To say I am in shock would be the understatement of the year. One chapter got 29 reviews! I have entire fics that haven't got half of that! A huge, heartfelt thank you from a delighted authoress to: Nedunque, Thiendrah, chibirei1227, XxSuIcIdAl LullabyxX, tntiggris, hoshicat, Amber,(thankyou for the lovely review!) Intense Innocence, dark-night-sky (), lilhazel nutta, Platinum Rei, Black-Dranzer-1119, a-devoted-life, Daray Cybele, spookpook1, NKingy, KenshinGal128, Maci May, SilkYuzu, (Your comments were a great help in writing this!)Dayna2, Angie, natasha, Sora Keyblader, miriam906,AnimeQueen48, Lirin Sama, hieinkurama, CrzyFreek09 andPlushie-Sensei.
Luv you all! (hugs) As a reward for the incredible amount of reviews, this chapter is about a page and a half longer than the last one.
Enjoy!
"Ray! Are you all right?" Tyson demanded, rushing up to his friend and predictably ignoring Kai in his concern. "What happened? Are you okay?"
"I'm fine, Tyson." Ray replied calmly.
"Are you?" Ray swivelled to glare at Kenny, who held his ground. "Are you?" the little genius repeated. Hating himself bitterly, Ray looked away and shook his head from side to side. A hand on his shoulder made him jump and he looked into Max's worried face.
"Why?" Max inquired curiously. "Tyson took the dog away, you know?" Ray nodded again, his mind racing in circles. They might as well find out right now.
"I know. I can't smell her anymore." The room fell silent. Puzzled looks were sent his way.
"What do you mean?" Max asked slowly.
"Is this related to…what happened when you saw the dog?" Kenny coloured in embarrassment.
"Yes." Silence again. Blunt as ever, Tyson spoke the question that no one else would dare even think with a degree of aggressiveness.
"What are you?" Unconsciously, Ray took a step backwards. Pressed against the door, he turned to Tyson and Kenny, the native Japanese in the group.
"A neko-jin." he stated. Kenny swallowed convulsively. Tyson burst out laughing.
"That's impossible, Ray! Stop joking around!"
"I don't joke about this." Tyson shrugged and pulled a face that clearly said: Have it your way, but I don't believe you.
"He's not joking." Everyone turned to stare at Kai, waiting for further explanation. Their leader just shrugged and folded his arms. No one, not even Ray himself, noticed his imperceptible movement towards Ray.
"He can't be!" Tyson blustered.
"Can't be what?" Max cried out, his large blue eyes bewildered. Glad to have something to do other than watch the furious sparks fly between Ray and Tyson, Kenny turned to the blond.
"You can speak Japanese, Max. Translate it." Max forehead crinkled.
"Cat-person?" he ventured uncertainly. Kenny nodded. "I still…don't get it…" Max admitted, shamefaced. Kenny slipped fully into lecture mode.
"Neko-jins are a supposedly mythical people. Legend has it that when humans were evolving from apes, somehow feline DNA entered a few of them. There have been certain…lewd theories about how this happened, but the scientific community tend to ignore them..."
"The scientific community ignores it full stop, Chief!" Tyson declared angrily. "It's a myth!" Kenny ignored his friend and continued talking.
"While what we would think of as "normal" humans, Homo sapiens, evolved into you and me, these few with feline DNA evolved too, into what is classified as Homo felis. They were few, very few, and instinctively hated by Homo sapiens. As a result, they were forced to live in secluded areas. Mountains, deep in the Amazon, even in deserts. All this has been worked out from actual evidence, but the "myth" of the hated cat-people who competed with our ancestors for food and living space has been warped into stories told at bedtime to frighten children, stories of a brutal, vicious race of half-breed monsters, tooabnormal to ever be accepted." Kenny ended his somewhat eloquent lecture and coloured furiously as he saw everyone's eyes on him. Max chewed his lip.
"So, they really exist?" he asked softly.
"Damn right." Ray snapped bitterly.
"Scientifically, yes. Bones have been found. Never a living specimen, though…" Kenny's voice trailed off. Alarm flared in Ray's mind.
"I won't be experimented on!" he snarled. Kenny looked outraged.
