Eight

Every time you point your finger

Three more point right back at you

I'm not saying that it's something wrong with life

Cause that's a sad excuse

An age old game of rat and mouse

Chasing us from house to house

I'm not saying that it's something wrong with you

It's wrong with me as well

Ray had slept a lot better knowing that Kai was safe. In a hospital, Kai couldn't be harmed by his father or Boris. Ray just wished he had a better idea of what Kai had endured while he was there. All he knew was what the doctor had said, and Ray had the feeling there was more to it than just bogus surgery and mind warping drugs.

He had moved himself onto the floor of Tyson, Max and Kenny's room, as having to sleep another night alone in the dark was going to drive him crazy. They'd stayed up until about three in the morning talking about Kai and Boris and Kai's father. They were all curious to know more, but they had decided not to put Kai through any more trauma than what he'd already been through by hounding him with questions on an apparently sensitive subject.

"Is anyone else awake?" Ray asked in a hushed whisper.

"I am," came the reply. It was Max. Max turned and sat up, shifting to the bottom of his bed so that he could meet Ray's gaze. "It's only six thirty."

"I know. When does the hospital open up?" Ray asked.

"Not for another half an hour. You're eager to see Kai too huh?" Max asked in return, smiling slightly.

"I just want some answers," Ray replied, his hands behind his head, looking up at the empty ceiling. "There's more to it than just playing doctor, that much I'm sure of."

"Well, we may as well go down and eat then, seeing as we're not sleeping anymore," Max concluded, getting to his feet and making for the bathroom. He jumped as he heard a loud bang. Ray jumped too. It was Tyson. Upon hearing the word 'food' he'd suddenly leapt to life.

"Time to eat!" Tyson cried out with joy. Max and Ray sighed. It was going to be a long and tiresome morning.

~~***~~

"Anything else on those punks that raided the lab yesterday?" Hideaki asked, still pretty angry that there was a break-in at all.

"Nothing as of yet sir," Boris replied. Hideaki slammed his fists down on the desk furiously.

"Boris!! I need to know who those little rats were who snuck into my laboratory and duplicated my information!! This isn't good enough!!"

"I apologise sir, but we've been puzzling over it all night. The thieves covered their tracks very well."

"Well, you're running out of time Boris. I want to see results before the sun sets this afternoon or you'll begin to feel the pain I inflicted upon my son! Get out of my sight!!"

"But sir! About your son! Should we raid the hospital and retrieve him?"

"You idiots would ruin the operation. Last time I let you fools kidnap Kai, I almost wound up in the big house!! You left too much evidence around for them to pick up on us, and I had to get rid of a police squad most of yesterday afternoon!!!"

"My sincerest apologies sir."

"You could apologise until you were green in the face, I still wouldn't trust you to handle my Kai. I'll take care of reclaiming Kai myself. That way there will be no mistakes."

"You're brilliant sir. Absolutely brilliant."

"Stop kissing my ass Boris and get out of my sight!!! NOW!!" Hideaki boomed, and with that Boris retreated sheepishly. Hideaki rose from his desk and went to the window. "That moron couldn't capture a small dried leaf without leaving too much evidence around! Those Bladebreakers are getting to be a real pain. How can I throw them off?" Hideaki turned to face the door, a maniacal smile developing on his face. "Maybe I won't need to…maybe Kai will throw them off for me…"

~~***~~

The Bladebreakers were stood outside the doors to the hospital. It was open, but they were hesitant to go in, as they didn't know what kind of mood Kai would be in. The hospital had been open since seven o'clock, and it was now coming up for noon. Tyson had really gone all-out for breakfast that morning, and he was already starting to whine that he wanted lunch.

"Tyson, shut up! We just had breakfast!" Ray snapped back at his whining companion.

"Yeah, I know that, but I'm still hungry guys!" Tyson groaned, his hands over his stomach.

"We're here to see Kai, Tyson, not to feed you," Kenny said, tucking his laptop under his arm. Kai was in the same hospital Ray had been put into after his battle with Bryan at the World Tournament. It didn't look very inviting, and to Tyson it looked more like a haunted house.

"After you Ray," Tyson said nervously. Ray gulped and lead the way in. They slunk up to the reception desk and waited for someone. A doctor finally came over to them.

"Can I help you boys?" the doctor asked. The doctor was a woman, and she seemed very friendly. Ray relaxed a little.

"We're looking for Kai Hiwatari. Do you know where he is?" Ray asked.

"Oh yes! He was moved into the Recovery ward last night. I checked up on him this morning, and it looks like his system is clean from all substances," she replied, a smile on her face.

