill everyone off to fast or there'd be nobody left.
Still, for every child that vanished beneath the floor, another one appeared to replace them. It was a never ending cycle, and the children of the Abbey were slowly getting accustomed to the deathly dealings. They trained harder then ever before, and they started to keep away from people. They started to isolate themselves.
If one had any companions, they would be targeted and they would be forced to face one another. There was no such thing as friends. Everyone was each other's enemy, and that was becoming abundantly clear. The three teams that had been created in the Abbey that were the only exception to the companionship rule were the Hazards, the Maims, and the Demolition Boys.
They were the best out of everyone in the Abbey, and they were considered to be champions of the whole complex. The Hazards were the oldest group of students that the Abbey had. They had all been around ten when Tala and Kai had first started their actual training at the Abbey, and they were quite skilled with their beyblades. They controlled various bitbeasts and they fought with a cruel fury that let everyone know just where they stood in the hierarchy.
The Maims were slightly different. Their team was made up of children of all ages, the oldest being Mikhail (oddly enough though he showed no true exceptional talent with a beyblade he had been chosen for a team) at fifteen, and the youngest was Ruski at nine. Their team was not the best out of the three, and they certainly weren't the most coordinated, but they seemed to be the most vicious of all of them.
Even Bryan, who was slowly yet surely becoming more and more angry and cruel as days went on, was hardly a match for the sadistic way the team bladed. Mikhail seemed to take pleasure in watching his opponents break down, and while he couldn't blade as well as the others, he was the master of cheap tricks. He had no qualms about trying to tear them all to shreds, and he did so with little mind.
Boris seemed to like his cruel streak, and that seemed to be the only reason why Mikhail had made it so far. Tala had said once that Mikhail was like a bug that kept popping up. Whenever someone tried to squish him, he'd hide in the crevices of their shoe or the imprints in the ground, and then he'd attack with a vengeance. He'd leave bites along their bodies and he'd snipe at someone when they were in the dark. He had no scruples and he had no morals. He was simply and completely a mercenary who would do anything for the right price.
Strangely enough though, Bryan enjoyed spending time with the boy, and the two were usually seen with each other if the falcon blader wasn't with his own team. They talked about the outside world, and Mikhail's ability to seemingly draw people to him like flies to flypaper flourished when it came to Bryan. It was a game of monkey see monkey do.
Mikhail smoke and drank, and cursed like a sailor. He seemed to know how to do anything and everything that wasn't entirely appropriate, and he seemed to be quite good and making people hate him. It wasn't long before Bryan too started to drink and had attempted smoking.
It was no secret though, that Mikhail loathed Tala with every fiber of his being. He cursed and yelled and he would purposely antagonize the redhead every chance that he got. Bryan snapped at him to leave his friend alone more times then not, but Mikhail didn't pay him any mind, and it didn't look like he ever would. The boy simply detested the redhead and their relationship was the best it was ever going to be.
When Tala returned to the Abbey, his eyes aided by the thin glasses that were balanced delicately on his nose, everyone was deathly quiet. Though he showed no signs of being hurt aside from those glasses, that seemed to reveal to everyone just what had went on in that dark room, everyone was under the impression that he was a dead man walking.
Boris took one look at the boy's face and sneered hatefully. His hand shot out the first moment that it was able to, and struck him so hard across the cheek that the glasses went flying and if it hadn't been for Bryan catching him at the last minute he would have too! Practically blind, and standing before Boris, Tala blinked up at the man without saying a word.
Boris snickered slightly at the blank look on his pupil's face. He reached forward and he took the boy's chin in his grip. Laughing loudly he roughly shoved him back into Bryan. Ian scooped up the glasses and slipped them into his Captain's hand.
"You really are a glutton for punishment aren't you?" Boris asked lightly, shaking his head as he observed the teen. The words echoed those of Bryan's less then moral filled friend, and ever since then Mikhail had used them as a way to mock Tala incessantly.
The Maims really didn't like the Demolition Boys all that much, and Mikhail's teasing was only the start of it. Whenever they beybattled, they lost. It was clear that the Demolition Boys were better then them, but that only made them more and more furious. Bryan was practically untouchable. He saw through each and every one of their attacks, as they mimicked his own, and he hardly ever came out with a scratch on him.
