Through the fire
by Ajedrez
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Disclaimer: Standard disclaimers apply.
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Summary:
After a tragic loss, the Bladebreakers are finally back on track, only to find themselves and their friends in another of those 'situations'. Secrets and lies, new threats and new hopes. Things aren't always what they seem. A changed outlook on the past might just provide new perspectives for the future. (Set in two timelines after the first season.)
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AN:
Sooo, surprisingly soon here is the next chapter. For now, things are only loosely connected, but in the course of the story they should fall in place – if you stick with it...
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IV. (Cal & Alex)
Just a few miles across the northern border, a tall, dark-haired teen known as Cal, turned off the TV in his room and grabbed his beyblade, feeling inspired by what he had just seen from the tournament in Japan. After donning a light jacket and pocketing his keys, the 18-year old left for the nearby park to meet some of his beyblading friends.
On his way there, he passed a little corner shop that was boarded up and hesitated for a moment, contemplating it. What a pity. That quirky little place had until recently been the home of the very best beyblade shop in town. It was not a fancy store like they had in the big malls, yet the owner had at his disposal every little bit of supply that you could have wished for, adding to that more than the necessary expertise while charging the lowest prices.
For the kids who were really into their sport, it had been the first address in the whole area, especially after old Billy had taken in an assistant about a year ago. That one admittedly was even more peculiar than the shop owner himself, but had an extensive knowledge of the beyblades, that even put his boss to shame. Even more remarkably, this assistant most probably was no older than most of their teenage customers, but no-one really knew for sure.
Cal continued on his way. At some point, his mother had forbidden him to go there. She had accompanied him once and thought the strange teen was dangerous – probably a street kid hiding from the cops. Her son, on the other hand, was impressed by how that boy knew what was wrong with your blade within seconds after you had handed it to him. To Cal, the other was simply mysterious and therefore fascinating – and of course Cal never listened to his mother where beyblading was concerned.
Unfortunately, Billy had been quite old and his health had not been what it used to be, so it did not really come as a surprise when he had been found dead on the floor of his shop one morning, just about two weeks ago.
The dark-haired teen wondered what had become of the assistant. The fact that he had simply vanished after the death of his boss seemed to support the theory that he had simply been a stray. The teen felt sorry for the other boy – old Billy had surely made his life a little easier, and now he was gone.
As he drew closer to the park, he realized there was a figure up ahead, moving in the same direction as he did, but hard to discern since he was wearing darker clothes and was sticking to the shaded side of the street. He squinted his eyes to see more clearly.
"Speak of the devil..." Cal thought grinning to himself, since there was only one person he knew who could remain so invisible without trying.
In his opinion, it had only added to the mystery surrounding Billy's assistant, when he had realized how effortlessly the other boy always kept to the shadows, with the hood of his sweater effectively hiding his features. He seemed almost like a shadow himself when he wasn't helping out in the shop. On anyone else it might have looked a little ridiculous, but this guy was always carrying himself with such calm determination, nobody really thought anything about it.
Still, Cal could not help finding the other extremely intriguing. So he kept his eyes trained on the shape ahead of him and watched the boy hesitate and stop in front of a shop window of a large electronics store. As he neared, he could make out what had caught the other's interest.
"Ah, the re-run of the Bladebreakers' success in the Japanese nationals..." Slowly he approached the boy who, for all he could tell, seemed deep in thought.
"Hi, Alex," he greeted him, addressing the hooded figure by the name he had heard the old man use. The other unhurriedly turned his head, as if he had known all along that he was behind him. Sometimes he seemed to have eyes in the back of his head. The hooded boy only returned his greeting with a simple nod, but then Cal knew not to expect anything else...
"Great tournament, wasn't it? Did you see the live broadcast?" Cal never knew any inhibitions trying to connect to people – be they somewhat different or not.
When the other simply shrugged and turned back to the screen, Cal simply changed the topic (Of course the other probably did not have a TV, he thought to himself with a little self-reproach).
"Are you heading to the park, too?" Alex was known to sometimes watch the other kids beyblade and from time to time help them out, when something was amiss with their equipment, even though Cal had never seen him demonstrate his own skills.
The other nodded again, this time hesitatingly, and together they went on in what could have been considered companionable silence, if it was not for the fact that one of them could never have uttered a word even if he wanted to, while the other was silently contemplating his strange companion.
