I'm so sorry that so late uploading! I'm had a lot of changes happening in my life lately which have made things a little crazy, also I now have to incorporate battles which I am absolutely not looking forward to. -_-'

Thank you all for pressuring me into finishing, even if it's only a very small chapter. I swear I'm still here and still working on it. I likely only have a few more chapters to go now and after working on this for almost exactly a year it's sad to see it coming to the end. I'm sorry this is so short, but I don't want to keep you waiting for even longer so I figured I would give it to you now and make the battle it's own chapter.

Thanks for sticking with me, everyone!

One month later…

Back when I was still in school, my psychologist had said something to me about the stages of grief and how you would eventually learn to accept it and move on. In a way, she wasn't wrong; I had accepted that my mother and sister would not be coming back, eventually turning the fear I once had of parental abandonment into a fear of losing the small amount of memories I had in regards the family I had lost.

Grief is not set in stone, though…

Now walking the halls of the busy hospital with Rei at my side, we were able to find the room Tyson had been staying in with ease, entering to the sound of the usual bickering that came with the territory of being near him and Hilary at the same time.

"Seems like he's feeling better." Rei smirked at me, an expression that I didn't return. "Maybe he'll come home and we can quit dividing his chores up."

Tyson was now on his second week in the hospital, acting as though he had needed his foot amputated instead of having a sprained ankle, which, to be fair, was sprained quite severely and although I had spent my fair share of time at his house in the past, it still felt odd to essentially be living there while we figured out what was happening with the team who was coming after us.

"It could have been a lot worse." I said as we walked in, no one noticing us over the shouting. "He got lucky… we all did."

Max was giggling at the scene in front of us as though watching a comedy show, ignoring the fact that in more than one instant, we had found ourselves near death.

"I don't think the really would have left us there to die." Rei continued. "We understand what they're after now and even if they had managed to get their hands on our Sacred Beasts, the chances of them being able to control them are slim."

"We aren't out of the woods yet. They'll be back."

It took me actually leaning over the post of Tyson's bed for him to stop talking long enough to realize that we were here, now giving a cheeky smirk in our direction.

"Did you get me a gift?" He asked. "The least you could do when visiting someone in the hospital is bring a gift, they even have a store dedicated to it near the entrance."

"Would you for once just take this seriously?" Hillary said with a glare, clearly not finished fighting with him. I almost felt bad about breaking the sexual tension with my presence, silently wondering if he even realized that she was starting to grow fond of him, even if she would never admit it.

"I guess she has a point." Max said, "I'm not gonna claim that things weren't serious before, but the authorities are involved now. I prefer being on the news because of a big win, not because we ended up kidnapped."

Although I was gradually managing to keep my mind occupied, Max's statement brought back the thoughts I was attempting to bury.

Did Wyatt realize that we had been declared missing? He would have to have known, it was embarrassingly big news, even if we didn't even make it to the 24 hour mark. My father had been working with Mr. Dickenson and Tyson's grandpa in order to find us and get us back home, but he had kept Riku out of the loop, pretending that everything was fine until Kenny managed to reach them and give our whereabouts.

Honestly, Kenny was the real hero in all this… they might not have found us without him.

"So, Kai..." I was jolted back to reality by Tyson's use of my name. "Were you able to talk to your case worker about what happened?"

"She understands that my father wasn't at fault." I mumbled. "No one knows where exactly that bus came from… but being in foster care or in school wouldn't have stopped it."

"She's not taking you away then, right?"

"I'm not going anywhere, but we still need to keep my whereabouts on the down low. I'm not really supposed to be staying anywhere other than the home I was put in, it can cause issues if anyone finds out I've been staying at your house."

"You're trying to protect your little brother, no one can fault you for that."

"If anyone learns the reality of the danger we're in, Riku could be taken away too. No one can know that I've been staying there, I mean it."

The laughter and irrelevant conversation had stopped completely at some point in our discussion, bringing everyone's eyes and ears to us. We didn't know what was going to happen from here on out, but we had reason to be worried.

"As long as everyone important is aware of the situation and how it can affect them, they'll be able to keep themselves safe." Kenny said.

"How, though? We still don't even know who these people are. Sure, we may have some understanding of what they want, but we can't trust anybody at this point."

"Kai, I don't want you to take this the wrong way but..." Rei interrupted, clearly not on my side right now. "You have trust issues, we don't fault you for that. We're doing everything we can to keep everyone else out of our battles but we aren't going into hiding. Your father and step mother are the ones in charge of Riku's safety, not you."

Although they claimed to understand, it was clear that they didn't. I had left a life in which I had no one; now the ones I did have were in the process of realizing how much better off they would be without me. I had never believed I would want a family; maybe in some ways I still didn't, but I had a brother to worry about and it wasn't just him, there was also Wyatt…

I could no longer recall the last time I had spoken to him before he gave up on me. I didn't like thinking about it, I worked too hard to avoid thinking about him to warrant remembering. I had gone from talking to someone practically every day to having them disappear and honestly, there were times where I mourned that loss as though he had died. My only true goal had destroyed everything that I held dear and in my determination to keep him safe, I had pushed him away more and more. Now that he was gone, there was a possibility of danger that I would never even know about, let alone be able to stop.

It had happened to Kenny and Hillary, what evidence did I have that Wyatt would be safe?