The Maims were arrogant and they were cruel beybladers who never showed even the slightest inclination towards accepting them as like members of the Abbey. Tala ignored them constantly, and seemed to enjoy walking away from them as it only riled them up more.
Bryan found himself in an uncomfortable position because he was friends with both Tala and Mikhail, but the redhead simply shrugged and told him to hang out with whomever he enjoyed spending time with. It really wasn't his right to say who he should enjoy being with after all.
Bryan leaned up against the stone wall that was the outside of the Abbey. Mikhail was sitting to his right, and he was taking long and sinful gulps of the fiery liquid that seemed to make everything fade into nothing. They were on the roof, looking out at the stars and the city around them. Bryan felt his body shift slowly and awkwardly as he glanced around their world.
"Stop fidgeting so much, you're giving me a fucking migraine." Mikhail hissed as he took another sip from his liquor.
"That drink is giving you a fucking migraine." Bryan snapped back, shifting slightly as he glanced towards the door.
By now, everyone in the Abbey knew that the older children walked around the corridors at night. There was no rest for the wicked, and insomnia seemed to kick in during the evenings. Boris didn't particularly care as long as they were sharp and attentive during practices.
That meant, of course, that it was just another reason to not do so. It was a risk that only the Demolition Boys and a few of the Maims and Hazards ever considered. They were the only ones valuable enough to never loose their lives if things got bad. They took beatings with smiles and laughs and if that was all they would receive for being up after dark then they were willing to take the chances.
That didn't mean though that it was something that they all wished for and were so excited about. Bryan didn't want things to get any worse then they actually were, and that meant he didn't want to needlessly put himself in harms way (as Mikhail so often suggested that Tala did).
"This drink," Mikhail defended with a smirk, "is curing my fucking migraine." He offered it to Bryan and the younger boy took it from him.
"What's so great about tequila anyway?" He asked as he took a daring sip from the bottle. Hissing he roughly shoved it back at his friend while he choked on the burning fluid as it went down his throat. Mikhail laughed all the while, clearly enjoying himself at his friend's torment.
Lilac eyes glared hatefully at the older boy who was still snickering in his corner with a great smile and a mischievous gleam in his eyes. The brunette had obviously enjoyed seeing his companion in such a state, and it appeared like he wasn't going to attempt to say anything in his defense.
"Ass hole." Bryan snapped as he rubbed his throat thoughtfully. "How do you drink that crap?"
"Easy." As though to prove his point, Mikhail took a long sip from the bottle. "And it's so great because you have to be eighteen to drink it."
"Why?" The age old question. Mikhail just shrugged.
"How should I know? The fact that I can drink it makes it all the better. It's like sticking it to the man."
"The man?"
"Jesus, twerp you don't know anything do you?" Mikhail shook his head and went to take another sip when the bottle was suddenly pulled roughly from his hand and thrown across the roof top where it shattered. The fluid spilled from the bottle and for a moment the older boy stared at it in horror.
"You shouldn't take the lord's name in vein." Bryan snapped viciously as he stood up to leave. Mikhail kicked out, knocking him to the ground and glaring hatefully at him.
"Do you realize how hard it is to get that shit!? What the hell is your problem you fucker?" The brunette raised a fist to punch out his companion when it was caught and he was thrown back with enough force to send him half way across the roof.
"Watch your mouth Mikhail." Tala was standing there, his face looking annoyed and his eyes sharp and glaring. He didn't appear to be happy, and Bryan looked up at his friend in concern.
"What, little Bry-Bry can't fight his own battles, you have to step in? Or maybe we should call him Cry-an." The boy in question blushed furiously as he forcefully stood up. His eyes glared with an uncompromised anger at the other. He looked ready to throw down right then and there.
"Mikhail. I strongly suggest you stop your incessant attempt at being clever. It will never become you." Tala sighed heavily, his hand reaching back to his hair. He adjusted his glasses ever so slightly, shaking his head as though he were talking to a particularly hopeless teenager.
"Fuck you Valkov." A red eyebrow raised ever so slightly.
"Maybe I gave you too much credit; it seems you can't even remember my name. After all this time, truly, I'm hurt."
