Chapter 3

(Explanations pt. II)

Flashback

"In this room, Sir," the butler quietly bowed before opening the door for him.

Stanley smiled gratefully at the man before following him inside.

The sight that greeted him almost brought tears in his gentle eyes.

Kai lay on a bed, with his left arm and leg heavily wrapped in gauze, the same substance also covering a huge wound on the side of his forehead. There was a wheelchair next to the bed.

He went to the small boy, who was staring outside the window, and called his name in an overwhelmed voice.

Kai, hearing him, turned his head towards him, staring at him with deep crimson eyes.

"Kai, my boy, how long it has been since I last saw you. You have quite grown up," he let out shakily, a hearty chuckle leaving him as his heart exploded with the happiness that meeting boy, he'd failed to protect, alive brought.

Kai – or at least that's what everyone said his name was – gave him a quizzical look.

"Do I know you too?" he said in a voice that seemed more adult like than most kids' voice his age.

"I am Stanley Dickenson, Kai. The chairman of BBA in Japan. Don't you remember me?" he pressed, though he knew it would be hard for the boy to dig someone up from his memories of so many years ago.

"I guess, no," the bluenette let out.

"My bad, of course, it's been years. How would you remember an old chap like me?" he laughed lightly at the end, resting a gentle hand on the boy's ashen hair.

"That may be the case, Sir. But unfortunately, there is yet another reason for his forgetfulness," the butler, who had remained silent during the whole exchange, stepped forward.

Mr. Dickenson looked curiously at him.

"You see, Sir, when he was brought back, he had a severe injury on his head, along with the fractured bones. He had been in a coma for the last seven months. It's only been a week or so since he woke up. And when he woke up..."

He stopped and looked sympathetically at the bluenette who was again staring outside the window.

"When he woke up, he didn't remember anything. Not even his own name. The doctors say that he is suffering from amnesia. Whether it's permanent or not, they're not sure, but they say the injury on his head had damaged some part of his brain, resulting in a memory loss, and-"

He looked at the wheelchair with saddened eyes.

"Can he walk?"

Vladimir shook his head.

Mr. Dickenson sat looking at the floor for a few moments, finding it hard to digest the information. He had expected blood, he had expected bruises, he hadn't expected this.

His eyes moistened as he looked at the oblivious boy, his heart clenching at the thought of not doing anything to save him.

There was no one in his life, his own son and wife had died long ago, leaving him alone in this vast world, but he had borne the pain for long.

When he had seen Kai for the first time, in his mother's arms, he had felt a sudden burst of emotions in his heart, and that day the pain of having no family, no one to love, had dulled somewhat. He saw in those innocent big eyes, that were at the same time as similar and as different as they could be to his own grandfather's. The pain had increased manifold when Kai had been taken away, and his parents killed, but in a position as helpless as his own, he hadn't been able to do anything at all.

And now that same boy lay in front of him, having no idea of whatever was happening around him. Life was so unfair.

Suddenly, the boy looked at him with those same innocent eyes, and he felt even more ashamed at the thought of being such a coward.

The bluenette spoke, "Do you know about 'red'?"

Stanley raised an eyebrow, he hadn't understood what the boy meant.

"I said, do you know about 'red'?" he repeated himself, looking at him expectantly, his eyes radiating hope.

Stanley looked back at Vladimir, hoping for an explanation. The latter sighed, "This is the question he asks everyone who comes to see him, the doctors, the nurses, the maids, his Grandfather, everyone. No one knows what he means."

Mr. Dickenson frowned.

"Kai, my son, what do you mean by 'red'?" he asked softly.

The other's eyes saddened and he looked away.

"So you don't know either," his voice was laced with disappointment.

Mr. Dickenson tried, but could not get the boy to speak anymore, and on Vladimir's insist, left the room, his mind puzzled and confused.

"Maybe it was someone close to him in that place, whom hebremembers faintly," Vladimir spoke later, when he was about to sit in the taxi that would take him to the airport.

Mr. Dickenson sighed.

"I also thought that," looking back at him thankfully for the hospitality, he sat in his ride. "I will do what I can."

It was hard to listen to everything, and to know it was the truth rather the one they had believed to be, and for that, they were frustrated.

The fact that Boris had him the truth from them was infuriating. But more than that was the regret that they had believed him.

How could they?

Tala didn't know what to make of the muddle that was created in his aching head.

Mr. Dickenson continued, "And that's when I tried to search up whatever I could of the abbey – and mind you it wasn't easy – and I finally found a picture of you five. Most likely I found the picture because you were the beyblading champions in Russia at the time, otherwise I wouldn't have found anything at all. I immediately spotted you, Tala, and was sure that Kai was talking about you.

