Four Winds

Plans

Yurii: Wassup peeps! I'm back!

I found an error in the girls' nicknames. Here are the correct versions.
Taylia- Syevyerniy
Drayea- Zapadno
Riikka- Uzhniy
Mitsu- Vostoshniy

The first half of this chappie is going to be mostly humorous, then serious. Onward!

"Nervous?"

"Very."

"Terrified?"

"Definitely."

"Do you know how much fun I'm having rubbing it in your face that you brought this upon yourself?"

"Shut up."

Danica smirked triumphantly at the much taller blader's misery. She was enjoying herself in tormenting Drayea with the inevitable truth. As soon as their room door opened, Taylia was going to go Armageddon on all their doomed asses.

"So, do you want a fancy funeral or a simple one?"

"Fairly simple, and make sure Gundula is left to someone trustworthy or buried with me… 20 feet under."

"Will do."

Mitsu and Riikka exchanged glances, left in the cold as to what would happen to them. They were pretty sure that Taylia knew the whole thing was entirely Drayea's evil scheme, but one could never be too careful around their team captain. Taylia had the tendency to spit fire when she was especially pissed off, and sometimes it would be taken to an almost literal extent. It was very scary.

"I don't believe this!"

"What?"

"She's waiting in front of the door!"

Danica had both hands clamped over her mouth to keep from bursting out laughing. Drayea was on her hands and knees on the floor looking under the door, hissing news bulletins in a harsh whisper. The situation wasn't really what was funny, it was the fact that Danica had been right when she pointed out how dead she was.

"Shit…"

"Now what?"

"She's sharpening her scythe."

It took both Riikka's and Mitsu's hands to keep Danica quiet, who by now was just about asphyxiating with the effort it took not to laugh.

"We might be here a while…"

"Well, I'll give her this much, she's very patient."

"Shut. Up."

Danica had long since left; it had been a good three or four hours since they came back to the dorm, and it was getting late. Taylia was sitting in an armchair she pulled up, her scythe launcher resting in her lap. Drayea, Riikka and Mitsu were all sitting on the ground leaning against the wall while the German girl was trying to cook up a plan that would keep her from being pummeled into the next life.

"Damn it, doesn't she ever give up?"

"What the hell are you doing?"

Startled, Drayea shot up from her spot looking under the door, slamming her head into the doorknob with a BAM! Her hands immediately went to the pained spot as she turned around and glared at Tala, who was smirking down at her.

"Fuck! What the hell was that for, Ivanov?" She hissed in a harsh whisper.

"No need to whisper, Zapadno. I know you've been out there for 4 hours." Taylia said with a smug tone from behind the door. She could practically hear the smirk on her face.

"Three and a half!" She shot back lamely. "Ha!"

Several sweatdrops appeared. Bryan and Spencer looked on in amusement as Drayea stood up, drawing herself up to her full height of 5'8" –which wasn't much shorter than Tala's 6'0"- to glare at the wolf blader.

"And would it kill you not to sneak up on me? I'm edgy enough as it is."

He cocked an eyebrow and folded his arms in an amused manner, now smirking widely.

"Spill. What did you do?"

Drayea groaned and hung her head.

"I told Taylia to take the day off. She didn't want to, so I locked her in the dorm, but now she's sitting right behind the door to our room with her scythe ready to disembowel me." She growled.

Spencer was now sniggering right along with Mitsu and Riikka, though Bryan merely rolled his eyes finding the whole thing to be very stupid.

"Lovely. Well, you have fun with that."

Tala turned on his heel to go, but was stopped when Drayea grabbed the collar of his jacket.

"Hold it right there. Since you're the reason I probably knocked off a few IQ points when I hit my head, you're gonna help me."

Rather than whining, Tala just smirked in response.

"Oh? And why should I listen to you?"

Drayea raised an eyebrow. Mitsu and Riikka scooted away a few inches, receiving a few questioning looks from the Blitzkrieg Boys. They both knew that when Drayea gave anyone that look, she had already hatched a scheme to get what she was after. It was one of those perks that came with having an IQ over 200.

"Because, if you don't…"

She leaned in so she was speaking in his ear only loud enough for him to hear. Tala blanched slightly.

"Okay, okay."

Drayea smirked.

"Now that's more like it. Okay, here's what we do…"

From inside the room, Taylia smirked. She knew Drayea was putting together some weird idea to keep from getting mauled. Just for the effect, she dragged the whet stone in her hand slowly over the scythe blade, making a scraping sound loud enough for the griffin to hear.

"Wolborg, Howling Tempest!"

"Gundula, Arctic Circle!"

One eyebrow went up, her expression showing she was confused as to why the two had set their bit beasts in the hall. Either they were really stupid, or Drayea had something up her sleeve. She smirked at the thought of it being the former.