"Guys…look. Sorry I broke your bottle Mikhail, I'll get you a new one." Never before had the watchers thought that Bryan would ever say he was sorry. Yet there he was, acting like a peace maker of all things. It was such a sight. Tala shrugged ever so slightly and turned towards the door. Bryan sent an apologetic look towards Mikhail before following his friend.
"You're whore of a mother's name, bitch." Tala stopped- his hand on the door knob. His very features looked to have paled considerably. He appeared to almost become as white as snow.
"Don't talk about our mother-" Mikhail was laughing.
"Not our mother, you idiot, your mother. Boris' little whore. The one who gave birth to you and then died like the chicken shit that she was-"
"Don't you talk about my mother that way." Tala's eyes were flaring. His fists tight. Even Bryan looked enraged at his friend's words.
"Your mother was a whore that Boris fucked every night until she became pregnant with you and then she went and died!" Tala threw himself forward, punching the other boy in the face with all the power he could muster. He was furious and he was rearing to go. He wanted nothing more then to pummel the obnoxious little jerk into the ground.
Mikhail went sailing, and if it hadn't been for Bryan grabbing Tala by the shoulders and roughly pulling him backwards, the redhead would have torn his throat out right then and there. Never before had the young child been so pissed off. He was actually glowing in hatred.
The very ground he was standing on was turning icy as Wolborg herself felt his rage. She was putting out an exterior of ice and chill and Bryan shivered as he felt the sting of the cool temperatures around them.
"What? Mad that you're the son of a whore and the man that likes to play good touch bad touch with you?" Mikhail was digging his own grave. An icicle went flying straight at him, but he ducked it. He was well aware of Wolborg's intense dislike of anyone mocking her young charge. The boy didn't really care though. The furious look in the redhead's eyes was enough to make him grin with delight.
"Knock it off Mikhail!" Bryan snapped, glaring at his friend coldly. Tala tried to pull away so he could get another shot in, but his friend held him firm.
"Or what?"
"Or it'll be my fist in your face."
"Fine, take your little boy toy back to his room. The company was starting to get sour anyway." Mikhail hissed as he shoved passed the two and down the stairs.
Tala finally broke free of Bryan, but he made no effort to go after the brunette. Instead, he stood there on the roof and shook his head. Sighing heavily he looked over to his companion.
"You alright?" He asked after a while. The other nodded.
"You?"
"I'm fine." They were always fine. They couldn't afford to not be fine.
"I'm sure it's not true."
"What isn't?" Tala looked genuinely confused for a moment.
"About your mother and Boris."
"I really couldn't give a damn if it was." The boy shrugged. "Boris will never be my father, even if all the doctors in the world said our blood was similar. My father will always and forever be Niko Ivanov."
"I meant about Boris doing those things to your mother." Tala hesitated for a moment. He looked over at his friend and smiled a sad smile.
"Did you know I can remember her?" He asked softly, his body moving towards the edge of the roof as he leaned over to look at the city around them. Bryan shook his head, knowing the other boy would understand even if he couldn't see him. "I didn't realize it until years later, when I was in my father's…Niko's…workshop under the house. Dad would be working on some masterpiece or other and I'd stay down there and just draw and sketch. I didn't realize I was actually good at it, I thought everyone could draw what they saw perfectly. Dad couldn't believe it when I showed him what I was working on. It was her picture."
Bryan moved closer, looking at his friend in awe. Never before did the redhead ever willingly talk about his parents. Especially not this strange talent he apparently had in drawing. The boy though seemed to think nothing of the revelations and he kept on talking.
"He asked me who she was, and I couldn't tell him. I didn't know her name. Until Kai and his parents started to teach me how to talk, I didn't even understand the language that they were using – that she'd used. Understandably though, the last time I'd heard it I was only a few months old."
"What do you mean?" Tala smirked ever so slightly.
"My mother was killed. Boris was trying to find her. She'd been working at an out door wildlife facility, the wolf exhibit of all things. One of the wolves that she'd been taking care of had taken an interest in children, and so she'd bring me with her when she was making the rounds to see if everything was alright. One night while she was checking up on the wolf, her name was Luna back then, (at least that's what my mom called her) and her litter of pups she'd just had, a man came and tried to take her out of the habitat.