After a few months, when Kai was brought back to Japan, I went over to him. Luckily, the paralysis was temporary, and he could walk with the help of crutches. Vladimir was also there. I told him about what I found. He didn't let me tell Kai. He said that it was for the best if Kai doesn't remember his past, because it wasn't pleasant anyways. At the moment, he was free from all that, and could give life a new start, a better start. I agreed, there really is no better way to deal with a memory of something unpleasant than to just forget about it.

Kai, though, was persistent, he asked me every time I saw him about you, and there were quite a number of times when I almost told him. He always looked so miserable at not having gotten a satisfying answer. It was almost as if a parent was finding his lost child. But over the years, he grew more mature and quiet, and stopped asking. I thought that maybe he had finally found an answer himself, or had just forgotten about it. That is until the World Championships occurred, and he came to Russia. That's when everything must have started to make sense to him."

There was silence in the room, almost too thick that it could be cut with a knife. Various thoughts were encircling all of their minds.

But more than everything, it was the shame that was weighing them down, the shame of having believed Boris...

They had a hard time taking everything in. They had believed that Kai had acted indifferent to them when he arrived in the abbey before the world championships, because he didn't give a fuck about them, simply because he had betrayed them before already. But in actuality, he was too busy struggling with his own mind, the puzzled memories had confused him to a point that he wasn't much aware of the happenings around him. He was too caught up in trying to grasp at every piece of memory that he got back as he trudged along those same abbey walls that had kept him imprisoned for so many years.

He didn't hate them, it was them who had acted like they hated him.

And that's why he had kept away from them, wearing that mask of indifference behind which his heart was shattering.

He had finally gotten to what he had been finding missing in his life for so long, and now that he had found it...

Tala was suddenly feeling like he couldn't breathe. The way they had just treated Kai, the way he had treated Kai...

What would he even think of them? They had acted like they hated his guts. They had acted like he meant nothing to them, he had even said that he meant nothing to them.

He was feeling horrible, in the back of his mind, even after believing Boris' continuous lame excuses regarding Kai's absence, there was a tiny piece of hope left in him. That maybe, it all wasn't true. That maybe, his best friend was there somewhere, thinking about him the same way he was. Missing him the same way he was.

But they had shown Kai how much they hated him...

If not with their venomous words, then with their loath filled eyes…

Mr. Dickenson seemed to understand what they were all thinking. He cleared his throat, and grabbed their attention.

They looked up at him, their faces looking miserable, dull, and most of all regretful.

"Now, my boys, it is no good dwelling over the past. It is not late yet. Everything can be fixed, if one puts one's will to it. I am sure, if you actually talk to Kai, he will understand. After all, he cares about you all, whatever you may think about him. The guilt of having done what he did in his own consciousness makes him feel like he's the one at fault. And I'm sure you must also not be able to brush off that mistake of his."

They looked confused.

"Black Dranzer, I'm talking about wanting her, thinking maybe that her. You can blame him for being after power, but that's really not the real reason. You all, I am sure, must be quite attached to your bitbeasts. That's the same for Kai. And I understand that Kai's bitbeast is Dranzer, but black Dranzer is a part of Dranzerherself."

"So you mean..." Ian spoke up.

"Yes, Kai is the real master of Black Dranzer. If any other blader uses her, she won't accept him or her. As you must know already, bitbeasts choose their owners themselves, and Black Dranzer chose Kai. It was destined to happen. So there's really no reason for us to blame Kai for wanting her. She is connected to his mind the same way Dranzer is, more so if I dare say."

"But, then why couldn't he control her like he could control Dranzer?" the blond asked him.

"Because, Black Dranzer was not natural, she was extracted artificially from Dranzer, her counterpart. Kai was given Dranzer by his mother before she was killed. He had Dranzer for so long, that was the connection he couldn't build with Black Dranzer."

"You mean, if Kai had Black Dranzer from the start, he would've been able to control her?"

"Yes"

This revelation was the most surprising of all. Black Dranzer was indestructible, invincible, undefeatable, and also untamed…

Her power was so raw and magnificent, that if used the correct way, and to the extreme limits, she could destroy the whole world. It would take lesser than a microsecond for her to do so.

But.

There was no way to use her in such a manner, no human was able to control a power so enormous, no power to defeat it, to control it.

Except, her own opposite. If the power of Dranzer and Black Dranzer were ever brought close enough…

One shuddered to even think about that.

It had been a miracle that Kai, even though rightfully owned her, could not tame her, otherwise…

"That is all I have to say, my boys, and after that, I leave it to you to decide if Kai is at fault, if he really did betray you, or not. There's only so much I can tell you, but if you don't want to forgive him, I can't do anything against it. But I will definitely not let you blame him for something that wasn't even his fault in the first place," Mr. Dickenson's tone changed from warm to rigid, and they heard in it the care, the love he held for the bluenette.

There was really nothing that could be done to make the past better, but, there were infinite ways to make their present worth living.

As Mr. Dickenson said, it was not too late...