She was abruptly snapped out of her thoughts as the door was kicked forcefully open courtesy of Tala, her reflexes reacting immediately and causing her to spring towards the door, scythe still in hand, ready to pummel the living daylights out of her teammate. However, she noticed too late that the entire hallway was now slick with an inch-thick sheet of ice. Unfortunately, having been in a spur of the moment thing, Drayea had forgotten to move out of the way and was flying tackled right into the wall. The result looked like something jacked out of a Looney Tunes cartoon.

Picture this in slow motion. Taylia came flying through the doorway at some 30 miles an hour (as Drayea mentioned once before; getting flying-tackled by Taylia was about the equivalent of getting hit by a bus) and tackled Drayea head-on. Tala, who hadn't moved completely out of the way, tried to run but got nowhere from the lack of traction from standing on the ice. Drayea and Taylia crashed into him, all three skidding into the other side of the hall with enough force to crack the ice on impact. The chain reaction caused Riikka to lose her balance and land flat on her ass on the ground. Mitsu and Spencer started to fall off balance when Spencer grabbed her arm and pulled her against his chest to steady them both.

(Bet you thought I was going to have her land on top of him, nyet? ;) )

Drayea, Tala and Taylia crashed through the Blitzkrieg Boys' door, passing Kai who was repairing his Dranzer, and disappearing into the den. The phoenix looked up as a loud crashing sound came from the den a second later, likely that they had broken something. A moment later, three very dizzy and migraine-ridden bladers staggered out of the den. Kai raised an eyebrow, not noticing Ian who had come out of his room to see what all the ruckus was. Said shrimp smirked when he saw the damage.

"You could have just knocked."

Drayea did the honors of smacking him in the back of the head as she passed and getting a smirk from the slate-haired blader, Taylia shaking her scythe launcher at him menacingly and stalking back to the Four Winds' room, looking very smug in her work. The hallway remained coated with an inch-thick sheet of ice.

Pause.

All it took were those 60 seconds for the other 4 bladers to return to reality. Mitsu and Spencer were especially surprised by their predicament. Both of them quickly stepped away from one another, refusing to make eye contact. Mitsu was turning red, getting a very wide smirk from Riikka who was still sitting on the ground by the doorway where the door itself had been pretty much smashed off its hinges.

"Well, that was... interesting..."

"HIYA! HYA!"

The gym was completely deserted except for one raging furious, brunette phoenix who was mercilessly pummeling the stuffing out of a red EVERLAST punching bag. By now, she'd put her fists and feet through it enough times to make it resemble Swiss cheese. Wait, scratch that. It put Swiss cheese to shame. She had reason to be pissed off. First the whole taking-the-day-off thing, then the incident in the hallway with Kai and Black Dranzer... putting into consideration that her element was fire, all of it really didn't help her temper.

She was still berating herself for letting him see the scars that had been left behind so many years ago. Taylia didn't doubt that he too probably bore similar marks, but nonetheless, it was humiliating. This time, she'd taken the liberty of putting on a black tank top and black, cropped sweats, her hands and arms bound in bandages to cover the scars on her arms but still show her tattoo. Her usual armored boots were absent and replaced with athletic tape.

"I had a feeling that it was you down here."

Speak of the devil and the devil walks in.

"What the fuck do you want, Hiwatari?" She snapped, not bothering to look at him as she unscrewed the cap on her water bottle.

"I don't think I need to repeat myself."

Taylia growled under her breath. He just didn't know when to give up.

"It doesn't matter how many times you do repeat yourself, my answer remains the same: it's none of your damn business."

She heard a frustrated sigh, earning a smirk from her. It was just another one of the qualities she possessed that could be either good or bad depending on the situation. In this case, her stubbornness. Normally it got her into trouble. Now, it was getting an opponent blader impatient. Irony wasn't all bad...

"I'm going to keep asking you until I get an answer."

"Hope you have a long time, because I'm not telling you."

She heard his footsteps get closer, but this time instead of being afraid, rage kicked up her adrenaline enough to whirl around a full 180 degrees and swing a head-height roundhouse kick at his head. Kai only barely managed to duck in time, obviously not expecting her reflexes to kick in so fast.
Taylia shot him a glare from her fighting stance; legs spread a little wider than the span of her shoulders, weight balanced on the balls of her feet, and both hands in the ready position in front of her; surprisingly, they weren't in fists, just loose and up, ready to defend or attack.

"I think it's only fair to warn you, you caught me off guard last time. I'm a hell of a lot stronger than I look." She growled.

He could see even with her hands obscuring her face, Taylia's eyes were taking on that same fierce, retaliatory hawk-like appearance, but this time instead of cold anger, it was raw adrenaline. It was only thanks to his sharp, honed senses did he realize it when she moved from her stance, dancing around on the balls of her feet and waiting for a strike, hands up like a boxer's.