"She screamed, and tried to fight back, and I think I started crying because I can't remember seeing anything much. Suddenly, Luna started to attack the man and he started to shoot wildly at things. He killed her pups and shot my mom. The habitat was broken open in all the chaos; and my mom grabbed me and started to make for the hills while other men started to run in.
"Luna followed my mom, and when she couldn't go on, Luna took me from my mother and ran away." Tala pulled back his collar to show the bite marks that still marred his shoulder. "My mom died, and for the next year and a half or so I was living with Luna…or Waw-oo as I came to know her…or Wolborg as you've come to know her."
"How did you remember all of that, you couldn't have been more then a few months old!"
"That's the way I was made." Tala shrugged. "Photographic memory and a kick ass smile. I'm chock full of surprises." Bryan sighed heavily, raising a hand to his forehead. "My mother wasn't a whore. She was a good person and she loved me. I didn't understand anything that was going on back then, and only as I started to get older did I really start to realize what had happened. Wolborg raised me because I was her pup. My mother died and so did her real children, so she took care of me for both of those losses."
The watchers were silent. Tala's admission to being completely and totally aware of everything that had been happening around him since he was a baby was unbelievable. He seemed to be telling the truth though, his face perfectly straight and his eyes unwavering. He didn't hold the characteristics of a person who was trying to lie. It was all to calm and collected.
Bryan seemed to believe him too, his eyes looking over his friend and Captain with an almost over abundance of respect. The lilac haired blader truly believed in his Captain, and it was clear in that moment that he would do anything if Tala asked him to.
Tala was a complete enigma. Who he really was, no one probably knew. He acted so differently to different people, and all the while he kept such a smile on his face that never quite seemed to meet his eyes. What he was really thinking and what was really going on in his head was a mystery.
"Why'd you tell me all of that?" Bryan asked, his eyes full of wonder and confusion. He honestly didn't know. Such personal details were best left between Kai and Tala. Those two were able to speak about anything, and because Kai had adopted Tala into his family, such discussions should have been just that – a family matter.
"Because, you're my friend, and I'm not going to tell you what you should do, I'm just going to explain what's been said." Tala smiled lightly. "Let's go though, we have training to do."
The scene faded and it came back to someplace that was quite different and strange. The watchers had never seen this place before, but Kai and Anna were there and they were being led through the halls. Anna's hand clasped in Kai's, and Voltaire shadowing them protectively as though the world would swallow them hold.
Michaels was showing them around a building, introducing them to people and having them start communications with the various office staff. Clearly this was the base that all of their information was being routed through. The watchers were impressed. It was grand looking, and everything about it was so pure and shiny that it was something that they could hardly believe. The staff were polite but efficient. They worked tirelessly and they were clearly military personnel from the way that they acted and reacted.
Kai was brought down a corridor, Anna being left behind to her own devices, where he was going to receive a psychological examination. According to Michaels, he wanted to record the boy's brain waves and chemistry and then run a study on what his reactions would be to spinning a beyblade.
Although after a while, things started to become more clear. Though Kai seemed to not understand the hushed tones that the staff, Voltaire, and Michaels were speaking in, their words were clear as a bell to the silent onlookers that were spying on their lives. The test wasn't so much a test of what brain waves functioned at in normal circumstances, it was a test to see just how far they peaked when provoked by a sacred spirit, or in this case, Black Dranzer.
The boy couldn't remember anything that happened with Black Dranzer. Although his memory had started to return, it had only gone so far as to bring back people and specific events that made him who he was. Luka seemed to be the focal point of most of his recollections. The boy was everywhere in Kai's mind, and though the slate haired child seemed to be able to remember the other boys fairly well, he couldn't recall certain events in time that were drudgery or not important.
The main event though, that was missing entirely, was everything from when he saw Black Dranzer to when he woke up in the hospital without a memory in his head. Nothing existed in the recesses of his mind. He couldn't recall ever seeing the blade. Whenever asked about it in a covert way, he'd stare at them blankly, eyes fogged over in confusion and misunderstanding.
"I don't know what you're talking about." He'd reply coldly, not really able to answer them with anything more then that. They would drop it and move on, yet they were certain that there had to have been something left behind from the experience. Voltaire allowed the tests because he too wanted to find out just what was going on in his grandson's head.