Alex' clothes – washed-out navy jeans and a black sweater – were rather worn, though impeccably clean, and Cal wondered if he had ever seen him in colours lighter than dark blue. The very slender boy had his hands pushed deep into the pockets of his sweater, but Cal knew that Alex most probably was wearing the ever present accessory which Cal found more than cool. Black gloves with the caps cut off to reveal claw-adorned fingertips instead of your normal nails. Cal had once tried to obtain gloves like that, but had been unable to find a shop that sold them, and Alex had typically refused an answer when questioned where he got his.
A slight stumble by his companion tore him out his thoughts and he cast a worried glance toward the slightly smaller teen which was simply ignored.
Cal wondered if there was anyone who cared for the other when he was sick, if he had a shelter during the nights, which were now gradually getting colder as autumn drew closer. Did he get enough to eat now that Billy was dead? Why didn't he seem to have a home? Where did he come from?
Cal was immensely curious, but he knew that Alex would not grant him the answers, so he refrained from asking the dozens of questions that were on his mind. As soon as they entered the beyblade area of the park, Alex hung back a little and Cal was quickly surrounded by his friends, forgetting about the other boy.
Had Cal been able to read minds, he might have received a few of the answers he wished for, but as it was, the boy called Alex was the only one whose thoughts were going back in time, to one of the days he had been "born"...
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It had been a cold evening, when he met Billy for the first time. The first snow had fallen a few days prior, and he was awfully hungry, so he had left the shelter he had found a few days earlier in order to scout out the area. He was new to this city, after having travelled thousands of kilometres and crossing a whole continent mostly on foot and all alone.
It was by sheer luck that he had found the abandoned, but inhabitable part of an old factory building on one of his first days here and it had been too good an opportunity to go to waste. It wasn't like anyone would come looking for him there. At that time he was still a little more paranoid after all that had happened, still uncomfortable in his own skin and confused about his options, but, for the first time in a long while, he felt invited to stay, and so he did.
That very evening he was unashamedly checking the waste containers behind a fast food diner, when he was surprised by one of the workers there who wanted to empty a dustbin into the container and yelled at him, what the hell he was doing there. Shame and disgust about what he had to do had long ago faded in face of the pure necessity to find something edible. Still, he needed to stay out of trouble. Unable to explain himself verbally, he opted to take his exit as fast as possible.
His escape landed him in an area he had not been to before. As he tentatively looked into the next best container there, he almost froze when he found it filled with broken beyblade parts, and he could not help digging through the pieces wonderingly. Maybe he could find something useful. Then once again that night, a door opened to bathe him in a stream of light. Taking a defensive stance, he cursed his bad luck. Yet he was to find out that luck comes in many disguises.
The figure behind the door revealed himself to be an old, slightly hunch-backed man who, surprisingly, did not yell at him, but told him matter-of-factly: "You won't find anything to eat in there, you know, son. But if you find something of interest to you, you may keep it. Just don't leave a mess."
He had slowly closed the lid and made to leave, when a hesitant voice told him to wait. Despite his better judgement, he did just that. When the old man returned slowly, he handed him a small package which he later found out contained a little bread and cheese. He bowed in thanks and hurried away, before the old man could change his mind.
He could not help it, although he knew he was treading on dangerous ground, but he felt drawn back to that place, the back of a beyblade shop, as he later learnt during one of his daytime tours. He often returned to see whether he could not find parts he could use. For a while he did not see the old man (or any other person in the neighbourhood) again. What he did not know then was that he was being watched regularly as he instinctively took the few good parts that had "accidentally" slipped into the waste.
It was a few weeks later, when a coughing fit had him almost doubled over next to the shop's back entrance, that he met the old man again, who put a blanket around him and helped him up and into the warmth of the house.
Above the shop, there was a cosy little apartment filled with odd bits and pieces related to beyblading. The old man introduced himself as Billy and gave his young guest a steaming mug of tea, only raising an eyebrow when the other did not remove his hood nor introduced himself in return. The second brow followed, when he noticed the claw-like fingers closing around the mug.
Trying every language he knew (which limited his possibilities to English and French) did unsurprisingly not help in drawing out his guest. Exasperatedly he even turned to sign language which he happened to know. This finally caught the boy's interest. The old man noticed the change and suddenly understood. Hurriedly he searched for pen and paper – and that was the beginning of a strange, but wonderful friendship in which he would gladly take to helping the shop-owner in exchange for sign-language lessons and the odd meal.
When asked for his name, the boy considered a little while on what to say. He had been called many things in his relatively short life. Apart from the usual first names he had been given, "weakling", "traitor", "freak" and "monster" came unbidden to his mind. In the end, not feeling overly creative, he simply settled for "Alex"...
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TBC
AN: Could it be I'm seeing the wheels turning in your heads? Yeah, well reviews are always appreciated...
04/14/06