Chapter 8

Tyson lifted his head, sniffing slightly. He gave a weak smile and dried away his tears.

"Are you going to be ok?" Garnet asked, wiping at her own.

"I think so. But there must be a way to help him! I can't just stand by when he's dying!" he yelled, hitting the wall.

Garnet yelped and gently restrained him from punching the wall again. He stared at the ground furiously, clenching his hands until the blood trickled in a thin stream through his fingers.

"Don't do that," Garnet whispered gently, unclenching his fists. "It's not what Kai would have wanted."

She gasped when she saw the piece of paper flutter from his hand.

"Where did you get that?" she asked.

"Boris..." Tyson whispered venomously.

She slowly unfolded it, careful not to smear the blood on her fingers over the writing. In cramped writing read, "If you wish to save Kai, you must beybattle my specially chosen team from the abbey. If you win, you shall receive the antidote that is necessary to his survival. If not, then you shall all die like him." At the bottom was a signature: Voltaire. She stood for a moment, her breath held, as she felt Tyson read over her shoulder.

"We accept?" she asked, after Tyson had turned away.

"Of course. That antidote is Kai's only hope. I don't want to lose him," he murmured.

"You forget, he is the warrior of the phoenix. He's a fighter," Garnet smiled, patting him on the shoulder.

He turned and smiled back. At that moment, he sensed something different about her, something ancient and benevolent. He blinked, and she was back to normal. She left to tell the rest of the Bladebreakers. He stared at her retreating back, puzzling over the strange feeling that had just come across him. He thought about what she had said. The warrior of the phoenix. Maybe there was a chance that Kai could get out on his own.

It was dark. Too dark to see. Kai breathed, feeling the huge strain on his chest, like it was wrapped up in tight bands. It misted out in front of him. That was strange, wasn't it supposed to be June? He tried to lift his hand, but it felt like it was a block of lead. His whole body felt like it. And yet he couldn't feel the ground or anything beneath him. He closed his eyes, sifting through his sluggish memories. Last thing he remembered was Tyson's warm arms around him as he lay unconscious on the floor. Then he had sunken into this state of black oblivion. Oblivion. A word many people used to describe the sensation of death. But he wasn't dead, he knew that. But at the same time, he wasn't fully alive either. He was on the edge of death, waiting for one single moment where everything he held precious in his mind would be lost forever. Light filtered into the darkness, casting a pale sheen across him and his surroundings. This place was familiar. Where had he seen it before... this was the lake in Russia where he had nearly drowned before! Except that this time... he was beneath the ice instead of above it. The cold winter sun seemed to look on him in disdain, because it shed little light and absolutely no heat. He shivered and closed his eyes to let dreams claim him. The last thing that flitted through his head was, "Tyson. Help me." A tiny voice in a world where no-one even knew he was there.

Garnet sat on her bed, clutching at Kai's Dranzer blade. Nothing she had said to Tyson had reassured her. They had little hope of getting Kai back. A tear trickled down her pink cheek, carving another path from the eyes red from crying. They had arranged for the battle to take place in 2 days. She held the beyblade to her chest and sobbed. She stared around the room, until her eyes met the mysterious book that her grandmother had sent her. She wiped the tears away and stared at the cover. There was nothing about it to suggest that anything was happening, but she felt an unmistakable urge to read it again. She knew that she wouldn't understand it but... she pulled the book towards her. She opened it. The first page... blue-grey symbols that swirled across the page like the teasing touch of the wind. The second... golden-yellow inscriptions that crowded the page like the suffocatingly close plants in a bamboo forest. The third... dark purple characters that rose and fell like waves. The fourth... she gasped. Before there had been scarlet signs that reminded her of crackling fire. Now those signs had rearranged themselves so that she could read them. It read, "The spirit of the phoenix calls. He is trapped in a place of darkness, where ice reigns. Slowly, over time, the feeling of being deserts him. He will freeze over, the flame of his heart extinguished by brutal cold. Only the spirit of love and compassion and the spirit of the guardian will save him, raising him from the ashes."

"The guardian?" Garnet whispered, eyes closed, Dranzer slipping out of her hand.

When she opened them again, the writing had converted back to gibberish. She laid a hand over her forehead. She turned back to the front page where her grandmother's handwriting gleamed. She finally understood.

"I am the guardian."

Kai opened his eyes. The sun was beginning to sink, the Russian sky dyed bright crimson, the snow clouds and pale pink. He shivered. He had always hated snow-clouds. It meant the bringing of ice and the bitter cold. He turned his gaze to his hand as he tried to lift it again. His eyes widened in shock. His fingers had a thin coating of ice over them. They were totally numb.

TTTT I hate doing this to him. And no, he isn't dead. I hate killing off my characters. Though this was really hard to write, this chapter is probably one of my best. In my opinion anyway.