They connected various wires and cables to Kai's skull, positioning him at a dish and having a man stand in front of him. The adolescent looked at him skeptically but didn't say much. Every thought that was in his head was recorded on a computer screen, blips and waves forming with each electric signal sent from the right brain to the left.
"What is your name?" The man asked him. Kai raised an eyebrow.
"Which one?" He asked calmly, his waves blipping as the thought was recorded. The questioner sputtered, he looked at his boss who nodded for him to continue.
"You real name."
"That's really none of your business, but you can call me Kai Hiwatari." The boy smirked; if he was going to be used as a lab rat (for it was clear that despite his lack of understanding to the purpose of the experiment, he most certainly was aware of what was happening around him) he was going to be a resilient one till the end.
"How old are you?"
"In which country?"
"What?"
"In Asian countries the age of a person starts the moment that they are born. They are one year old in that moment, and on the next new years they advance one year. Thus I could be eleven; or ten if you follow the western way of tracking your age. That of course starts at zero and moves onwards with each three-hundred and sixty-five and a quarter rotation to return to the year mark of the day I was born." The muscle on the man's face twitched. Voltaire laughed though, his eyes glittering with pride. Kai was not going to let anyone push him over. He was not going to allow someone to think they could control him. Boris had tried to do that, and Kai wouldn't let it happen again.
"Who is Luka?" Clearly his wise comment had been ignored.
"He's an actor in Prica iz Hrvatske."
"Are you getting anything?" Michaels asked his technician who was reviewing the responses on his screen. The man looked up at him with a quirked eyebrow.
"You mean on the brain waves for sarcasm? Yeah I got it all right here. He's right in the normal range, in between deadpan and irony." The man replied as he rolled his eyes. At Michael's pointed look though he coughed and moved on. "He's a normal kid, nothing wrong with his answers. If anything he's just above the normal level on how to be a stubborn punk. His reaction time in being a smart ass is just a bit faster then normal, but that's subject to fluctuate. I don't think an encounter with a sacred spirit is going to affect his rate of come backs."
"God help us if that's what it does do though. I don't want to deal with any of those boys if they're hyped up on smart comments after they experience full on puberty." Michaels said as he shook his head. He motioned for the test to move to its next objective. The man before Kai removed a beyblade and handed it to him.
"I've got my own." The boy replied, refusing to even look at the blade as he removed Dranzer from his pocket.
"We need to record you status with this first, then you can use Dranzer kiddo." Michaels called over.
"Don't call me kiddo." The slate haired boy hissed, red eyes flashing dangerously at his direction. There was a beep and Michaels looked at the technician who jumped.
"What is it?" He asked quietly, looking at the screen where one of the waves spiked far higher then any of the others.
"Nothing, back up flare from residual afterthoughts, it all came in at once."
"How can you be sure?"
"It's nothing, he just thought too many thoughts at once and it over powered his receptors, they all came in at once. Nothing out of the ordinary – you did piss him off."
"Should I do it again?"
"Nah, we'll never get him to cooperate if you do." The man shrugged as he reached for his bag of potato chips on the desk.
"You're a real role model Harrison." Michaels said as he shook his head. The man snorted and laughed.
"I do brain things, I'm a brain guy, I play with computers and read brain waves. I don't do baby sitting or kids. That's your new job apparently." Michaels glared at him, showing him he certainly was not amused by the comment.
The man in front of Kai went over to a set up in the corner and pushed a button. While Kai placed his borrowed blade into a launcher and prepared himself, the dish started to appear. It was a normal training dish with a few obstacles. There were cups placed here and there that were supposed to be avoided and there were a few dips and bumps in the dish to provide a slight challenge.
It all looked so easy to the young blader who was frowning at the dish in disappointment. If that was the best that the BBASS could come up with, he was annoyed. It was so simple and so boring looking that it was practically an insult. Did they really think so little of him? He beat this same obstacle course when he was three. He could barely launch the blade when he was three!
Shaking his head he waited for the go ahead and then he launched his blade with striking skill and power. The plain thing shot out, and spun in the center of the dish looking normal and boring. Raising an eye Kai looked at the new challenge for all of three seconds. The blade he'd always used was always Dranzer. She had always been there to connect with his soul and so moving her had never been a problem before. This blade had no sacred spirit though.