"I would never do that, Ray!" he shrilled. Ray backed down and stared at the floor.
"Sorry." he mumbled.
"But…that's…disgusting!" Tyson exploded, after a few seconds of fumbling for the right words. "Neko-jins are unnatural!"
"You saying I'm unnatural?" Ray hissed, rounding on Tyson like a hunted animal.
"Yeah!" Tyson shouted. "Humans are meant to be humans, not some kind of stinking crossbreed with a cat!" He let out a terrified cry as Ray pinned him to the wall, glittering golden eyes boring into him. His gaze was drawn to the long, razor-like fangs suddenly very much in evidence. "Everyone said your kind killed our kind." he whispered. "You gonna live up to your ancestors?" With a horrible hissing, yowling sound, Ray flung Tyson to the ground and stood over him, shaking in every limb.
"We killed you? Yeah, right!"
"I'm ri-"
"Humans killed my parents!" Once again, the room was deathly silent.
Ray stared down at Tyson, barely able to see him through the tears that swam in his eyes. "Yeah, that's right. Killed them in cold blood, purely because they were different. Do you know how old I was, huh? When Lee's grandfather found out what had been done and told me my parents weren't going to be coming back anymore?"
"…How old?" Tyson quavered at last.
"Three." The word came out as a sibilant half-growl, half-hiss. Somewhere, a sob was tangled up in there as well. Ray shut his eyes and fought to calm down. Suddenly, he felt someone hug him tightly. Opening his eyes again, he looked down at Max's blond head.
"I'm really sorry, Ray…" Max said softly, hugging Ray as tight as he could. A faint, dry smile flickered at the corner of Ray's mouth.
"Not your fault, Maxie. It was a long time ago." Max moved away, looking up at the neko-jin.
"So you're a…neko-jin?" He tried the phrase out nervously. Ray nodded. "What does that mean, though?" Ray shrugged.
"It means I've got brilliant athletic abilities, and flawless senses. I can also see at night. You know, just your ordinary guy." His tone was self-deprecating, his eyes darkening as he saw the well-hidden fright in Max's eyes.
"You wish." Tyson muttered darkly.
"You're right, Tyson, I do wish I was an ordinary guy!" Ray yelled, his temper blazing back into life. "I wish I wasn't an orphan, too, but that doesn't help! And if you hadn't brought that pathetic mangy bitch here, I wouldn't be standing here feeling like I am right now!" He swung around, tears stinging his eyes, and prepared to run.
It always happened. People always turned away, hated him, were scared of him. Sooner or later, the only thing left to do was run. Run and run, and get away from anyone and anything who knew about him. Because sooner or later, he would end up like his parents. Dead. Or like Gary's parents; so used to being called freaks that eventually they had begun to believe it themselves. He didn't want that.
And if life and sanity meant never having real friends, meant moving homes whenever his secret was found out, then so be it.
"Ray." Everyone turned to Kai, who had been standing silently in the doorway until now. He stepped forwards. "Come with me."
"Why should I?" Ray shot back.
"Because I said so, Kon!" Everyone's head snapped round from their resumed staring at Ray to gape at Kai. Their captain's eyes were glowing a deep, fiery red, an angry scowl on his usually emotionless face.
"I don't care what you said!" Ray snarled, his golden eyes wild, face twisted in a grimace of distrust and fear. He darted forwards, trying to get past Kai and flee, but instead found himself trapped against the wall in the same way that he had trapped Tyson, mere inches from Kai's unexpectedly menacing face, his hands pinned above his head. Automatically, feeling threatened, his lips drew back in a hiss, baring his two enamel weapons.
"I am your captain, you will listen to what I say!" Kai whispered, his voice low and venomous. He drew back slightly, keeping Ray immobile by leaning his entire weight on Ray's wrists. Cornered, Ray shrank backwards slightly. He didn't understand this. Why was Kai so angry, when previously he had been so bizarrely accepting? What had he done? Had he said something?
