Disclaimer: I take no credit whatsoever for any element of this piece pertaining to Beyblade: including characters, setting, etc, etc… It belongs, and rightfully so, to its creator – Aoki Takao.

I Hate Him

By Dixon Oriole

Everyone knows it—I do, he has to by now… I hate him and the proof is his blood smeared across my fists, red matching the dripping red all over his nose and his jaw and I'm pretty sure it's coming out of his mouth now too, staining the pristine starch-white of his jacket. And I'd wondered if he even bled...

The proof is my chokehold on his throat, kneeled over his helpless body, my expression reflected in his eyes intent, the muscles in my arms fighting to squeeze the very life out of him as this irate little voice in my brain restrains them and says over and over again "don't do it" and this other part replies "but it's so easy…"

Even though there are people yelling at me and trying to pry me away, I'm not budging; I'm digging my fingernails into the soft skin and savoring the wild pulse fluttering beneath the press. I'm staring down into his face, and that part of me that says "don't do it" is crying out and trying to alert the other part that there isn't any self-satisfied smirk on the horrified boy. There is an expression of shock: that so often smiling mouth agape, attempting in vain to suck in some tiny amount of air, and the wide, the wide, wide blue-green eyes might just hold a little bit of terror.

It's not that expression I hated, though I hated him most when he wore it—it was just him… so if he isn't smirking or saying anything (he's gasping right now) or… if… it doesn't bother me. I hated, hate, him any way he is. I'll hate him while he's alive and curse his memory when he's dead.

I want him dead. I want to choke and shake his soul free and watch it spiral down to hell, and then I'll sew up his mouth and rip out his eyes and yank all of the soft orange hair, gleaming now like it always does in the sunlight, however matted with blood. I'm not going to take any chances with him ever getting into my head or under my skin again—I'm going to destroy everything that made me think of him or dream of him or wish he was dead.

He's gawking up at me and I'm staring down at him and I can't help but grin, just a little, short grin… He's trying his very hardest to pry my fingers away from his throat, his hands grasping and legs twitching and there are these annoying others trying to drag me off of him, screaming things that are supposed to make a person think twice—or at least look up—but I can just shoulder them away and he'll be unconscious in a moment. It'll be disappointing not to see this fear, but I can comfort myself knowing that it's only a matter of minutes after that... If all else fails, I'll just snap his neck.

God, I hate him.

When I first saw him I didn't know what to think, but I know what to think now. I know he's not sane and he's never really loved or hated anything in his stupid life, that he's so easily manipulated, and I know he'd hurt people just because he could, or because he wanted something. He's a weapon… He was in the wrong hands once and I know it'll happen again. He's dangerous and it's not smart to keep him around.

But I'm not doing this for anyone else, to protect anyone else.

This is for me.

This is for what he did to me and because of what I was once told in Russia. They told me I was a natural… I was genetically perfect and one day I would be unbeatable. They told me that I was a machine, made for the sport and nothing else. They told me that it was my life, and no one would ever come along who would take this purpose away from me—this purpose to be perfect. And they promised me power. They promised me my perfection. They said nobody could take it away from me—

But he did.

I was fighting like I always have and I'd still be fighting in just the same way if not for him. As he tore me apart without even… without even sweating or caring or… I think he was laughing at me and I hate him more than ever for it…

As he killed me I looked up, just for a second, and saw that man who had promised me everything in Russia. The very man that told me what I was. I don't think that he lied to me back then. I can't think that. But he wasn't even watching—he didn't even glance at me. He was gazing at this little twerp that I'm killing, the very same way that I'd felt that malicious gaze before… I remember it in my dreams. And I had lost my purpose to this thing. I had lost everything I was. He just—took it, without even wanting it, without even understanding that I needed…

It was a terrible revelation I made then. I'm glad I made it, but that doesn't numb the pain. I'd never realized before him all the hate I felt and suppressed, all the hate I could channel, all the hate I could find in myself—this beautiful, frightening, fathomless lake reflecting fire in the lowest level, the bottom of my heart, the place that nobody goes. I looked into it then and saw him at the forefront… but it was worse that I saw everyone I've ever met behind him. I saw how I could loathe them, I saw that if I really wanted to, I could scratch hate out of nothing—that I would find reasons if I only looked for reasons.

I saw everyone I'd thought I almost loved and I'll never be able to fight like I did again. I'll never be able to resist that rage I wasn't aware I had.

I was pathetic. I was so pathetic that people saw it and spoke to the back of my head and I wanted to—I wanted all of them dead. But more than that, I wanted them to be wrong. I had to prove them wrong. But when it was over and I had nothing left, and he was smiling like he always does and he was smiled down upon, I couldn't find it in myself. I just couldn't find my purpose anymore.

I was never as pitiful as after that lousy fight—that stupid, shut-out fight that a different me could have won in my sleep. I have won it in my sleep. I've dreamed it over and over again and known how different it would have been if I could have just—

It wasn't enough to beat him for him to leave my head. It's like he's ingrained there, smirk and all. It's like he's some horrible reminder of what it really means to be a natural, and his being in this world means that they lied to me, all those years ago in Russia. His being alive means that I've always been wrong… about everything. That I have dedicated my life to nothing.

So I've got to kill him.

It wasn't enough to beat him and see him scared or finally not feeling those adoring eyes from the balcony on somebody else, and it wasn't enough to see him beaten again or standing there like some kind of pseudo-human, tired, smiling. It wasn't enough, and now I want to burn his face off for what he did to me.

It wasn't enough that he's supposedly reformed and living. No matter how much they said he'd changed… I know, I still know what he is, just as he made me forget what I was.

He made me question myself and I… don't… question myself. I never debated what I was or what I was meant to be. They said that I was perfect for this and that I had to rise to deserve that kind of perfection—they said it was my purpose and my destiny to be the best. And then they called him a genius as he beat me. And then they felt sorry for me when I would have died to defeat him. I would have died to kill him—I'll die right now, I don't care.

But he goes first.

Once he's dead, I'll have my purpose back and no one to get in the way of it again. They said I was a natural… genetically perfect, and it was me that cringed under that gaze and me that was the secret weapon and me that went to sleep knowing that each day of pain brought me one step closer to my destiny. After him—after him I was afraid that each day of pain brought me nothing.

He's got to die now. Because I won't be pathetic in front of these people and I won't lose myself. Because I won't let anyone have the power over me that he does—making me hate him so much and act on the hate. Because I won't be controlled by my emotions like this. He's blacking out, and I'm just… glad.


A/N: This was written alongside earlier chapters of The People With Wings… It sums up a lot of what's said there, and a little more, but because it's in Kai's perspective, and Kai only knows so much… it doesn't cover everything. Something's odd about the way it's written—but I like it anyway. It's also, very much so, a one-shot. Nothing comes next. Not even a tidy little, "and then he woke up" ending. Thank you for reading. Comments fuel my soul.