Master Kai, she obviously knows what she's doing. Are you sure you still want to go through with this? Dranzer questioned, her tone suggesting slight concern.

She has answers and I intend to find out what they are.

Dranzer had no time to retort; Kai had already focused his attention back to Taylia, who had just swung a close-to-invisible left hook at his face.

Damnit, she's fast…

Smirking in turn, Kai removed his scarf and vest to keep them out of the way, lazily putting his fists up in an almost playful manner. It was obvious he still wasn't taking Taylia seriously, and it was really starting to piss her off.

Cocky bastard.

Her hands balled into fists as she rained down hooks and crosses (1), all of which Kai was blocking easily. He probably thought she was trying to really hit him… bah. This was just like one of her hundreds of blading strategies: strike the opponent, figure out their limits and/or weak spot, then rain down attacks with speed and power. Not as effective as the Armageddon strategy she was known for, but it would do.

She snapped out of her thoughts of strategy when she noticed a tiny error in one block made for a right jab: Kai put up the wrong hand as defense.

Gotcha.

Kai was more than surprised when Taylia suddenly lunged, barraging him with jabs and crosses even faster than the punches she'd been using before. Having almost no time to think, he put his arms up in a defensive cross over his face… the opening she'd been looking for.
Luckily for Kai, his reflexes were much better than his ability to block jabs as he jumped back when she swung a straight kick at his chest. Taylia lunged forward again, still throwing punches with amazing speed. He knew she couldn't keep it up, but then again, neither could he…. It was almost as if she were as strong as he was.

Taylia barely managed to duck when Kai finally threw a roundhouse out of the blue. She smirked.

"About time, Hiwatari. I was starting to get bored."

He just growled in response and kicked off his shoes, shifting into a fighting stance. This was the fight she was after.
A blader's beyblade was an extension of their person, and if she kept him fighting long enough she stood a chance of finding out his attack patterns. Of course, he could do the same, which was one of the reasons why she had so many different strategies.

Taylia suddenly dropped down, swinging a sweeping drop-kick at Kai's ankles. He easily jumped back and avoided the blow, but she landed a solid kick to his chest when the foot that performed the sweeping drop-kick planted itself on the ground, and using the torque of her twisted body brought her other foot around and up to land the blow. It was a signature move, one she intended to teach Riikka to use on Garland.

Smirk.

The leer was erased from her face when her lightning-fast reflexes brought her left forearm up to shield her face from a right cross… unfortunately, the punch made contact with her bruised wrist, drawing a slight wince from her. High pain tolerance or not, Taylia bruised easily, and she hated it.

Seizing the opportunity, Kai used the fist that had thrown the punch to grab Taylia's hurt wrist fast enough to put her in an arm bar and slam her face-first against the gym's mirrored wall. Taylia snarled ferally, struggling to get out of his vice-like hold. His other hand had grabbed her other wrist and pinned it to the wall by her head. Smirking victoriously, he leaned in to speak in her ear.

"I'll ask you again; how did you get that beyblade?" He growled.

Taylia's furious panting paused only for her to growl back in an animalistic fashion. She was a lot more stubborn than he thought. Narrowing his eyes, he paused for a moment to come up with a plan only a second later.
Releasing the wrist he had pinned to the wall, he slid his hand down her arm to her shoulder, drawing an almost panicky exhale from Taylia. He smirked; it was her mistake to show fear when he'd pinned her before, now he knew her weakness. Taylia banged her forehead lightly against the wall, growling in frustration when Kai's hand snaked down her side, thankfully not daring to venture to her chest, and came to rest on her hip.

"You can't hide the answer from me forever."

That touched something.

Summoning whatever control she had left, she brought her free arm's elbow up and over in an arc to land a hard blow to Kai's shoulder, making him release her other arm and back up. He hadn't been expecting that kind of blow; she was right about being stronger than she looked.

Without hesitating for even a second, Taylia whirled around to execute another hard blow; a backwards roundhouse kick. Her heel smashed into the side of his head by the ear, knocking him over to the ground on his back with a grunt of pain. It wasn't enough to cause any real damage, just a lot of pain.
Before Kai had the chance to get up, she put her foot on his chest and leaned forward with most of her weight. One arm rested over her knee while her free hand was on her hip.

"Listen closely, because I'm only going to say this once. Unless you have an urgent reason for knowing where I got Black Dranzer as well as a huge apology for coming at me twice, I suggest not starting something you can't finish."

Kai glared at her with a growl before grabbing her ankle and throwing her off, Taylia stumbling back a few steps as he leapt to his feet. She shifted into her same fighting stance, this time looking even more determined than before.