"Why do I even care how you're behaving?" he muttered inaudibly. He tipped his head up and stared Kai defiantly in the face. "If you let me go, I'll leave, and none of you will ever have to hear of me again." Wincing as the pain in his wrists increased, Ray realised with bewilderment that Kai had either not heard him - impossible, they were only inches from each other - or was deliberately ignoring him. Feeling suddenly claustrophobic, the need to escape became overwhelming. "Let me go!" he yelled at last, writhing and twisting, unable to move either his hands or his feet, since Kai was effectively standing on them.
"R-Ray?" Ray turned his head. Wild golden eyes met unhappy blue, and he realised that Max was crying. "Why do you want to r-run away? D-Do you really hate us that much?" the blond demanded, tears falling fast down his freckled face. With a soft, confused chirrup, Ray relaxed, staring at Max though he was speaking in another language.
"No…" he whispered. "I don't hate you. I thought you hated me… you should hate me…" Unprepared for Kai suddenly releasing him, he fell forward, saved from crashing to the hard floor at the last second by Kai. "I… I don't get it…" he whispered, his eyes bleak.
"Tyson, Kenny, Max, leave us alone for a while." It wasn't a question, and even Tyson dared only to open his mouth for a brief moment before a glare compelled him to exit without delay. At a loss as to what was going on, Ray looked up at Kai, who moved away from him and sat down with his back against the wall, eyes closed. "What don't you get?" Kai said at length, without opening his eyes.
"You." Ray mumbled. "I mean, Tyson's disgusted by me, Kenny wants to use me as a lab animal and run tests, Max is scared witless, but you're…" He trailed off with an exasperated wave of his hand. "You're…not. It's like you don't care about what I am. It's… not normal." Kai stared at him evenly. Standing up with a grunt, he paced slowly to the other end of the room and began to speak in a low, flat monotone.
"Tyson's scared of the tales he has been told, the horrific things he's been told, and of things changing so abruptly. Not you directly, but what neko-jins as a race represent for him. Kenny would never dream of doing anything like that to you, and would no doubt be very hurt that you would think it of him. He is an intellectual above everything else, and it was only normal for him that scientific facts took the place of emotions when he found out about you. Max is scared, yes, but he isn't particularly scared of the fact that you're a neko-jin. He's scared of the way you are acting, the fact that you seem so positive that the whole world loathes you. He's never experienced anything like this before, none of them have. But they're still your friends." Ray snorted in disbelief.
"And you?" he asked curtly. "What about you?" Reaching the end of the room, Kai leant against the wall, arms folded, eyes shut.
"I know what it's like." he said quietly. "To be different. I know how it makes you feel."
"How?" Ray demanded sceptically. "You're human." Kai sighed.
"Yes, I am." He moved away from the wall and began to walk over to Ray again. "For as long as I can remember, Ray, my grandfather has been in control of my life. I wasn't allowed to play with anyone of my own age, only to beyblade against people that Grandfather found worthy, and there were few enough of those. At the age of four, he put me in the Abbey, where I found Black Dranzer, decided I wanted it, and nearly killed myself in the process." He smirked. Ray stayed silent. His panic and rage were slowly fading away, replaced by wonder that Kai was doing the one thing that he and the rest of the Bladebreakers had been trying to convince him to do since they first met.
Open up.
"He realised that I was too self-willed for the strict, military lifestyle at the Abbey and took me home with him. For the next decade, he had full control over me. I was not, and still am not, registered in any hospital or church of any sort, I had no birth certificate, I was nonexistent to the authorities. He could do whatever he liked." One hand rose and touched the blue markings on his cheek lightly for a second. "He certainly took that opportunity. I wasn't allowed outside if there was anyone else around, and the idea of sending me to school was out of the question. He wanted a puppet, someone who would do exactly what he asked. At fourteen, it became obvious that I was never going to be what he wanted. He dropped all pretence of caring for me - until then, he had tried relatively hard to maintain the façade of a kind, loving grandfather even through all the psychological torment he put me through - and we moved to Japan." Ray couldn't help raising an eyebrow.
"So that's why you were living there." he muttered, almost to himself. Kai nodded.