"Can we see him?" Tyson asked. She nodded and lead them away.

"About that hallucinogenic drug the doctor was talking about yesterday," Ray began. "Was it ecstasy?"

"Let me see," the doctor mused, flicking through the notes on her clipboard. She had obviously been assigned as Kai's new doctor. "Oh here we are! Blood testing for banned substances…" she read through the notes carefully, flicking from her current page to the next every so often. "I'm still baffled as to how a young teenager like Kai was able to get his hands on so much heroin. Is he an addict? We have a counsellor here if he needs help."

"No, Kai's fine," Ray assured her. "As far as we know, it was put into his system by someone else."

"By someone else?" the doctor said in surprise. "Who in their right mind would flood a young man's blood stream with that?!"

"We don't know," Kenny replied. "That's what we're here to find out."

"Here it is!" she cried with delight. "Listed substances found in Kai's blood!" she ran through the list in her head, humming every so often to herself. "Yes, looks like ecstasy is on here. I suppose that does explain the hallucinations. Heroin doesn't usually bring on hallucinations. Trust me, I've dealt with quite a few drug cases in my time." she stopped them at the entrance to a small room. She opened the door slightly, looked inside, then looked back at the others. "Well, he's asleep right now, so I doubt you'll get many answers out of him."

"What I wanna know is why Kai would take ecstasy," Tyson said, his arms folded. "I know for a fact that ecstasy is in tablet form, I learnt about it in school last year. He _had_ to have taken it of his own will!"

"It is most commonly slipped into food or drinks, if people wanted someone to ingest it without their knowledge," the doctor said. It all clicked for Tyson. No wonder Kai didn't like eating too often, if his father and Boris kept putting poison and drugs in his food. Ray walked into the room anyway, and the rest of the team followed. The doctor left them be and continued on the rest of her rounds.

"I hope we don't wake him up," Max said, looking around at the sterile surroundings in which Kai was now resident.

"Well, it's a bit late for that. I heard you all at the door," a familiar voice said. They turned to the bed to see Kai sitting up, his arms folded. He _didn't_ look too happy. The IV tube in his left arm was gone, and a bandage was around his arm over the place where it had been. The IV tube in his right arm remained. He looked a lot better than he did the previous day, and for that they were relieved. Tyson forced a smile onto his face.

"Well, we were just here to ask you a few questions, you know, about the deeper side of Biovolt and all that…" Tyson said, trailing off as Kai's death stare started to break into him.

"Kai, there's more to this than what the doctor said, we know that," Ray said, ignoring the fact that Kai was now glaring daggers at him. "We just want to know what exactly are they up to? And how are you involved?"

"The new leader of the Biovolt Corporation is my father. I was raised in that Abbey to be a tool for Biovolt, so it's obvious that _my_ father is going to want to continue _his_ father's work. Is that enough for you Ray?" Kai replied, his icy gaze still fixed on Ray.

"Kai…we knew that. We want to know more about it, like what he's hoping to accomplish by torturing you."

"Isn't it obvious? By torturing me he'll get his kicks and he'll be happy and the world will be doomed."

"Tone down the sarcasm Kai. What's the point of pumping you full of drugs though?"

"Like I know!" Kai snapped. Max looked at Kai's arms, and noticed how inflamed his veins appeared to be.

"Kai, what's up there?" Max asked, pointing to his arm. Kai looked down at it and sighed.

"A side effect," Kai replied, looking up at Max. "It happened a lot when I was younger and I was taking the drugs. I'm actually beginning to feel the withdrawals setting it…shit." Kai put a hand to his forehead, then rested back into the pillows, sighing heavily. "To tell you the truth…I haven't been sleeping at all. My breathing is just so shallow that when I close my eyes and one of those idiot doctors come in, they're convinced I'm asleep."

"Why haven't you been sleeping?" Max asked innocently.

"Because of the withdrawals!!" Kai replied angrily. Max took a step back, looking a little upset. Kai sighed, rubbing his temple. "Sorry Max…you didn't deserve that…it's just that I've not been sleeping, I haven't been eating, I've felt sick, I've been jumpy, and I've been feeling awake one minute then tired the next. I'm just…not feeling myself right now. So don't take it personally."

"No problems buddy," Max brightened up a bit.

"I just want out of here so I can have a chance at getting my father and Boris for this," Kai said, looking blankly over to the window.

"Well, you're gonna be stuck here for another week at least Kai," Kenny said as Kai looked over at him. "They still want to run a few tests on you to make sure you'll be OK without the drugs in your system. Or at least that's the general protocol in these situations. Dizzi and I checked it out the internet last night. We had nothing much else to do."