He came at her again, feinting a punch that made Taylia cross her arms in front of her defensively, giving him enough time to get behind her, loop his arms under hers and lock his hands behind her head, putting her in a sort of headlock/arm bar combo. Taylia growled, squirming and trying to wriggle out of his grasp.

"Struggle all you like, you aren't getting out of this."

"We'll see about that."

Taylia reached back and grabbed the collar of his shirt before kicking his right instep (2) with her heel, causing him to let go. Taylia crouched low to the ground, pulling his shirt off over his head in the process.

"See how you like having your scars revealed." She hissed coldly, looking over her shoulder from her crouching position. "Makes you feel very self-conscious, doesn't it."

Kai glowered darkly at her; not because of the action itself, but because she was right. However, he knew just from the first glance he had of her back that she bore far more scars than he did… she had to have had it very hard.

Taylia tossed his shirt aside, ready to turn around to shift back into her fighter's stance. Kai didn't give her time to before tackling her to the ground from behind, flipping her over on the ground so he was on his hands and knees above her, holding her wrists down and keeping her legs pinned with his. By now, she was too tired to try and fight back against his solid strength. Instead, she was content trying to glare a hole through his forehead.

Kai glared back at her, almost scowling. This girl was confusing. For starters, she had Black Dranzer. But back on their current situation, he noticed something else. Any other girl who looked at him in public would look at his face and try to get as much of his body as they could in as well. Taylia, on the other hand, was pinned beneath him while he was shirtless and she stared him straight in the eyes. It was unnerving, but at the same time intriguing, just like the other traits that had him so fascinated by such a person.

Damn her…

It was starting to piss him off; he was getting impatient with trying to figure her out. Most people he could read like a book, but she had too many layers for him to see through. He liked challenges, but this girl was trying his patience.

"I'm going to ask you again. Where did you get that beyblade?" He growled, emphasizing each individual word to get the message across.

Taylia remained completely silent and kept glaring at him. Mentally, she was berating herself for not thinking to take one of her beyblades with her. Black Dranzer would be raging furious if he knew what was happening.

Stop… please stop…

Memories she tried to lock away were starting to resurface, and it was starting to make her panic. Kai's expression became questioning; could he see that she was scared of him?

What is going on with her?

Kai's calculating stare became softer. Even though Taylia's face showed a loathing scowl, her eyes betrayed fear and rising panic.

Master Kai, I think that's enough.

Kai didn't respond as the blader beneath him started to show more visible unease. Mentally, he was debating whether or not to keep her there until she cracked, or just let up. It was obvious she was losing control of whatever allowed her to keep her cool, much to his satisfaction of knowing it was his doing, but now he was having second thoughts.

"Goddammit Kai, get off me!"

Now she was disguising her fear by exerting it as anger. Whatever tenderness his expression had held a moment before was gone in a flash.

"Not until you tell me where you got Black Dranzer."

Taylia growled under her breath.

"Get off me now before I scream my lungs out. I can, and I will."

It was a last-resort threat, but it wasn't a bad one; she was simply taking advantage of the fact that it appeared he was taking advantage of her.

Sly bitch.

By now, Kai was starting to get uneasy himself. If she did scream/yell/whatever, he wouldn't have any way to shut her up. He couldn't use a hand; if he let go of one of her wrists, she'd clobber him as soon as he released it.

Fine.

Fed up with waiting, Taylia breathed in, ready to scream herself hoarse, expecting Kai to let go upon realizing she really would yell. What she didn't expect was for him to frantically shove his mouth on hers as soon as she'd hollered out, "GET OFF, BASTARD!"

Taylia froze.

Flashbacks were flooding her mind too fast to even see what they were of. Nobody had dared touch her this way since the last time one of those pissed-drunk guards caught sight of her 12-year-old self lost in the labyrinth of the Hermitage. Conversely, something was… different.

True, he had her pinned in a very suggestive position, and it took her a moment to realize it; he wasn't trying to hurt her. His grip on her wrists was gentle, especially on the one he'd bruised earlier, and even in his hurry to keep her quiet, Kai was being surprisingly (and somewhat uncharacteristically) tender, as if he knew what he was doing scared her.

The younger phoenix smirked inwardly as an idea formed in her head.

I can use this to my advantage…

Kai's mind was racing almost as fast as his pulse. He was mentally kicking/slapping himself for doing something so stupid and at the same time… enjoying the close contact.

I am so screwed when she gets out of this.

Much to his surprise, Taylia leaned forward a bit as if she were… returning a kiss. His eyes widened slightly. He hadn't expected her to take it the wrong way…

But then again, this was what you wanted.

Kai scowled mentally at Dranzer, knowing she was right.

It's official. I've lost it.

(1) Hook and Cross- Two types of punches

(2) Instep- located at the front of the ankle


Yurii: Alright, another chapter! It was a total piece of shit! I made it nice and long, so I want long reviews!