"It was. When we got there, he let me run wild. His only rules were that I must always be the best beyblader within a six-mile radius, and friends were forbidden. When he discovered that I was leading the Blade Sharks, he ordered the team and I to start collecting beyblade parts, specifically the bit-chips. He told me that this was to help him locate Black Dranzer. Foolish as I was when he was around, I believed him. Then I met Tyson, and the rest you know." He was standing very close to Ray now and looking down at the younger blader with a strange light dancing in his eyes. "So yes, I know what it's like to feel different; to know that you don't belong." Once again, a hand rose to his cheek. "I know how people stare and judge before they should."
There was a long silence, until Ray spoke again, forcing the words up through anger that felt almost artificial. He had to be angry, he had to be scared. That was just…how it worked.
"Was that supposed to make me feel sorry for you?" Something ugly flashed in Kai's eyes for a second, but it was gone almost as soon as it had appeared, replaced by a cold, calculating stare. He crouched down until he was level with Ray and reached out. Ray shivered involuntarily as Kai's cool, dry palm rested briefly on his arm.
"Why are you so scared?" Kai murmured, his voice low and intense. "Why are you so determined to hate anyone who knows who you are?" Ray tried to look away, tried to get up and leave, but found himself physically unable to tear his eyes away from Kai's. The twin pools of magma bored into him and a pressure built in his chest. A headache began to pierce away his composure.
"Because I am." he mumbled softly. "Sometimes I'm so scared it feels like my head's splitting. You don't know what it's like, living your life just waiting for someone to find out your secret. They find out, they hate me, they're frightened of me, sometimes they even hurt me. It never changes. You don't have a clue what it's like. And I have to be scared, I have to run, because if I don't, I'll…" He trailed off and screwed his eyes tightly shut, shaking his head helplessly from side to side. Tears burned like acid behind his closed eyelids.
"You'll end up like your parents." Kai finished, his voice calm and steady. Ray nodded once. "Over my dead body." The sentence was spat out with a sudden fury. Ray opened his eyes and made a sound of incomprehension.
"What do you mean?" he asked, his voice barely audible. Something akin to an electric shock jolted through him as Kai laid a hand on his arm again.
"That's my job isn't it, as team captain? To protect my team mates?" came the almost casual response.
Ray felt like screaming. Kai didn't understand at all, he didn't know just how abnormal Ray was. On top of being from another branch of humanity. Well, there was only one way to show him… Leaning forward, he kissed Kai with an almost animalistic fervour. Now you'll see. he thought to himself viciously. For a second, thought processes seemed to stop, frozen in expectation. He came back to awareness realising that Kai hadn't pulled away in the revulsion and horror that he had been expecting. Far from it. Kai's arms slid around him and he reluctantly allowed the older blader to take control.
It wasn't a soft, chaste, nervous kiss, it was a harsh, hot battle of lips and tongue and the occasional tooth, with heads tilting this way and that, and short, gasping breaths escaping the participants when the need arose. Finally, Kai moved backwards, his crimson eyes dark and oddly soft.
Ray felt hot all over, trembling with a feeling that wasn't fright, and it wasn't anger. It wasn't even happiness. It was something deeper, something that he didn't want to examine too deeply for fear of it escaping.
"Kai?" he mouthed, his voice sticking in his throat. He licked his lips a few times. Wordlessly, Kai pulled him into another deep kiss.
"Don't be scared, Ray." he murmured as he moved his head back a little. "Don't try to run. You're safe now." The words sounded alien to Ray.
"But…Kai…" He blushed scarlet as a sudden low purr rumbled out of his chest. Kai laughed quietly and stood.
"Get up, tiger." Ray stayed where he was. Frowning slightly, Kai bent down and took Ray's head in his hands. "It's okay, Ray, you understand? It's okay."
"It's not okay! I'm a-"
"You're a neko-jin. And I don't care." Ray blinked, then sighed in defeat and closed his eyes. A soft, contented purr echoed through the room as he leant into his new-found safety, felt strong arms close securely around him. You're safe now.
"Thanks, Kai."
I don't know whether it shows, but that ending was really difficult to write.I don't know why,I just couldn't find a satisfactory way of ending it. Hope that was okay.
Anyway, please review! If I get another 29 reviews I will be in so much heaven... (sighs blissfully)
If I get below 19, I'm not writing another chapter (glares) I think it would benefit from just one more chapter. Unless anyone thinks otherwise?
So, as usual, all opinions welcome except for flames, and I hope you all review!