"What about training? That's something," Kai said, folding his arms.

"Kai! We're not even a team anymore, and you're still dogging us to train?!" Tyson moaned.

"He has a point Tyson," Max agreed with Kai. "We may have to go into battle against some of the Biovolt cronies, so it's probably best if we're prepared." Tyson groaned loudly.

"Does _everyone_ have to _insist_ on constant training?!!" he whined. "I just wanna bask in the glory of being the world number one! Can't I even do that?!"

"You're done basking Tyson," Kai stated. "You've got to get back down to it unless you want to have some punk beat you three months down the line."

"OK, OK! If it'll make you happy Kai, we'll train today!" Tyson gave in.

"I'd rather train with you guys than stay here, and that's really saying something," Kai said grumpily. He wasn't happy at all about being in hospital. He never had been. Even as a child he'd hated it.

"You can't just bust out of here Kai! You need to recover!" Ray said, almost laughing as he did so.

"I'm recovered enough," Kai replied. "I just want to make sure you're not slacking."

"Oh, you just love to see us suffer don't you Kai?" Tyson said sarcastically.

"It's what I live for," came Kai's equally sarcastic reply. Tyson frowned disapprovingly.

"Well, you're stuck here for another week Kai, so you'll just have to like it or lump it!" Tyson said, almost gleefully.

"Don't try breaking out or anything stupid like that Kai, you need the rest," Ray said, a gentle smile on his face.

"Hn," Kai replied, not taking much notice of them. Ray sighed and they decided to leave to get their training started.

"We'll see you around Kai," Kenny said as the team left the room quietly. Kai was in a bad mood, and he wanted to get out of this hospital as quickly as possible. Breaking out seemed like an incredibly tempting idea.

The sound of heavy metal footsteps approaching him suddenly reached Kai's ears. He knew those footsteps all too well. A wave of panic washed over Kai. He had to get out before he got caught. He tore the IV tube out of his arm, though perhaps maybe too roughly, as there was blood everywhere after he did so and it hurt like hell, and he ran to get his shoes on. The blood was running down his arm and onto the sterile white floor, forming a large puddle. He got his shoes on, but the footsteps were growing louder and louder. As he got to his feet, the footsteps stopped in the doorway. Kai looked over to the figure blocking his way, his voice froze over, his heart leapt up into his throat. He wanted to scream out for help, but he didn't want to show he was weak and desperate. He backed away towards the window, and kept himself against the wall, showing no signs of fear on his face.

"Time to come home Kai."

~~***~~

"Let it rip!" Tyson yelled out as he pulled the rip chord out of his launcher and sent Dragoon flying into the dish. Ray did the same. They were having a friendly training battle. Tyson wanted to be ready if he had to battle Biovolt. Dragoon and Driger clashed several times, but both seemed pretty evenly matched.

"Come on Driger!" Ray called out to his Bit Beast.

"Don't let him win Dragoon!" Tyson called out to his Bit Beast in return. The two blades smashed against each other continuously with great force. Kenny was recording their battle stats with Dizzi's help, to see how much the World Championships had really helped them. Max watched on in awe. He enjoyed watching a good old fashioned Bey Battle. It was one that didn't involve evil Bit Beasts. Or evil Bladers for that matter.

"Tyson! Tyson!" a familiar voice was calling out to them. It was Kai's doctor from the hospital. Tyson stopped Dragoon and Ray stopped Driger, and they waited for the doctor to catch them. She seemed out of breath, and worried. "Tyson, is Kai with you?" she asked, breathing heavily.

"No. we left him at the hospital with you," Tyson replied, beginning to become confused.

"Well…I went into him just after you left…and all I found was the removed IV tube and a lot of blood. Kai's gone!!"

I escape

Then we rewind

And I find myself back where I started

I can't run away

No matter what I try

We always rewind

Back to my genesis

Back to my genesis of nightmares

Back into hell

SN: *waves flag* Eight parts!! And things are getting a lot weirder if you ask me. I will be the luckiest person alive if this fic makes it up to 100 reviews by its end. Make a wish come true: please place a review today! (God, it sounds like I'm advertising for Christmas hampers…bleh!) Oh and by the way, that opening passage is from Amigone by The Goo Goo Dolls. And like Beyblade, I do not own it. Bah.

READERS!!! This authoress needs YOU!!

Yes, YOU! I need your help in letting me know how you feel this story should end! Should it end on a happy note? Or should it end on a sad note? I already have both parts written, so its up to you which one I submit. Cast your votes, and the winning choice will be my ending! Get reviewing!!