Xxx

Things calmed themselves when Tyson left the hospital, meaning we were able to focus once again on our training, working hard in order to figure out how easy or difficult it would be to defeat those who were after us… Team PsyKick, they called themselves.

"You're gonna wear yourself out." Rei stated, eyeing me somewhat uncomfortable as I continued training. The rest of my team had sat down at this point, taking a break from the hours we had gone through. "You can't train for this long without rest… you should at least eat something."

"I'm not hungry." I mumbled. "If you guys can't keep up with me, I can just go somewhere else..."

I knew I was being snippy, but similar to how I had felt before Wyatt broke me down, I didn't care.

"Rei has a point, Kai." Kenny now began, laptop open and fingers typing aggressively. "You might be doing fine now but if you continue like this without taking any breaks it isn't going to last. The human body can only handle so much."

"I said I'm fine." I grunted.

"Honestly, I think Kai has the right idea." Tyson smirked, giving a slight nod as he stood up. "The best way to improve is to keep pushing ourselves." He approached me, launcher now in grip and pointed in my direction. "Not that I don't think I can still take you on. I might have been in the hospital but that doesn't mean I can't still kick your ass in the stadium."

"Last time I checked, your talents aren't based around your ability to be a smart ass."

"You're all talk." He smirked.

Either way, I agreed to fight him, intrigued at the prospect of facing a somewhat new challenge. Sure, we had battled many times, but it had been awhile since we were given a chance to, school and life in general getting in the way of our training until summer was able to open our schedules back up once again.

Now concentrating only on the beyblades that clashed in front of us, our power near equally matched, I was able to tune out the rest of the world around me. I was able to temporarily forget about the danger we faced, to forget about the life I was leaving behind… briefly, I was able to forget about Wyatt.

Maybe it would have lasted longer, but all things come to an end.

Everything happened so much faster than I could possibly comprehend, Tyson's blade along with mine being shot back into the air. Although startled, our reflexes kicked in quickly and we were able to catch them in our hands. A third blade had entered our small makeshift arena, a circle that Tyson had drawn with a stick into the dirt and rocks.

"Watch it!" He yelled, taking a step back.

Where had the blade come from? Where was it now? It had just been here, it had knocked us out in a sneak attack and had now vanished back to where it came.

"Who's there?" I shouted.

Although still unable to see my sudden onset opponent, I could hear the faint chuckle that came from the trees and bushes around us, my ears catching the shuffling of leaves and branches.

"Hey!" Tyson grunted, "If you wanted a battle you could have just asked. No need to be rude about it."

"Cool it." I mumbled. Now wasn't the time for him to be cheeky or to have a sudden boost of ego. "Come out."

As the large silhouette emerged from the woods in front of us, I felt an annoyance in the pit of my stomach. After everything that had happened lately I had assumed we were in danger.

"Long time no see, Kai." The boy snickered, tucking his dirty blond hair behind an ear that likely hadn't been touched with soap in awhile. He was the same person who I had fought on the rooftop, back when Wyatt and I had only recently become friends.

"What do you want?"

"If you don't know what I'm after then you're even denser than I initially thought."

Big words from a guy who looked like he had stowed away on a cargo ship.

"I already fought you. I'm not looking to waste my energy."

"I want a rematch." He smirked. "Our last battle was a draw and as much as I enjoyed our little bonding experience, that just isn't gonna be good enough for me."

"Your name is Dunga, right?" I asked, thinking back to some of the information that Kenny had been able to get a hold of. "Listen, I'm in the middle of training for matches that are actually going to matter, so if you don't mind, I'd appreciate it if you just left me alone."

Tyson was behind me now, likely taking in everything that was happening.

"This is the guy who you fought?" He asked me. "Some dumb gorilla man?"

Dunga glared at him.

"How about you mind your own business?" He said. "This is between Kai and me."

"I'm just saying." Tyson said, now smirking with a slight shrug of the shoulders. "When I heard someone had been good enough to draw with Kai in a battle, I had assumed it was someone who was actually cool. What trash can did you roll out of?" He had stepped in front of me now, launcher in hand. "If Kai isn't willing to take you on, I will."

"Knock it off." I said, elbowing him. "Last time I checked, you lost your match."

Dunga held out his launcher, battle stance as though he was fighting a battle of human strength. Aiming directly at me, he shot out his blade which took to the air, throwing itself in my direction and pointed directly at my head. I pulled out my own launcher, loading it and just about to pull my rip cord when it vanished.

The blade had been aimed for me, now it was gone.

I looked at Dunga again before drawing my attention to Tyson and then the ground. The two beyblades spun at each other in a circle, neither going in for an attack.

"I thought I told you to butt out!" Dunga yelled at him. "I'm Kai's opponent. He's the one I'm after."

He looked confused, their eyes meeting in uncertainty as he called his blade back and Tyson standing with a loaded launcher still out in front of him.

"That wasn't me." He said.

We all looked toward the still spinning blade, not taking our eyes off of it as it lifted itself back to it's caller with ease. Where had it come from, though? Who had launched it?

Continuing to focus my gaze, I watched the blade throw itself back up the steps of the beach front, a figure how standing at the top of the concrete stairs. Brown hair blew ever so slightly, eyes large and heavy as though the joy had been sucked out of them. He wore no smile; his face held only pain. Pain that I had caused him, harm that I would never be able to take back.

"Wyatt?"