Sighing he just touched the launcher and pressed down on the device that was there. The blade snapped to attention and shot to the right instantly. It was a simple matter of controlling the blade's movements with the launcher. Any starting beyblader knew that. He had noticed the control system when he'd been handed the launcher, but he hadn't thought he'd use it – especially considering the fact that he'd never done so in the past.
Still it was easy enough to figure out. He could control where the blade went by a movement of the fingers, not to hard to deal with and soon enough everything was instinct. He sent the blade careening towards the first cup, and at the last second it dodged to the left and cut around the cup. It was so completely trivial and boring that he was annoyed by it.
He closed his eyes, and sighed. There was no challenge at all. In his mind he could see the dish perfectly clear. He could see everything. The dimensions of the room were engrained into his memory and he had no problem at all in keeping track of his blade's progress with his eyes shut. He could make it dodge around things because his memory brought the image to his head.
It was as simple as that, once he'd memorized the blade's movements, there was no harm at all in him closing his eyes and just waiting out their task, boring as it may have been. He spun about the dish a few more times and completely lost himself in the mental image of the world.
"I don't believe this." The technician was looking at the screen with his jaw dropped. The blips that were appearing were unbelievable, they shouldn't have even existed, and yet there they were. Perfectly sound proof of what the boy's brain was doing. Michaels looked over his shoulder.
"Talk to me." He commanded softly.
"His reaction time surpasses all of the set records to date. Not only that- he triples them! Of the various sections of his brain, he's concentrating on memory, and his memory is what's feeding him his information. Look at him, kid's not even looking at the dish. He's off in lala land while he's unconsciously setting world records!"
"That's strange." The tone of his voice made it seem like he wasn't all that surprised though. The man looked up at his boss in confusion.
"What is it Michaels?"
"His results are odder then that. He's never even used this type of launching and controlling system before. As far as Voltaire's told me, he's been using a standard non-remote linked blade. He shouldn't be able to function as well on this level. I wonder what he does with his real blade…Hey Kai, that's enough!" Michaels called over, and almost instantly the blade had popped from the dish and had slapped firmly into the boy's hand. The spike on the screen that showed it was impressive. Harrison was still goggling at it when Michaels told the boy to switch to his Dranzer.
That was something that Kai was actually looking forward to. He dropped the borrowed equipment without a second thought and he placed his beyblade into his launcher and he fell into the stance that was drilled into his mind. This was going to be pie. The dish changed though, and he watched it as it did. The terrain was much more bumpy, and there were spots that if the blade fell into it would instantly stop the rotation of the top. He programmed all that he saw into his mind and he waited for the order to release.
He was given it, and that was that. He reached out with his soul, there was no need to even think about the foolish launching system that was a clear beginners tool. He wasn't that inexperienced. He had his pride after all. His mind calmed instantly as he felt the presence of his bit beast in his body.
Dranzer soared through his veins, her very presence acting as an elixir that sent him into the same quiet and calm state he always felt with her near him. He didn't need to commit the dish to memory; he had only to trust in Dranzer. Standing perfectly still he felt all of his muscles loosen up, his face relaxed perfectly and his body was at ease.
He felt better then he'd ever felt before. Dranzer sang in his ears and as the blade spun and hopped and skipped about the dish with a grace that was unfathomable, he felt himself get only calmer and a feeling of freedom overcame him.
He felt his lips quirk into a brief smile, but he didn't care if anyone saw. He only wanted to spin his blade. Dranzer sang in his ear, singing softly to him some song from long ago. He could vaguely remember seeing his mother working tirelessly on a long white scarf – a gift for his father – she'd been humming the same simple tune. It was soft and sweet and it was a memory of home. He felt himself become lulled by it. It was so peaceful in his mind, and there was nothing that could possibly happen to him if Dranzer was by his side.
Memories of his mother then shifted to Luka. The boy sitting next to him as they listened to their mother as she sang. That was the memory that persisted. Then Luka looked at him, his eyes slashed by a whip. Glasses adorned his face. He looked young and old at the same time. He was going to say something but –
"Kai?" Dranzer shot into his out stretched hand and the boy turned and looked at Michaels who was staring at him in shock.
"What?" He asked, raising an eyebrow. Michaels didn't say anything though. On the screen that he'd been looking at with Harrison, there had been the unexplainable.
Kai's brainwaves had completely ceased. His blade had picked up such speed and ferocity that it was dancing without a care in the world through all the traps that the dish had to offer. It was faster then the speed of sound and yet Kai's brainwaves had decreased. They'd decreased so far and so fast that the technician was actually starting to become terrified. He couldn't believe what he'd been seeing.
No one could just stop all thoughts to and from the brain while they were engaged in physical activity. It just was not possible. Yet Kai had done it. He had stood there with a completely blank look on his face and fallen into a sort of trance, and his blade had broken every record he'd set only moments before by ten fold. His reaction time was unparalleled. It was impossible to think about what he could have peaked at with the real Black Dranzer, it was totally impossible, and there wasn't even an enemy challenging him on this.
Michaels shook his head; he was in a state of awe at the fact that the boy had done all that without even thinking one thought. Suddenly though, there was a huge spike, the memory division of the boy's brain had gone off the charts, it had gone from zero activity to a full blown over load melt down, that Harrison actually jumped with surprise.
"What's he thinking of?" Michael asked, and the man stared at him incredulously for a moment before plugging in a few commands and pulling up another program. The screen had faded into a system of colors and the audio produced the Phoenix song that Kai was listening to Dranzer sing to him.
The watchers had been able to see everything that Kai had been thinking of as he'd done the impossible over and over again. Only when the song cut abruptly and a picture of Luka's broken and bruised face appearing on the screen did Michaels call it quits and yell for Kai to snap out of it.
The boy looked at him in confusion, as though he didn't understand what had just happened, yet he had done it. He had gone through everything and he had done what they'd asked for. He'd done far more then they'd expected him to do, and he hadn't even tried out their program yet. It was a computer program designed to copy all the information on Black Dranzer into the boy's mind. Then, in a state of practical hallucination the boy would blade as though he were using the beast of darkness itself. It was something that was the peak of their research that day, and yet already Kai had surpassed everything that they had hoped to discover. Truly, Kai was an enigma.
Back in the Abbey, Tala was blading some nameless blader that he'd never seen or cared much about. He was barely concentrating, his mind wandering to a different time and place and he hardly could stay focused. That was his problem after all. Ever since he was a boy he couldn't keep himself concentrated on one thing at a time. He was always wandering around in his head as he tried to think of what he was supposed to be doing.
The cognitive thinking was starting to get annoying though; thinking about thinking was something that he truly didn't want to deal with at the moment. He heard a scream and he looked up. Apparently Wolborg had defeated his nameless foe, and the boy had disappeared into the floor beneath them. Tala sighed, he hated this place.
He looked to his left and saw that the match next to him was just about to come to an end. That was where he was supposed to go when he'd completed his match, and he shook his head slightly. Walking towards them he looked at the dish. It was clear that the boy in front of him was going to lose. Little Yusef was not cut out for a battle with a Hazard. The child was lucky he'd made it even that far. Moments later a blade went flying and the floor opened up to swallow him whole. Luka sighed heavily and reached a hand up to his face, he was still trying to get used to the wire glasses that were now essential to his daily tasks.
Temporarily blinded he moved forward with little care for his surroundings, assuming that the floor had righted itself as it always did after a child disappeared into the dark. He felt something hit his shin and he stumbled forward to catch himself. He gasped when his foot touched nothing. He barely even recognized Ian's startled shout as he fell into the darkness. His last sight of anything was Mikhail as he stood at the dish across from him sneering as though Tala had always been, and now literally would be, beneath him.
The floor closed up behind him as soon as he disappeared down below, and silence filled the room. The guards didn't know quite what to do. They couldn't believe that Tala had actually fallen into the hole. They looked at each other, horror filling their eyes. This wouldn't be good at all.
Nobody who went into those holes ever was seen alive again, there was no other way out of it. They'd never bothered to deal with it. It was a chasm of death, and there would be no way to get the boy out. He was going to rot there with the rest of the rejects, forever. And there wasn't a damn thing they could do about it.